Sydney is perhaps the city closest to perfection. It is logically planned, has mild climate year round, captivating architecture, incredible beaches and wonderful night scene. Its main quality, however are the people.
Segments of the mandarin, that inspired the architect of this Opera House
I am now officially in love with Sydney. It is a perfect city. The downtown is clean and extremely well organised with hyper-modern transport system, which other large metropolises can only strive to achieve, elegant architecture and beaches. I can also spend several pages praising the climate!
Favourite spots:
Manly, passage
Manly, near which I was staying, is a pleasant place with many bars and restaurants and wonderful beach fringed with shade giving trees. Some of the bars, right on the beachfront street have terraces, which are splendid for people watching and beach life contemplation. I must say, that although I might have been influenced by my friend, I believe that Manly has a specific character, which makes me long for Sydney and possibly want to move there.
Bondi Beach in a completely different part of Sydney is more of an open area beach curved in a shape of a croissant. There are no trees there and the bars are far from the sand disallowing for a good beach viewing. The road between the beach is also much busier that the one in Manly. The scenery however is slightly better due to the vicinity of picturesque cliffs. Nevertheless, I liked it less. I can be biased, but hey, I just want to comply with the rule.
What's really great:
There was a specific element I loved about Sydney – it was the people. I have to say that for a large city like that, I was astonished with the number of very friendly people. One cannot say the same about Paris and definitely not about London or New York, where the vast majority of the population are selfish and backstabbing bastards. In Sydney, from the very first handshake, it is clear that people are genuinely friendly.
Sights:
The Harbour Bridge
I wanted to climb the Harbour Bridge, but I did not realised that this activity must be booked well in advance. There was no room for me on that day. Instead, I went on a walk across the bridge and on the way back I picked up a ferry to the Circular Quay.
Circular Quay was hosting an open-air painting workshop. Many artists from around country and abroad came with their palettes and canvases to compete on a subject of the day – Sydney’s Circular Quay. Some of the work was really good and revolutionary, particularly those that did not rigidly stick to the subject. Some of the others were rather mediocre, but I understand the competition was open and simply anyone was welcome to enter, and many amateurs must have done.
The sun was going down and the street lanterns and restaurants’ windows kept reflecting the majestic shape of the Sydney Opera House. Its roof was changing colour as the sunrays kept hitting it at a different angle as the evening progressed.
Accommodations:
First time I came to Sydney, I stayed at my friend's in Manly. The second time, when I came on business, I was lucky to discover the Hilton hotel downtown.
Nightlife:
The first one we went in was almost directly on the beach. It was packed with very funny people but disappointedly it closed at midnight. I could not believe that something would actually close so early on a Saturday night in Sydney. I was thwarted but my friends said not to worry because there were loads of other places we could and rather should go to.
We stood in a queue to one of the clubs but quickly got impatient and went to check some other place. It was a large club with a few bars and a decent size dance floor. It was immensely packed and the music was simply great.
Hangouts:
There were three parks in central Sydney that I loved.
Restaurants:
By the Rocks, along the road going over the famous bridge, there was this magical Thai restaurant. It was reasonably priced massively popular!
Other recommendations:
My friend and I were hoping to see kangaroo hopping in the park. They are known to show themselves in the area quite frequently. I did not have much luck though and I could not see any.
That was the National Park of Ku-Ring-Gai Chase, some 15 kilometres north of Sydney. The park gives great views towards the Palm Beach and Broken Bay. It also boasts great walking trails in the bushland, some of which lead to several sites of Aboriginal Rock Engravings.
Palm Beach is an area of luxurious housing, occupied by celebrities and obscenely rich people. Broken Bay would provide excellent swimming but it in fact it does not due to sharks.
On the way to the park and back I learnt several rules of Sydney. One of them is to hate either Manly or Bondi. If you live in Manly, you do not go to Bondi and vice versa. This is a golden rule and there is currently no need to seek origins of it. You are just expected to comply. That’s it.
del.icio.us
Digg this
