Sydney, Day 1 ...

I was so excited the entire flight from Wellington to Sydney that I just stared out the window for something ridiculous like 5 hours.

This is what it looked like most of the time:

And then as we got closer it looked more like this:

And then we were at yet another airport with all that damn luggage:

So much luggage that our shuttle was a little cramped,

although nothing could cramp Naoko & Kazumi's style:

We got to our first hotel in Australia and it was amazing. Actually it wasn't a hotel at all, we had rented a suite apartment on the 50th floor of the Meriton building located in the center of downtown Sydney. I felt like I was in some sort of fairy tale, seriously. I spent at least a good ten minutes in awe of how amazing my life is.

The view of downtown Sydney at night, from our terrace (that wrapped all the way around our apartment):

After the six of us got settled into our three bedroom apartment Daniel and I had dinner plans with some friends. It still amazes me sometimes that I have the most amazing friends strung out all over the world and I have people to get together with in damn near every big city across the globe. Sydney was one of those places. We had people to see. We met up with Alan and Lauren for dinner downtown at a German bar with really, really bad karaoke. That was half of the fun. :)

The 4 of us:

Downtown Sydney, from the pier:

Since we were already downtown, we walked to the pier to get a view of the Harbour Bridge (barf) and up to the Opera House. Even in the dark it is amazingly beautiful. The Opera House, definitely NOT the bridge, although I did manage to look at it and even take a few pictures without having an anxiety attack. That's progress. :)

The Harbour Bridge at night:

Here's a quick 411 on the Opera House: "The Sydney Opera House is located in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Based on the competition winning entry by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, the Sydney Opera House is one of the world's most distinctive 20th century buildings, and one of the most famous performing arts venues in the world.
The Sydney Opera House is situated on Bennelong Point in Sydney Harbour, close to the Sydney Harbour Bridge. The building and its surroundings are one of the best known icons of Australia.
As well as many touring theatre, ballet, and musical productions, the Opera House is the home of Opera Australia, the Sydney Theatre Company and the Sydney Symphony."

The Opera House at night (I wish I had a better camera):

I was most surprised by the fact that the building is actually 3 separate buildings with 5 different performances spaces. Who knew? In most printed pictures it looks like one large structure.

See?:

"The Sydney Opera House is an expressionist modern design, with a series of large precast concrete 'shells', each taken from a hemisphere of the same radius, forming the roofs of the structure. The Opera House covers 1.8 hectares (4.5 acres) of land. It is 183 metres (605 ft) long and about 120 metres (388 ft) wide at its widest point. It is supported on 588 concrete piers sunk up to 25 metres below sea level. Its power supply is equivalent for a town of 25,000 people. The power is distributed by 645 kilometres of electrical cable."
Maybe I was most surprised by the actual texture of the outside of the building. It looks kind of like bathroom tiles & feels just the same.
'The roofs of the House are covered with 1,056,006 glossy white and matte cream Swedish-made tiles, though from a distance the tiles look only white. Despite their self-cleaning nature, they are still subject to periodic maintenance and replacement." That's a lot of tiles.
More daytime pictures to come. After all, at this point I've only been in Sydney for about 4 hours. This entire trip is about making the most of your time. :)

much love

-tara-

xx