Monday morning started with a flat white from a local café…
Then we found “Dory” who took us out to the Blue Mountains for a walk in the bush.
Dory is a car.
Before we left Doha, I registered us for the “GoGet” carshare service in Sydney. It was very convenient, and a lot cheaper than renting a car for the whole week. All we had to do was activate our membership pack that we picked up on the day we arrived, and then we called and reserved a car the same morning we needed it. The service has cars parked all over the city. The agent on the phone then located the closest available car to us, and then voila! We used the smartcard in the membership pack to unlock the car and were on our way.
The agency keeps track of the cars by naming them- Dory was a practical Yaris. We opted for “her” and not for Cassidy, the Audi.
The drive took about 2 hours, and we stopped along the way at a grocery store and got sandwich fixings for an impromptu picnic while hiking.
Originally, our plan was to visit “Scenic World,” a theme park basically built into the mountains with a roller coaster going in and out of the hills. But upon pulling up, we noticed just the line to buy tickets looked to be about an hour wait. It was a trap! So we skipped it and just made our own adventure by hiking around Katoomba Falls.
The walk was nice and the area was really pretty, but even the hiking trails were crowded. And by crowded I mean, busloads of foreign tourists with every photo taking gadget available stopping, shooting, selfie-sticking, repeating.
Nonetheless, we had a good time, and it was nice to get some exercise and out of the city for the day.
To treat ourselves for our strenuous walk, we stopped and got gelato on the way home at “The Cow and the Moon.”
That evening we played it pretty low key- took a nap, then got take out burritos and took them over to the Sydney Observatory lawn. It was the perfect place to watch the sunset, and we liked it so much we returned there again on our last day. I was a mess and spilled my burrito all over my dress, but luckily it was black!
Afterwards we went to 2 pubs located in the “Rocks,” a historic part of Sydney located close to the Sydney Bridge. There was a super drunk man who looked like Santa Claus at the second one and he would shout “Anchorman”-esque comments to people walking by. My favorite was “Ahh a bevy of beauties!” to a group of girls who looked like they were about 15.
And then home for the night to rest up for a busy day of culture on Tuesday.
Hollers in the 'ha 