Work and travel

The last few days have been a little bit less eventful than the first couple, but still I’ve been keeping quite busy. Yesterday I went on a trip to Bondi Beach, which is probably the most popular beach in entire New South Wales (the province where Sydney lies in, which is about 20 times as big as The Netherlands). Though the weather was not that great there was still a tropical atmosphere and there were quite some people surfing. 

I couldn't let you miss out on a nice beach picture

Also; I’ve finally seriously started job hunting, and succesfully: Tomorrow will be my second day as a mover, carrying  boxes into trucks. Now, this may sound as the most boring, bad work you’d ever want to do, but it’s better than an office job with nice weather and when you’re working with Scots and Irish it’s actually quite a lot of fun. And also, it pays about a 150$ dollars a day which makes the whole trip a little bit more affordable. It may sound like a crazy amount, but things here are quite expensive as well: 

6 bucks for a can of orange juice. This was one of the cheaper ones.

As for travel, I’m planning to fly up to Cairns within two weeks at the most. Cairns is a bit smaller town (a little bigger than Enschede) but it’s much more in the north (warmer climate even, yay!) and there’s a lot to see there. What's pretty cool is that I got tons of info from my roommates who just finished backpacking through Oz and are going home this weekend, so now I know what's really worth visiting and what I could skip if I run out of time. The things I’m looking forward to most are a dive at the Great Barrier Reef and a trip into the jungle, which are ofcourse two things that are unique and nothing alike can be found in entire Europe (and for the Great Barrier Reef, the whole planet). After Cairns the plan is to then slowly travel down back to Sydney since the return flight leaves from there. 

The Great Barrier Reef, seen from the air

Manly walk!

And no; not meaning there is a specific way to walk manly :P

Manly is an area lying nearby the heart of Sydney and is only really (from the center of Sydney) reachable by ferry. I went there yesterday to, yeah well, just to walk around actually. This because my travel guidebook (which I’ve really, REALLY grown to love, thanks for the tip, Thijs) described it as very relaxed and having some good scenic walking routes. 

The Manly wharf

It was indeed very pretty, but because of my lack of planning and information-gathering my walk turned out to be an 6 hour long one. Nevertheless it was totally worth it and I don’t regret not having taken the buss to the look out spots as the weather was lovely and there was lots to see. To give you an impression of the beauty of the surroundings of Manly: 

One of the many small but beautiful beaches

The cliffs of Manly seen from the Fairfax lookout

What also definitely lengthened my walk is my bad orientation skills (thanks, dad), and though the GPS on my phone has never been so much appreciated, the locals here were also really nice and helpful in finding my way around. It actually happened twice that I was standing somewhere looking on my map when somebody called out to me “Are you lost mate? Let me help ya” and helped me back on track.

It wan’t until sundown that I had made my way back to the wharf and could catch a ferry back to central Sydney, but this did make for a perfect picture opportunity of the Sydney Harbour Bridge:

The Sydney Harbour Bridge by sundown

Furthermore, I’ve mostly been exploring bits of the city. One thing I’ve come to realize is how mad expensive Sydney is. Paying 4$ for a cup of coffee is the standard; no matter whether you’re in a touristic area or not. Speaking of coffee: I had the best cup of coffee ever (and for those who know me; I'm quite a critic on coffee) at the Barefoot coffee traders.

As for today; yesterday was definitely a lot more fun: I spent the day mostly practical, having a job interview, setting up a bank account, planning further travels, and preparing to move to a different hostel. The rest of the week I’m planning to fill with more fun things, but that’ll come in the next post!

Day 2

 

So the second day; or my first being active and no longer zombie-like, turned out entirely different then I had expected. The plan was at first to look at my travel guidebook and just see something interesting. As I walked out of the hostel looking for a supermarket however, there was a girl who was looking for the same thing. As we together looked around for the supermarket (and found it within 5 minutes, yay :D) we started talking and I found out that there was a free city tour organized by the hostel! Naturally, I went along, and it took up most of the rest of the day. But, I did see some pretty amazing things and now I know what I want to visit again and see more closely.

In front of the Sydney Opera House: which is really, REALLY beautiful!

As we went along the tour, I came to realize something that I actually already expected: Sydney is a really beautiful city. We went past chinatown, the docks, through the central business district, past the Sydney Opera House, the botanical gardens, and lots of other small (but really nice) buildings and statues. What’s really nice about Sydney, and what you don’t immediately notice, is that it is really clean and that there are no obvious signs of poverty (no beggars or anything).

Also the atmosphere is pretty relaxed, people just never seem to be in a hurry (nobody really goes through red lights, compare that to Amsterdam :p). It’s also visible in other things:

"Closing time? What do you mean? We're just open 'til late!"

Along the tour I met some nice people, it’s really easy to get to talk with people as most people travel on their own or with one other person. Everybody asks each other all kinds of questions (Where the hell is the supermarket!? Do you know how to use the wi-fi?  Could you watch my bags for a minute?) and it’s just impossible to not-talk to people. After we got back, we sat down in the bar at the hostel and had a couple beers together, though it was really nice I ALREADY miss Grolsch so much!

Having a couple beers in the bar at the hostel

The first day

Finally; after 27 long hours of flying and waiting I’m finally in Sydney and I don’t have to travel anymore. I have my luggage, I made it through customs (although a dog sniffed at me and they took me to some back room to further inspect my bags, and asked me very seriously "Are you carrying drugs sir?") and I can now go to my hostel and all I have left to do is stay awake for a bit so I won’t get too jet lagged :).

Or that’s what I was hoping for when I got through customs. Trying the ATM to get some money, apparently my bankcard isn’t working here. Seriously, not having any money whatsoever is a nightmare if you’re just arriving at the airport(nothing to drink if you’re thirsty/eat if you’re hungry, no way of getting to your hostel). After trying a ton of things and even getting advice from a local bank I decided to just walk to the hostel, with all my luggage. Having to walk for 15 kilomters with all your luggage is NOT something you want to do after a flight like that, believe me :p

However, there are also some advantages of my walk (I thought this up trying to cheer myself up when I was seriously pissed off of walking :p I didn’t know exactly how to get to the hostel and it took me nearly 4 hours):

-          I feel like a bad-ass because I walked 15 kilometers with all my luggage after flying

-          I saved 15$ by walking

-          I’ve already seen quite a bit of the town which I otherwise never would have

Once arrived at the hostel I remembered a news article I read a while ago stating that the Rabobank was going to turn off world-use of all bank cards automatically. At the hostel they allowed me to use wi-fi, and I managed to turn my bankcard on for Australia and the whole problem was solved:

 I never really had to walk.