Rain, rain, go away, and STAY AWAY!

As you probably noticed, it's raining. Has been all day. The plan was to go to the beach and have a nice sunny day, but that obviously didn't work too well. Our backup, the Museum of Contemporary Art, is too far away to walk in the rain, so no luck there either... At least this way I have some time to bring you guys up to speed. But mainly this is going to be pictures:

This is the Central Business District, which is right on the waterside. Lots of Banks, all the expensive hotels like the Four Seasons, and of course the Opera House. It's very nice to just sit there and enjoy the view, but if you get hungry, I'd recommend going somewhere else.





The view from the Harbour Bridge is beautiful, except for a very, very strange building on the side facing the Opera House. People in that building seem to be turning to religion, but so would I if I lived there. Imagine lots and lots of these appartments all stacked on top of and beside each other, and you get a pretty good idea of the overall effect.

But who says you have to leave your house the way you found it? When you walk from Victoria Street (that's where we're staying) down to the water, you pass some kind of community building, which has been decorated by some very talented people.



 As I mentioned before, we all fell completely in love with the Royal Botanic Garden. It's right next to the Opera House and the Ferry Wharf, where we were headed when we got stranded. And of course you can see all the banks from there. By the way, the building with the weird construction on its roof on the left is the Deutsche Bank building.

At first look the Botanic Garden seems like any other park, although I have to admit the plants are a bit more exotic than anything you'd find in a German park. There are palm trees everywhere, and of course the ever-present eucalypts (minus the Koalas, so far, haven't seen any yet).



But then you turn a corner, and there's at least 10 cockatoos. We had been wondering what those huge white shapes in the trees were...







 There is one kind of tree in particular that I've fallen in love with here, and it's not even a native Australian tree (at least I think it isn't). It's the Jacaranda tree, and there's one of them in almost every front yard and in every park.



This picture was taken when we went on a ferry trip to Rose Bay. Sydney ferries are a very non-expensive alternative to a harbour cruise, because a ferry ticket costs as much as a bus ticket, and we happened to have a 7-day-ticket... So we took the ferry to Rose Bay (that was at around 7 pm), and since it was the last one for the day, we just stayed on and went right back. Of course we didn't get to see Rose Bay, but the views of the Harbour were the only thing we were after anyway, so...

I know it's cheesy and very touristy, but every time I see the Opera House I have to take a picture...

So that's Sydney, or at least some of it. Last Sunday we went on a trip to the Blue Mountains, the part of the Great Dividing Range that lies just past Sydney. They don't look very impressive from a distance, they're neither very high nor very steep, but once you enter them they're absolutely beautiful.

Once you get a way into the mountains, there is a little town called Katoomba, and it sits right on the edge of a truly spectacular valley of red cliffs and silvery green forest. Of course, as always happens, the pictures don't do it justice...





Right on the edge of town you can share a viewing platform with busloads of Japanese tourists, but it's absolutely worth getting yelled at in Japanese to get out of the f@$%#ing picture (of course they're very polite, I guess, but then I don't understand Japanese, and I'm sure that's what they would like to say) to see the Three Sisters.

Well, the rest really is just going to be pictures, because I have already taken so much time working on this post (I still have to figure out the finer points of tuning this, hopefully it will get better with time). Oh by the way, it's stopped raining. That's how long this is taking me...

Eucalypt tree

lots of Eucalypt trees

and one more...

the left side of the first Sister...

...and the right side

And even more trees - I really like those trees, if you haven't already noticed...

This is from another place called Wentworth Falls, and there are waterfalls to the left of this, but we didn't get to see them either (it would have been an hours walk to get to the bottom, so we didn't go), so why should you... And I know the cliffs look pretty much the same, but they are different ones, honestly!





Once more with the trees, but again, different trees, different place, and there really are a lot of them, if you hadn't already guessed. But they're really nice, and when you're walking through the forest in the sun it smells really good.

I guess I'll just get this baby on the way, this has already taken far too long. I started this post on Monday and it's Wednesday now...

See ya!

We've moved...

So we're at Sydney Central Backpackers now, and the internet connection is crap. I'm sitting in a shopping centre right now, where one hour costs 2$ (same as at the hostel), but it's quick, and it works all the time.  Gone are the times when we had unlimited internet access at all hours of the day.
Anyway, what I'm trying to say is: Updates are going to be a little less often...

We've been looking for cars, and it's frustrating as hell. The guys found a really cheap car the first day they were looking - they paid 650$ for a rust bucket and they had to take a four hour train ride to get it, but everything seems to be working, so... For us it's a little difficult, because we need a car that fits three. But we're going to get there eventually.

The hostel is pretty cool, it's more or less clean, but we did meet our first cockroach on our first night. Sadly, he died the next day... We'll miss him.
Unfortunately no pictures of the hostel OR the car yet, but I'll do my best to keep up.

The cockatoos at the Botanic Garden are at war with the pigeons.
No wonder, I mean who in their right mind likes pigeons...

One of the amazing things we discovered here was the Royal Botanic Garden. We were actually on our way to the Ferry Wharf and decided to take a shortcut through the Botanic Garden. But then we got stuck.



I've no idea what those are called, but they're beautiful, right?



There are incredible plants everywhere, cockatoos, parrots, other birds that I've never seen before... It's absolutely stunning, and you've got a view of the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House.



Harbour Bridge in the back, with the Opera House in the front.
This was taken from the Botanic Garden.

 I guess if I was living in Sydney, I'd probably spend most of my time here.

Well, this is it for now, running out of time, we still have to look for cars. But I'll see if we have free internet access at the next hostel, and maybe then there'll be a bit more.

So this is what happened next...

Ok, so yesterday we went to Sidney city centre. The plan was to take the train to Central Station, then walk to Chinatown and get an Australian SIM card for our phones, walk to the Australian Tax Office, get a Tax File Number, look for a bank, open a bank account, and then meet up with the guys at the Opera House. As plans go, it was pretty good...

The Chinatown part wasn't a problem. Well, the town part anyway. Try talking to a recently arrived Chinese woman who nevertheless manages to speak with an Australian accent. Between the three of us and the four of them we managed to get to the point where there was a SIM card in each phone. Minor glitches like the lack of a PIN when the phones were switched back on were soon overcome. E.T. phone home for 5 cents a minute from now on.

Getting to the ATO proved to be a tiny bit more difficult than we expected. First of all, walking there was not a good idea. It's a bloody big city, and even the tiny part between Central and the Opera House is quite big. So after what seemed like ages of walking, we decided to take a bus. The only question was which one to take...
When in doubt, ask a nice Australian. We found a lady who was not only willing to explain to us in detail which bus to take, where to get on, where to get off, and where to go next, but who also gave us a map and three cans of coke she happened to have in her handbag... This is a strange and wonderful country.

After that, finding the tax office was a piece of cake. We applied for our tax numbers and then decided to skip the bank, find something to eat and go to the Opera House. Now, trying to find a cheap place to eat in the harbour district isn't as easy as it sounds. We ended up at McDonald's, of all places. But for some reason the burgers taste like burgers here, not like cardboard, so it wasn't all bad.

By the way, the weather is, well, not what you would expect from Australia. Sure, it was warm when we left in Quakers Hill, but then at around 3 pm it started raining cats and dogs, and it cooled down quite a bit. Which we didn't expect, of course... Bad case of wrong clothes.

Anyway, we arrived at the Opera House early, so we decided to have a look inside. And let me tell you, the restrooms in that place are absolutely amazing! It's hard to describe, I'm going to have to go back sometime and take a picture, but it really was great. Marvin and Nico arrived soon after, and after what seemed like hours we finally decided to go look for a bar somewhere. We did eventually find one, where you could bet on sports and there was a video juke box, and we had our first Australian beer. And our second...

The reason we missed the last train back to Quakers Hill was not that we were drunk, because we weren't. We simply lost track of time and got a bit confused by the timetable... Well anyway, the last train was gone, and the first one in the morning was at 4am. Fortunately for us, the bar stayed open pretty late, so at least we had a place to stay. In the end, due to general undecidedness, we ended up missing the first train as well (by a few minutes), so we had to wait at Central for another hour. AND we missed our connecting train in Blacktown, because by that time we were so tired and exausted that we didn't find the right platform on time. But we got home all right, and that's all that matters, right?

Here we go...

Ok, so this is it. The Big Adventure. The Great Unknown. The... Oh, what the hell, we're in Australia, not at the end of the world. Although...

So anyway, getting here was... well, basically pretty boring. Long, long flights with an even longer stopover in Shanghai; crappy airplane food; chinese in-flight movies; and the wonderful staff at China Eastern, who apparently speak English, but in a way that drives non-Chinese speakers up the walls. The Chinese officials in Shanghai looked scary, so we mainly stayed in the terminal and tried to get some sleep on the extremely uncomfortable benches in the waiting area. We did however change some money (20 Euros, I think), and ended up with more Yuan than we could possibly spend in such a short amount of time. You can only eat so many packets of crisps in 7 hours...

Also quite scary: the architecture of Shanghai airport,
especially if...



...you are sitting in the departures hall.



Everything that's happened since the landing in Sydney has been pretty cool. The Australian customs officials were joking around - unlike the Chinese ones, who seemed constantly to be on the verge of arresting someone - and the whole overall atmosphere was just extremely relaxed.

We'll be staying at my aunt's brother's place for the first few days; him and his wife were kind enough to pick us up at the airport and give us food and shelter. Also loads of helpful advice.

So tomorrow we're going to start exploring. Apparently the train fare is cheaper if you start your trip after 9:00 am, so that's what we`re going to do. We're in a suburb, Quakers Hill, which is approximately 30 km outside of Sydney, but the train station is only about 3 minutes away. Getting into the city shouldn't be a problem.

I guess this is it for now, it`s a quarter to two in the morning and not that much has happened yet. Need Sleep. More updates when I have something to tell.
And by the way, this is my first ever post in a blog, so I hope it will get better with time.