Sydney Opera House

This is the only picture for the post this week. As you all read in the newsletter we attended the opera, The Gondoliers, by Gilbert and Sullivan, in the Sydney Opera House. At $58 per ticket we probably won't be doing that too often! If you look at the picture, our seats were in the shell shaped building to the right, in the very top of the point of the shell. That section on the right is one theater; the section on the left is another theaters. Then there are 3 more theaters behind. It is a very unique building. Our seats were in the last row of the theater in the balcony. It was a long way down to the stage!!! The performance was very good. They interjected some local humor into the dialogue including a quip about the horse flu which is devastating the racing industry in NSW (New South Wales). We enjoyed our day at the opera!

Sydney Tower and Wildlife World

Saturday P-Days are great. It gives us a chance to explore the wonderful city in which we live. Today we spent our time at the Sydney Tower, which is like the Space Needle in Seattle. It rises above Sydney from a huge mall in the middle of downtown. We took the ferry to Circular Quay and then the bus. As the driver told us where to get off, we looked up, saw the tower but no entrance. As we approached the entrance to the mall we saw signs that said the entrance to the tower was two levels up.

The view from the Tower is spectacular. The day was clear, the skies were brilliant blue and you could see for miles in every direction. There is a restaurant on top that serves a buffet lunch and dinner for the price of $46-$66 Aus. It is supposed to be very good. We opted the "cheap" lunch at the snack area which cost $25 Aus!!!



This picture shows the view of Darling Harbor and the path of the Parramatta River which winds to the right of the picture, towards the middle and the top. That is the direction in which we live. The ferry we take to downtown comes right down that river. We live 30 mintues away by ferry.

After lunch we walked 5 or 6 blocks to Darling Harbor where we visited Wildlife World. It is basically an indoor zoo of Australian animals, snakes, spiders, butterflies, lizards and birds. The koalas were our favorite. The snakes were pretty scary. Of the 10 most poisonous snakes in the world Australia has 5 or 7 of them. This country has beautiful birds. I could really become a bird watcher here!

This is a cassowary. It is a very large bird and is supposed to be the most dangerous bird in the world. It looks as tall as Dad. The colors on its head are beautiful.









This is a lorakeet. They are all over the place. Very common. We see them in the mornings when we walk. They feed on the berries of the trees. Sometimes they are hard to see but when they fly out of the trees you see their beautiful brilliant green wings. This picture was taken at Wildlife World.

















I took this picture last Saturday on my walk early in the morning.





Needless to say the koala bears are the cutest of all the Australian animals. By the time we got to see them they were all asleep. We had been told that they get drunk on the Eucalyptus leaves that they eat. Apparently that is not the case. The people there told us that their stomachs are very small and when they eat they have to sleep to digest their food because it takes so much energy.









Mama and baby sleeping!

Wallaby. These animals are the smaller version of the kangaroo. There were no kangaroos at the Wildlife World - only Wallabys.

These cuties are called skinks.






Hanging out with the Aborigines on Circular Quay!









Aborigines playing the didgeridoo. They really are quite a sight when they are all painted up. You can see the harbor bridge in the background. All in all it was a fun day with interesting sites.

APEC Weekend trip to Dubbo

Friday morning we took off for our first trip to the "bush" outside of Sydney. First we drove about 30 minutes from our flat to the countryside home of Edna and Alan Watson. Edna is a half blooded Aborigine and they own a "mom and pop" souvenier shop out of their garage. Alan carves bowls, snakes, boomerangs and didgeriedoos out of wood; Edna is a painter and decorates them or does her own Aborigine paintings.

After our visit there we drove into the Blue Mountains, so named because there is often a blue mist over them formed from the Eucalyptus trees. On the way we passed Richmond Air Force Base which is an Australian base with a US presence. There on the tarmac was Air Force One as big as life. President Bush flew into Richmond to attend the APEC meeting.We travelled through the Blue Mountains passing the ZigZag Railroad station. This is a steam engine train ride into the mountains. The seniors will be riding it in October. They also have certain Saturdays when they run a Thomas engine and also a Harry Potter train with everyone dressed up as wizards. The Saturday we are going won't be either one of those.

We stopped off at Walls Lookout to view Pierces Pass.

We arrived at Dubbo around 4 pm and went straight to the Jedda Boomerang shop to see their boomerangs. Haemish, who owns the shop is supposed to be an expert in boomerangs. The shop was closed but after waiting about 30 minutes he returned. We enjoyed seeing his place. It was different, that's for sure.





This Sulpher-crested Cockatoo was in a cage at the Jedda Boomerang shop. Kids: This is a hint to one of the birds in the newsletter!

He got way excited when you rattled his cage!

We travelled with two other couples and because we joined the group late we could not stay in Dubbo. Everything was booked so we had to stay in Narromine, 30 minutes away. This was our Motor Inn - comparable to a Motel 8. The people were very nice.



On Saturday we spent the day at the Great Western Zoo in Dubbo. It has over 1000 animals, they are in their natural state and most are not caged but are out in the open. See if you can identify these animals! I am posting our favorites.
Kids: see if you can identify the ones that are in the newsletter! One of the pictures was not at the Zoo but was at the Aquarium.

Camel




Sleeping Hippo










Otter









Echidna

Petting Susy, the wombat.

Cheetah












Koala Bear





After church we drove home via the Blue Mountains, stopping at Katoomba, a quaint town where the Three Sisters rock formation can be seen. We had a great weekend!