 | | Darling Harbor |
|  | | Sydney Opera House |
|  | | Anette on helicopter ride |
|  | | Bill and Anette prior to helicopter ride |
|  | | The Harbor Bridge |
|
|
 In September 2005 Bill and Anette had an opportunity to visit Sydney and Adelaide Australia as Bill had business meetings "down under". Sydney is about a 6 hour flight from Jakarta and Adelaide was a further 2 hour flight from Sydney. We spent 4 days in Sydney and 3 days in Adelaide. |
|  | | Australia Map |
|
|
 Where we stayed |  During our time in Sydney we stayed at the Observatory Hotel which was a quaint boutique hotel. The hotel is centrally located and very comfortable. We would recommend this hotel to anyone contemplating a visit to Sydney. |
| Sydney Harbor |  The majority of our time in Sydney centered around the harbor. One day we took a 2 1/2 hour harbor boat tour with Captain Cook Cruises. We were surprised at actually how large the Sydney Harbor is. During our boat tour we only covered a fraction of the harbor. According to the tour commentator the Sydney Harbor is the world's second largest harbor. There are numerous bays and coves along the harbor with many residences with fantastic views (and correspondingly high real estate values).
The highlight of our time in Sydney was a 30 minute helicopter tour we took of the Sydney Harbor and surrounding areas with Sydney Helitours. The day we took the helicopter tour the weather was fantastic with clear blue skies (as you can see in the photo to the right) which really made for some great photographic opportunities. To see Sydney from the air really brought a different perspective of the city and we would recommend this tour to anyone visiting Sydney.
Circular Quay
We also spent time walking along Circular Quay which is the hub of the Sydney Harbor, situated at a small inlet called Sydney Cove, the founding site for Sydney and Australia. At Circular Quay there were many street performers, restaurants and shops to check out. |
|
|
Sydney Dining |  In addition to beautiful scenery Sydney also has some fantastic dining opportunities. We've included comments on the more memorable restaurants that we visited during our visit which mostly included seafood dining.
On one night we had a wonderful dinner at The Pier Restaurant at Rose Bay with nice panoramic views of the waterfront. This restaurant has been consistently rated Sydney's best seafood restaurant (read a restaurant review here). Our seafood dinner was excellent as was the service and ambience, albeit it was a little bit overpriced in my opinion for what you got (particularly the wine, you would think Australian wine would be moderately priced in Australia but this wasn't the case at this restaurant).
On another evening we had dinner at Nick's Seafood Restaurant at Darling Harbor/Cockle Bay Wharf. The seafood was as good as what we had at The Pier Restaurant but more moderately priced. Nick's is a more casual restaurant with more seating and therefore a little bit noisier so the ambience wasn't quite as nice as at The Pier. Overall between these two restaurants I would have to give the edge to Nick's based on value for your money, however, if you are looking for a more romantic ambience to celebrate a special occasion then you can't go wrong with a visit to The Pier.
One afternoon we visited the James Squire Brewhouse at King Street Wharf/Darling Harbor. We enjoyed a light meal of raw oysters and traditional fish and chips accompanied with a few pints of the local brewed beer. We sat outside and enjoyed nice views of the harbor and watched the activity of people on the wharf. Based on this single visit we would recommend a visit to this microbrewery/restaurant if in Sydney. However based on some of the negative comments at a Sydney restaurant review website we are uncertain if we just got lucky on the day of our visit or if improvements have been made since these individuals made the negative comments about this establishment (or even worse, maybe our standards are sub-par!). In any event, we enjoyed the beer and food at this restaurant during our visit and it is ideally situated to enjoy the harbor views. |
|
Adelaide Visit |  Adelaide is the capital city of the Australian state of South Australia (follow this link for tourist info). With an approximate population of 1.1 million it is the largest city in South Australia and the fifth largest in Australia. Because of Bill's meeting schedule there wasn't much time for sightseeing, however, Anette was able to visit some of the markets in the CBD. Despite not having much time to sightsee our general impression of Adelaide was favorable. A short 25 minute drive in one direction from the Adelaide CBD are nice white sand beaches and a short distance in the other direction are rolling hills (I won't say mountains as they weren't that high) and wine country and further inland is the great outback. We hope to visit again and have more time to explore this part of Australia particularly the wine growing region. |
|
|
 | | Aerial view of Sydney Harbor |
|  | | Bill and Anette in front of Sydney Opera House |
|  | | Aerial view of Sydney Harbor |
|  | | Aerial view of Sydney Harbor |
|  | | Sydney street performer |
|
|
|
