Sydney - Part 1

The rest of the visit with my family in New Zealand was fantastic. During another week and a bit, we traveled on from Mount Doom to Wellington, across the strait to the South Island, spent a few days in Abel Tasman National Park, saw the seals in Kaikoura, and finished up with some time in Christchurch. But now that my family is back in Canada and full of stories, people are asking what I did for the rest of the break. Prepare to be regaled with weeks and weeks worth of my experiences in the Land Down Under.

After a fantastic time in New Zealand, my family had to go back to Canada (claiming to have lives outside of paradise). I was on my own again, but with another month before school started. I had no idea when I'd be back in the area, and with New Zealand crossed off my travel list, I had plans to see some of Australia as well. On the 5th of January, I landed in Sydney, New South Wales. In my opinion, Australia is known for two things things primarily: the outback and convicts. One gets shoved down your throat (Kangaroos! Ayers Rock! Bushwalking!), but the other isn't mentioned all that much in Australia itself.

After the Boston Tea Party, the British needed some other place to store their less-desirables. A companion of Captain Cook remembered how nice Botany Bay (KHAN!) in Australia had looked, and with France and Russia showing interest in the South Pacific, the British liked the idea of a permanent claim in the region. By the way, No one knows why Cook named the area New South Wales. He had originally named it "New Wales," which he corrected in his journal by adding "South." He had never personally been to any part of Wales, what did he have against the North?

Unfortunately, Cook had glimpsed Botany Bay in the very very...very short time of the year during which it appears to be a paradise. When Britain's "First Fleet" of convicts and soldiers arrived, they weren't too pleased with what they found. Thus in 1788, Arthur Phillip changed their plans, and they all settled at Sydney Cove instead.

When I got there, I wasn't sure how Sydney Harbour was any better. It was hot! I know, brr everyone is cold in Canada and I'm whining about how hot it was. But it was pushing 40 degrees, so I'm not a complete baby. Gum trees, naturally packed with oil, were just bursting into flames. It was the beginning of "forest fire season." Dragons had returned to rule the earth. It was HOT!

To begin to pay off the haircut debt I had racked up in ten months without a snip, I got another haircut to accompany the one I got in New Zealand, then I began to wander. As Lisa can attest to from the list of European cities we traveled through together, it takes me about a day to orient myself. After that, my sense of direction leads me through every street and subway junction a city can throw at me.

It's OK to be jealous about how cool I look

I wandered to the ferry junction, and saw a sign for the zoo. Now I had seen Australian animals before, but never IN Australia. Technically, this was my chance. I figured, just in case I didn't see any kangaroos, wombats, koala, or platypie (yum) later, I should stack my deck by checking out Sydney's zoo. And, now an expert in the quirks of NZ's freak animal the kiwi, I was hoping to learn what made the platypus so wierd.

The Zoo is on a hill, and you can take a bus ride to the top and then work your way through the exhibits downhill to the exit. This sounded like a brilliant idea, but after the bus dropped my off I wandered up and down staring clueless at the map trying to find the wombat house (takes me a day to directionalize, no less). At least the Taronga Zoo had it all. I entered the kangaroo pen, then immediately panicked. Evidently I had made a wrong turn and entered the "keepers area," because there were no fences separating me from the person-tall monsters. There was me, a couple feet of air, and then a lazy kangaroo. And then there was an emu approaching from the other side. But no, this was the set up, fenceless. I worked my way through, fighting a mental battle to not abuse the zoo's trust by trying to find out just how good kangaroos were at boxing/hugging.

Do the emus have large talons?

In this picture, it looks like I actually shouldn't be in here, but I swear it was allowed! No fences!!

There was everything I was looking for, plus wallabies, penguins, echidnas, and crocodiles. A very informative poster a little ways away from a seven metre crocodile (surrounded by so-clean-I-was-afraid-it-wasn't-there glass) taught me everything I needed to know about underwater death. I learned to: Check the water for crocodiles carefully - they can look like floating logs. If in doubt, do not swim or use small boats. Crocodiles can leap out of the water; to be safe, do not lean over the edge of a boat when fishing. Crocodiles learn the movements of their prey; do not return to the same spot repeatably. Life lessons, all.

I even got a little video of the platypus, the squirmiest swimmer in the animal kingdom, dazed after accidentally swimming into the oh so hot sun.

And of course all that other stuff - the usual African and Asian animals, and ice cream. Then I was back on the ferry to wander Sydney some more.