Sydney, Australia – March 2

vintage beer poster

Clear, 35 degrees - HOT

I woke up in a new bed this morning…and a new room with lots of room. It’s interesting how the new room’s room is distributed. This room is more than twice the size of our last room, but other than the balcony, we won’t use much of the additional space – that’s not shy we decided to upgrade.

name seems apropos

whisky bar

 There isn’t a bedroom, but a bed ‘niche’ with 3 walls –either side of the bed is pretty narrow and we’re not very wide (although we are widening.) The bathroom is exactly the same size as our last smaller room. This is odd, the bathroom is OK for space, but on the tight side, considering how much extra room there is to work with, extra room in the bathroom would be great.

Anyway…I can’t wait for tomorrow’s sea day…my plan is to spend as much time as possible on the balcony! The weather isn’t supposed to be great, but I’ll force it.

vintage beer poster

Today’s activity was a walking tour of an area we were yesterday – ‘The Rocks’ - apparently Sydney’s

more stairs

birthplace dating back as far back as the late 1700s. There were only 10 of us including the guide on the tour today – perfect. A handful of pubs here all claim to be the oldest – depending on how you measure the oldest and what constitutes a pub.

We spent 2 hours with a guide wandering and listening to stories. After the tour we were very hot and in need of refreshment…we found a

Sydney's oldest pub, was Paul Hogan's local

pub. I had a delicious cider – cloudy and not at all sweet. We thought food would be a good idea too, but as it was Monday – the pub only served burgers…I’m not the biggest fan of burgers, so we split one…it was quite tasty…the fries were excellent too. We are on a hunt for a meat pie…we’ve been told Australian meat pies are a thing…but I’m not sure where they are a thing, because

so far we’ve found none – we had one in New Zealand that was delicious, another thing I’m

many to choose from

not usually a fan of, but maybe I’ve just not had the right meat pie or burger!?!

The guide took us to many very cool little nooks and crannies, each with a story, many of which I’m not sure were factual, but were fun to hear – we’ve learned to take all of what guides tell us with a huge grain of salt, but again…truthful or not…fun. Many of these hidden spots turned out to be bars that will be fun to explore more deeply on our next trip. We learned why Sydney’s pubs’ last

more stairs

call used to be 6PM and why there were ladies’ areas…won’t recount here…I’m sure it’s on the Google or maybe not?!? Many of the streets here are cobbled and there were lots

can't get enough of the skyline

of stairs – good for some exertion. We also learned to spot vintage beer posters outside many of the old pubs…what I walked ignorantly by yesterday, I today stopped to admire.

We learned from our guide that our ship is moored at an inconvenient dock because it is small enough to fit under the Harbour Bridge…if this is

burger and a pint

true, I think just because you’re big doesn’t mean you should get the best spot! It sure would have been more convenient to be able to walk off the ship and be right in town, like some of the big ships are – however, getting back and forth on a

more posters

shuttle is better that tendering, which we saw some ships doing.

The shuttle stop is about a 15-minute walk from The Rocks. On our way back the 35-degree heat, we had to

Luna Park - amusement park

stop for a pint…and one fish and chips…this time…the fries and the fish were only meh.