Good morning everyone! Sorry this post is up a little later than usual, by the time I sorted through all my pictures last night, I decided to just head off to bed, instead of getting the post up! Now I'm feeling rested though, so here goes! Had an absolutely fantastic time hanging out in Watson's Bay yesterday, it was one of the most gorgeous places I've ever been too. After taking a bus down to the Circular Quay (there was the cutest family with two little kids who kept trying to press the "STOP" buttons, much to the horror of their parents), and then we took a twenty minute ferry from the Quay over to Watson's Bay. Even the ride over was spectacular, it's always great to have an excuse to get to see the harbour from the water! The strange thing was, I took the fantastic photo of the city there as we were leaving, and by the time we were halfway across the bay, we looked back and saw Sydney was absolutely engulfed in rain clouds! It looked like the apocalypse, but was incredibly cool! The rest of the day we had to deal with the same moments of absolute sunshine followed by intense rain showers the next. It was really funny, and you can see in the pictures in the slideshow the weather switching back and forth.
When we arrived at Watson's Bay, we immediately spotted Doyle's (the very famous Sydney seafood restaurant known for their fish and chips), so we decided to grab some lunch while we were down there. At first we didn't realize that the building we went to was Take Away Only (which is what we wanted anyway), but we'd been told that there was a sit down restaurant about three times the price, which we eventually found just a little bit down the beach. It looked super cute, but we stuck with our Take Away and each got some fish and chips! Despite not being huge on fish, it was actually really good! Yummm! We did have to stare down quite a lot of seagulls that kept circling the area, but other than that we managed to enjoy our lunch in peace, and watch all the dogs playing around in the dog park we were sitting in! Right as we finished eating the rain started pouring down, so we caught a lucky break that we were able to enjoy our lunch without the rain ruining it! We decided to hang out under an awning and get our bearings while we waited for the rain to stop.
After lunch we headed up to Sydney Harbour National Park, where the Gap is. a series of cliffs overlooking the ocean. Even with the slightly rainy looking clouds at this point, it was absolutely gorgeous. We spent a while wandering around the bluffs and taking all the trails, some of which took us into some very tropical looking areas. It was very peaceful to stand at the top of the cliffs and overlook the waves crashing below, and the large expanse of ocean in front of us. Unfortunately, the spot has a bit of a dark past, as a ship wrecked here once, leaving only one survivor, and, more recently, it has become known as a suicide spot, so many handrails have been put in place to make this more difficult. Very sad, but the spot itself is absolutely beautiful. In some of the readings I've been doing for class, this is a place where many travelers first landed in Sydney, and it really must have been an impressive site. I took a bit of video, to give everyone an idea, but keep forgetting to flip my camera, so it came out the annoying vertical way. Sorry about that! Also it started to rain a bit as I was taking it, but you get the idea!
At the end of the trail, we found a delightful little (and surprisingly empty!) beach, and the sun had come back out, so we splashed around by the water for a little bit, and looked at Sydney, which could be seen on the horizon. There was a cute little dock we sat on for a bit looking down into the water, before we decided to head down another one of the National Park's paths, which was supposed to take us to Hornby Lighthouse. Right as we were climbing the hill, it started to rain, and we looked behind us back down to the beach, and saw the most gorgeous full arc rainbow sitting over Watson's Bay. It was so beautiful, and I've included it in the slideshow!
After taking cover when another bout of rain hit, we eventually found the cute little striped lighthouse (and one of three legal nude beaches in the Sydney area, which we quickly abandoned when we discovered there was one lone, older man on the beach, not exactly what we wanted to see). The lighthouse was very charming, as was the area around it, with more cliffs to look at. We were shocked to see a man fishing way down below at the bottom of the cliffs, and have no idea how he got there. I was a little concerned he was going to be swept away by all the crashing waves! More frightening was when we saw a little boy almost wander off a cliff (as this area had barely any handrails), when his parents weren't quite paying attention. Really scary, but he was okay in the end! We saw some very tropical birds on our walk back which reminded us just how different Australia is from home, and got to see the Dunbar Anchor (of the ship that wrecked here many years ago). Right as we were about to leave the biggest downpour yet started, so we ran for the ferry, and rode back very cold and soaked.
We had originally been hoping to see the last night of Vivid, but it was just too rainy outside, so we ended up staying in and doing our readings for homework instead. I made myself a delicious Greek salad and some breaded chicken, which turned out quite nicely, so I was proud of myself. Even better, we remembered that it was Elimination Night for House Rules, and our least favorite couple was eliminated! Woohoo! Successful night here in Sydney! I need to head off and get dressed for class now, but feel free to flip through the slideshow, there are some really pretty shots of Watson's Bay in there! I'll hvae another update tonight after class! Goodbye everyone!