The Harbor City just might steal this Seattle girl’s heart, and trust me the Emerald City is no slouch when it comes to scenic beauty. Back home, I’d still be bundled in the puffer coat and wool socks right now, but here I’m rocking my Judy Dench Best Exotic Marigold Hotel linen pants (Goodwill, $1) and clutching the sunscreen bottle closely (don’t leave home without it, our hotel attendant admonished us first thing).
This just might be my favorite cruise port yet; what’s not to like? Just steps from our hotel’s front door, the Sydney Opera House’s white sails and the Harbor Bridge hover over little ferryboats puttering back and forth from wharfs to outer islands and coastal beaches. And right next door, the Royal Botanical Gardens provide miles of meandering trails for us
to explore (we walked eight miles yesterday!). If there’s something we don’t like, it’s that we only have two days left to pick from a million activities before we leave. Retired person’s cruising dilemma, truly.
Each day, we’ve watched cruise ships pull in (6:00 am) and out again (7:00 pm), so the Quay is a rather joyous place, cruisers celebrating as they leave for or return from their cruise trips. Last night we found ourselves in the ferry-and-train nightly outward-bound commute, and even the locals seem buoyant here. The ladies in particular are very well dressed, and I’m impressed by the top-level fashion on parade.
Most ladies here seem to be tall, athletic, and – shall I say it – very tough, like Jade Hameister, a 16-year old Aussie skier who just completed the Polar Hat Trick by transversing the North Pole, South Pole, and Greenland ice sheet, the youngest person ever to do so. Taunted by internet trolls to ‘make me a sandwich’ after a girl-empowerment TED talk, she made one, posting a South Pole selfie with the sandwich and taunted the trolls back: “I made you a sandwich (ham & cheese), now ski 37 days and 600 kilometres to the South Pole and you can eat it.” Oh, that just rocks.
When Padre dropped our hotel key down the gutter under the Opera House, we didn’t even panic in this laid-back place, and the nicest Australian gentleman stopped to help. Card retrieved, we set out to make the Harbor City our own, and I kept a lookout for a cat, of course (mission accomplished! I found a history cat, much better than just any old cat!).
Padre still hasn’t found something fabulous for his crypt section, but I bet our Australian Museum visit tomorrow will be just his ticket. I hear its skeleton section includes a cozy domestic scene of a man by the hearth with his dog. That is, the man’s skeleton and the dog’s skeleton, sitting by the hearth. That’s Padre’s kind of thing (For more about why, read our About section).
In keeping with my Judy Dench theme, I chose an oh-so-proper British hotel, The Sir Stamford at Circular Quay, for our stay. We’re not stuffy or proper most of the time (any of the time?) but we absolutely love this hotel’s sedate Old World charm: of course the first thing our greeter offered us was tea after our late-night arrival. Upon our return from long walks on the hot Sydney streets, we sat down to sip lemon-scented iced water in plush leather chairs scattered among the hotels’ antique furnishings and museum paintings, classical music playing in the background. The hotel staff doesn’t seem to care that we’re bumpkins, and unfailingly treat us like royalty. So it’s easy to feel at home here.
And bumpkins tend to be thrifty, so we snagged a hotel deal by booking way early (highly recommend because Sydney is so popular). We also rode the ferry to Manly on a Sunday, when transportation costs to anywhere (including the far-off Blue Mountains, even) are capped at $2.60 (about $2 US).
Cruisers who are only in port for a day should not hesitate to take the ferry to Manly, which everyone I asked says is the best day trip if you can only do one. It’s a half-hour each way, spectacular views everywhere, and at the Manly end we found two lovely beaches: The smaller, family-friendly Manly Cove, and the crowded but wondrous Manly Beach, which stretched out far into the distance. At Manly Beach we set our towels down on an uncrowded patch, and Padre discovered why it was less crowded when the lifeguard came by to warn him of the treacherous surf in
that section. So Padre didn’t wade out very far. (He doesn’t swim, people. I may have been a lifeguard in my younger days, but I’m just going to scream if he gets in trouble and he better hope those lifeguards are good!)
Sydney is cheap person’s heaven because many museums (not all) are free, including the charming Manly Art Museum. We found the current student art exhibit as fine as any top-end museum offerings we’ve seen recently. (Hey. Even bumpkins go to art museums. Art is for everyone). Each entry was accompanied by an explanation of the artist’s inspirations. If their art is any indication,
these Aussie kids care deeply about the future of our planet and its inhabitants – it gives us hope!
We also took a great free walking tour, where all you pay is a tip, if you want to, which of course we did. Our excellent guide Lili showed us places to go and things to see we never would have known about, like the easy-to-miss free entrance steps to the walkway over the Harbor Bridge. Today we’re taking the three-hour ‘free’ bus tour (you pay transportation costs – $18Aussie/ $14 US +tip), and oh heck, we might take the ferry back to Manly in the evening for the sunset views. It’s cheap, even when it’s not a Sunday – daily costs are capped at $16. One note: Make sure you take the local ferry, not the fast ferry (costs way more), unless you’re really in a hurry, which you shouldn’t be because you’ll miss the smashing views.
And then there’s my history cat. Trim’s owner, Matthew Flinders, literally put Australia on the map when he led the first circumnavigation of Australia and identified it as a continent.
Today you’ll find statues of Flinders and his beloved cat all over Australia and Great Britain. Named after the loyal butler in the novel Tristram Shandy, Trim was a cat that knew how to swim. When he fell overboard (which he did frequently) he would scramble back up the ropes and rigging to safety, to the delight of Flinder and his crew.
Trim survived a shipwreck with Flinders, and kept the shipwrecked men entertained for months with his mischievous cat antics. Flinders immortalized his beloved kitty with an oft-quoted epitaph, part of which says: “Thus perished my faithful intelligent Trim! The sporting, affectionate and useful companion of my voyages during four years. Never, my Trim, ‘to take thee all in all, shall I see thy like again’, but never wilt thou cease to be regretted by all who had the pleasure of knowing thee.” I could say the same thing about all the past cat (and dog) companions that have been a part of my life over the years.
So we’re about to start another packed day, and as I’m writing this I can see from our balcony that another cruise ship has just pulled in. It’s the Voyager of the Seas, the third Royal Caribbean ship to pull up to the pier. Thursday it will be a Princess ship, our very own Diamond Princess, and we’ll join the happy throng of departing cruise ship passengers ourselves. Can’t wait to meet all the people we’ve come to know online the last few months as we prepped for this trip, but I’ll miss the lovely Sir Stamford (and its bathtub. I know. How spoiled can you get?).
You make the trip come alive with your write-ups – wish I were with you
We wish you were here too; wouldn’t that be fun?
Sydney is one of the best cities we’ve visited. It is beautiful, well cared for by the Sydneysiders, as they call themselves. It’s easily walkable with many lush parks and views of the beautiful harbor. The rich history adds to the allure of this wonderful city Down Under.