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Other entries in Sydney

Some more boozy nights

So I'm all the way across the other side of the world from where I normally call home and what do I spend my time doing I hear you ask. Well in Sydney it mainly involved going out to the city's pubs and clubs with some friends we made there and some of the people we had met in other places (like all the lads from our dorm during our first visit to Perth) but to be fair it was almost Christmas so I did have to get some practice in (that's what I told myself anyway).
I ended up spending a lot of time in Sydney but not really seeing as much of the city as I should have but that was ok as I was having a fantastic time partying. During my time here I visited most of the pubs and clubs around George Street and a few in Kings Cross but my favourite was probably the 'Three Wise Monkeys' as I always seemed to have the most fun there.
And what else did I do in Sydney I hear you ask. Well Christmas Eve was spent partying hard as it was what we had been practicing for the previous days (honest!). At the end of the night I was walking to a 24-hour pub with a nice Scottish girl I had met when two guys asked us if we knew anywhere to carry on drinking. I naturally told them we were going to another pub so they decided to tag along with us. On the way to the pub we discovered that one guy was gay and the other wasn't and that the gay guy was trying to pull me whilst the other one was trying to pull the girl I was with so we hurriedly said our goodbyes and wandered down to a park by the Opera house to watch the sunrise over Sydney harbour on Christmas day (I still can't believe I got to see the Christmas day sun rise over Sydney harbour - how cool is that??)
I spent most of Christmas Day in the hostel getting over Christmas Eve and chilling over beers with the rest of the gang and having the Christmas dinner that the hostel cooked for us (it was almost like being at home but without my lovely family).
For New Years Eve we decided to look at the famous firework display they do from the harbour bridge and wandered down to Mrs Macquires Chair, which is a part of a park that overlooks the Opera house and Sydney harbour bridge. We managed to smuggle some booze into the place by using the very cunning plan of pouring some vodka into a large bottle of coke which the strict security guys somehow didn't pickup on (I still can't believe we got away with that one!).
When we got to an area that overlooked the vantage point all you could see was a sea of human bodies as it seemed that everyone else in Sydney had the same idea as us and were taking up every available area of the park but we managed to find a bit of grass for ourselves and were soon joining in the party atmosphere with everyone else.
Unfortunately the 9pm display was cancelled due to strong winds but when the fireworks started at midnight it was spectacular. They seemed to go on for ages with each successive firework appearing to try and outdo the previous one.
After a few days debating whether I should go to the final Ashes cricket match due to the quality of England's previous performances I decided I might as well if only to have a laugh with the Barmy Army so I got some tickets and made my way down to the large SCG stadium to watch the match. And believe it or not they actually managed to win. Okay so Australia was missing quite a few key players but who cares. England won and the Barmy Army were in better voice than ever before with a few new songs I had not heard before and countless dances, chants etc that kept us all entertained for hours.
Having done very little touristy stuff in Sydney I decided I'd better see what the city had to offer so I got myself a map and hit the town. One of the best things in Sydney turned out be the view of the city from the AMP Tower, particularly the harbour. The same as any other tourist I also visited the harbour bridge, the opera house as well as some of the beaches in Sydney and found Manly to be the best beach of the lot I went to.
We decided to visit the Blue Mountains next so checked out of our hostel and jumped onto the train to the town of Katoomba but once we got there we found that all the hostels and hotels were fully booked so we ended up having to head back to Sydney on the same day without really seeing any of the area.
Back in Sydney we decided to make the Blue mountains a day trip instead which turned out to be great as we ended up getting to visit the Olympic stadium, a park where we could get close to Koala's, Tasmanian devils, snakes etc, throw a boomerang and chat to some Aboriginal people about their beliefs and 'The Dreaming' as well as visiting the fantastic Blue Mountains.
The first view of the Blue Mountains we had was from a plateau that overlooked a valley full of eucalyptus tress that had the famous blue haze over them caused by the haze of eucalyptus oil. The whole area turned out to be fantastically beautiful and I particularly enjoyed the Three Sisters area with its bizarre steep train ride and lovely walk around the rainforest.
The other thing I did of note in Sydney was to let one of the Irish girls in the hostel dye my hair blonde. After she had started dying my hair she told me that the last time she had tried to dye someone's hair it had come out pink, which didn't inspire much confidence. And it turned out I was right not to feel confident as I ended up with a gingery/golden type of colour instead of blonde which cracked everyone else in the hostel up when they saw me. To be fair after a few days it did get a little lighter in the sun and it was OK once I had gotten used to it.

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