New Year's Eve in Sydney, Australia

After a night flight out of Bali, Ad and I arrived in beautiful Sydney, Australia on Wednesday morning. Our Aussie friend Dave picked us up at that airport and we headed back to his (and his fiancé Beck) home that is situated along the Sydney coast in a small community called Vaucluse.

Once we arrived, we dropped our stuff and headed outside to take in the amazing ocean bluff views. Their condo is situated on a park that borders the Pacific Ocean with a view of the Macquarie Lighthouse, the oldest and longest running lighthouse in Australia that was built in 1791; it has had a working navigational light since 1818.

On the south side of the park is a paved walking trail called the Coastal Cliff Trail that follows the coastline and offers amazing cliff-top views of the ocean. To the north there are picturesque views of Sydney Harbor, Watson’s Bay, Center Point Tower and the infamous Sydney Harbor Bridge; all are stunning!

After enjoying some sunshine and a nice shower we made a plan to pick up a few items for the New Year’s celebration. In addition, we decided it was time to get haircuts (we were in dire need). It had been 8 months since Ad had his hair cut, and for me, almost 6 months, so we were excited to get rid of the floppy mess we had on our heads.

One of the highlights of Sydney is the infamous Bondi Beach, a beautiful beach just 5km from Dave and Beck’s house. We only got to spend a few hours down here, and even though the beach was packed, the water was cool and quite refreshing; oh and the fresh fish and chips we had for lunch was incredible!!

New Year’s Eve celebration was on Friday and Dave and Beck invited a few friends over to ring in 2011. For the festivities, they set up a nice tent and had tables that were covered in white linens out on the front lawn. While a 13 pound red snapper marinated in Dave’s Thai-chili recipe, and tasty steaks grilled on the barbeque, we enjoyed delicious appetizers, glasses of wine and the first round of fireworks at 9 pm (in Sydney, they have fireworks for kids at 9 pm and midnight for adults). The fireworks were spectacular and it left Adam and me wondering what the midnight fireworks would be like.

After a few more hours of enjoying the festivities, the midnight fireworks started and were incredible. Ad tried to capture as much of the show as he could on video . It truly was the most spectacular fireworks show we have ever seen!

A couple of days after New Years, Dave and Beck took us down to Watson’s Bay to catch a ferry into the city. Along the way Ad and I had a chance to see the beautiful harbor as we made our way to the Opera House wharf. Once there, we walked through the city to an area called Darling Bay to enjoy lunch and the beautiful city views. After lunch, we decided to head back to the Opera House to have a nice glass of wine out on the deck and watch people climb to the top of the Harbor Bridge ($220 per person!).

After our great time in Sydney, we thanked our friends Dave and Beck for their wonderful hospitality and then jumped on an overnight train (and hopefully the last) to our next city, Melbourne!

More to come!

Love and miss you.

Cathy and Adam