tigers 30, bunnies 6

We just got back from the "footy" game.  The Tigers won over the Rabbitohs (a.k.a. the Bunnies...even their fans call them this).  It was so much fun!  We sat in the front row right in the middle, this made it a little hard to watch some of the plays, but it was a great place to sit in the crowd.  The game got more intense as the night went on, by the end players were picking each other up and throwing each other down in a manner usually reserved for wrestling.  The crowd also got more crazy (but not frightening) as the game progressed, yelling out exactly what they felt.  My favourites..."What's wrong princess" (yelled at a player who was injured, interestingly enough when they carried this guy off the same people were cheering the loudest for him) and "Get up you wanker" (aimed at a player trying to get up while being tackled by 3 guys).
 The people sitting beside us were great, the guy was a huge Rabbitoh fan who got the mascot "Reggie" to sign his flag and shirt.  His friend was a very quiet young lady who was cheering for the Tigers.  Once he realized his team was doomed he focused his energy on getting on "telly" by cheering loudly anytime there was a camera pointing our way.  In the end he even waved a huge Tigers flag in a last ditch attempt.  They were lovely people and were fun to watch the game with!
If you want to you can go onto Utube and find the game.  Watch for us in the background - we are probably cheering or laughing!

busing, walking & biking around...

We have had a busy 3 days here in Sydney, Australia. The first day we took the Hop-On, Hop-Off Tour Bus around the city to find out the history of the town. Then we transferred to the Bondi Beach run where we got off and checked out this historic area. The beach itself was beautiful and the town was lovely, but it was a little too cold for us. Some lovely gelato made up for this.

The next day we got up early to catch the bus to the Australian Museum. This was advertized as one of the top 10 places to see, but we were a little disappointed. It had an interesting dinosaur display, but otherwise mainly consisted of stuffed animals and birds. We walked on to the Hyde Park Barracks, a museum dedicated to the convicts that originally populated the area. These Barracks housed the convicts at night after they spent the day working for their “masters” as part of their sentence. It was a great look back at how Sydney was run in those days. I also found out that James McMullen (distant relative perhaps) was sentenced to 7 years for pickpocketing...interesting find. We continued our walk all the way to the Sydney Opera house where we bought tickets for the Saturday afternoon symphony performance (something to look forward to). Finally we strolled across the first part of the Harbour Bridge. By then our feet hurt, so we came back to the hotel for a quiet evening in.

Today we headed out to Manly on the Ferry. It was a beautiful sunny day so we rented a couple of bikes to go check out the sites. The man renting the bikes said there were a couple of short, steep hills but we didn’t let this stop us. Short my gluteus maximus! (If any of my students are reading this the term refers to a muscle in the human anatomy, look it up for educational purposes). Once we got past the one LONG uphill the rest was beautiful. We enjoyed a beautiful view of Sydney and a leisurely ride along the beach. Manly is not to be missed, the town is lovely and the beach was the best yet. Of course all this riding made us thirsty so we headed to the local microbrewery for their sample tray. Five small glasses of interesting beers made on site. (Again we took one for the team!) Tonight we are hoping to find a nice Tapas place for dinner before we go to the Sydney Football Stadium to watch the South Sydney Rabbitohs play the Wests Tigers. This is a game in the National Rugby League, should be a blast! 

Tauranga Zoo and Sydney Aquarium

A couple of days of wildlife in Sydney. Yesterday we went to the Tauranga Zoo on the north shore of Sydney Harbour. We walked down to the harbour and took the zoo ferry across to the zoo, taking in the beautiful sights of the city along the way. We float past the Harbour Bridge on the left and the Sydney Opera House on the right. What a view for the ride!
The zoo is set up on a large hill, so you take a bus or a gondola to the top, then work your way down.  We started by going through the Australian section; kangaroos, emus and tons of birds all around you on the path.  These animals are not behind bars, they are just a few feet away from you as you walk by.  The nocturnal area has bats, possums, kangaroo rats and other night time critters in specially lite glassed in areas.  Of course the more dangerous animals are properly set behind glass or in cages.  This included cassuary, a creature we missed seeing on our driving tour of the north, its home area. What a piece of strange and exotic work! This thing is crazy weird! (See large bird with blue head below).  The rest of the zoo included Tasmanion devils, lions, snow leapord, seal show, crocodiles and, of course, penguins.  You name it, they had it!  What a great day!
Today we went to the Aquarium, another amazing animal adventure.  There were a lot of tanks containing smaller fish, starfish, sea horses, jellyfish, platypus (very cool) and even some shark eggs lite from behind so you could see the tiny embryos moving around.  Then you go down ramps into the various large aquariums located in the harbour.  You walk through glass tubes at the bottom so the fish swim by and over top.  The first one stars rays and the dugongs (or sea cow) - very cool!  Then on to the shark aquarium with sand sharks, reef sharks, nurse sharks and huge rays!  The whole thing was mesmerizing and, in a strange way, peaceful. 

 

Daintree Rainforest

Today we went with our wonderful guide David on a trip to Cape Tribulation through the Daintree Rainforest.  You have to go across the river on this small "ferry" that is more like a large raft that is pulled across the water using cables.  Then you enter the rainforest...amazing...the trees and plants were incredible.  They were all classic examples of plants fighting to get to the top of the canopy in order to get to the light.  This is considered to be one of the oldest rainforests because it contains plant species only found in the fossil records everywhere else in the world.  The isolation of Austalia has preserved these plants over time. 
We walked down the beach at Cape Tribulation, one of the areas first explored by Captain Cook when he ran into the Great Barrier Reef and spent 48 days fixing the holes in his ship.  We cruised down Cooper's Creek in a boat that reminded us of the African Queen.  The creek runs through the mangroves, very interesting habitat.  Here we saw a couple of crocodiles, including one big one!  A little local tropical fruit ice cream and a walk through the rainforest at Mossman Gorge finished off the day.  What a wonderful experience!
By the way we figured out why the bird ran into Colin yesterday, apparently they spend the day eating fruit that has fermented, so the bird was drunk!  Now he has been hit by a drunk driver and a drunk bird...bad luck, eh!

2nd day on the reef

Today we went out on the Great Barrier Reef again.  We went to 3 different sites, two on the Opal Reef and then Turtle Bay.  The water was warm and the fish were beautiful.  We saw a lot of parrot fish nibbling on the coral, a turtle and even a few sand sharks!  Amazing!  We tried the using the underwater camera and had mixed results, we have included a few of the better ones.
We went out for dinner, and planned to say out for the Cane Toad Races at the local bar, but we couldn't stay awake!  Too much fresh air and exercise.  On the way to dinner we saw huge fruit bats and a swarm of parakeets, one of the parakeets got a little too close and hit Colin in the forehead!

some extra pics for you to see