Rainy Rainy Sydney

Once back in Sydney we drove around in our van to a couple places that we knew might be harder to get to the next day without transportation. We went to Paddy’s Market which was an Asian market with an Irish name...weird I know. Here is where we got most of our souvenirs because everything was so cheap. It was super cramped and smelled like a variety of packaging mixed with food. It was fun though, and we got lost in our zig-zagging that we accidentally went over our hour we had planned to stay because parking was so much money. However, once we had already gone into the 2 hour mark, we figured we should grab lunch in Chinatown and then leave. Well we found a cheap Asian food court where we got some yummy Thai food that was the most amazing hot meal we had had in awhile. We got a bit consumed by it, that again, time got away from us! Urg. Of course it did. We shoveled the last bits of our food and ran back to the car hoping that we would make the 2 hour mark. No such luck. So, not only did I end up paying $25 for parking for two hours, but we were now nauseous from running totally stuffed.

After that fun adventure we realized we didn’t know where the hostel was and if we could find something better. We headed to Bondi hoping to find some sort of camper park or at least just somewhere to park for free.  Considering we were in the city we should have known that was impossible. Either way I got to see the famous Bondi Beach, which they have a TV show of called Bondi Rescue where the lifeguards are always saving people. (We also got to get a yummy Gyro for dinner down there but this fit in at a different time I can’t place) We finally found the hostel, the cheapest one we could find ended up being in Kings Cross, Brados Backpackers. It was not the best hostel...honestly I preferred our van. It was up three flights of stairs, was messy, the people were not very nice and the toilet in our en suite bathroom was not working and did not look like it ever would… Beggars can’t be choosers though, we had chosen this hostel by listing cheapest first so we knew it wasnt going to be great. Luckily the boys who were already in our room ended up being super cool and we were able to chat and make friends. We stayed here two nights and the first night we were super tired and it was pouring down rain outside. Were talking like down-pouring, cats and dogs as my dad used to say. It deterred us from even leaving the room so we just took a night and stayed in.

The next day was our last day in Australia. The rain had mostly stopped and the sun was trying to peek through. It was a much better day for sightseeing. Since the day before we had returned the van we were finally on foot for the first time in 20 days! We tried to use the train to get into the city and got super annoyed when the tracks were being worked on and we couldnt figure out which line to take. We went up and down the stairs to platforms a million times and we both felt so stupid. For gosh sakes we were able to figure out the trains in Europe when nothing was in English and here we were super confused! We finally asked a train worker who laughed at us for our horrible pronunciation of the stop we were trying to get to. Circular Quey (Key). Once we got out of the subway though, we walked around and saw the sights. Got to see the opera house, a nice little market, and historic town buildings. We were touristy and took lots of photos. It was such a better day than the one before. I got to eat my first and last Pie Face, which is a little chain that makes all kinds of pies to go, meat pies, sweet pies, savory pies. yummmmy! We wandered into fancy malls and saw a three story Apple store. Essentially we just walked around snapping photos, enjoying ourselves and making sure we didn’t miss anything that we would later regret.

Overall it was a great day and when it was starting to come to an end we made a stop at one of the hostels in the city center where Makenna had a friend. She had worked with him in Surfers and they hadn't seen each other in a couple months so we made a point to stop by. P.S- this hostel was  wayyyy better than the one we were staying at. While we were chatting and catching up of course it started to downpour again. Luckily we had dressed appropriately that day, assuming it would at some point rain on us. We rushed down the street to get to the train and made it back to our hostel only partially soaked.