Harbor Bridge, Opera House, and Flying Foxes

We saw SO MUCH today! We started the morning by taking the bus down to Circular Quay where there were a couple people playing a weird mix of electronic beats and didgeriedoo. Saw the harbour bridge and the Opera House! It is so much more impressive in person than it even is in pictures- it is massive and looks totally different from various angles. We walked around Benelong Point and got views of it from across the water and wandered through the botanical gardens where we saw many lovely plants, but those aren't really very exciting, but we did see tons and tons of BATS!!! There is a huge resident colony of flying foxes, and they were surprisingly very active during the afternoon and flying about. It was definitely one of the more exciting animal encounters I've had lately! There are also lots of very noisy wild cocatoos in the Gardens, and a few that were happy to pose for pictures.

We walked through The Rocks (one of the oldest parts of town) and across the bridge to Kirribilli and sat out looking across at the sights. The weather was gorgeous and we were just enjoying being outside. We walked back across the bridge, through downtown, and onto Darling Harbour where we had dinner and got to look at all the twinkling city lights while we ate and sat by the water. Sydney really is one of the most lovely cities, and it is centered around so many beautiful natural and man made sights.

People seem to be a bit confused about an American and an English girl traveling together. One guy asked us if we had just met, and another said "that's like a weird fruit salad...with, uh, two kinds of fruit". He was cute so we let it slide.

After a bit of grocery shopping, some planning for the next 7 weeks, and walking 12 billion steps, we are both pretty exhausted... and are getting ready to do it all again tomorrow!