If you just landed up here somehow, checkout my older posts here:
- My 7 day Solo Trip to Sydney from Bengaluru! – Part 1
- My 7 day Solo Trip to Sydney from Bengaluru! – Part 2
– Day 0 and 1 – My 1 week trip to Australia
– Day 2 – My 1 week trip to Australia
This part is in continuation of the above series. This blog is going to be a visual treat.
DAY 3: 13th November 2019, Wednesday
I again had a filling breakfast and left the hostel at 9:50 AM. I again went to Royal Botanic Garden on bus till. I wanted to visit Mrs. Mcquarie’s Chair for the very famous view of Sydney Opera House and Habour Bridge together.
Bus will leave you about 500 metres before the spot. You have to walk till you reach there.
The disadvantage of reaching the place at this time was that there were already lot of tourists trying to snap good pictures for their families as you can see in this shot:
But I was travelling solo and I wanted to wanted find a good spot as well.
I was able to find a spot over what seemed like dustbins and stabilized my selfie stick tripod and took multiple shots as there were many tourists.
If you are in Sydney, you have to come here. Period.
I then walked ahead a bit, the wind was nice. I also took this shot:
I spent some time wandering in Royal Botanical Gardens again and time now was 11 AM.
I wanted to go to Manly Beach. I looked up on Google Maps and it suggested 11:15 AM ferry ride to Manly Beach.
I walked from Mrs Mcquarie’s Chair to Circular Quay via Royal Botanical Gardens and was able to catch the Ferry.
This is where I committed another mistake, which I realized after 2 days.
Continue reading…..
I did not see on Google Maps or while boarding the ferry that what kind of ferry it is. There are two types of ferries in Sydney, private fast-ones and government ones. I mistakenly boarded the fast-ones. This rides cost me 9.50 AUD one-way, government ones would have cost 2.52 AUD or max 4 AUD. If you are using public transport with OPAL card, you will not pay more than 16.5 AUD in one day and maximum 50 AUD per week. That means any ride you take after exhaustion of 16.5 AUD in a day or total 50 AUD in a week will be free. So when my 50 AUD on OPAL card got exhausted 2 days later, I was wondering how I am not entitled for free transport. Turns out, this policy is valid only for government transport systems and not the private ones and the ferry I took was a private one.
Nevertheless, since I did not realize it at that time, I continued happily!
When you board a ferry, go quickly to the top and do not sit. There’s a space between seats on the edges, go and stand there on the edges.
Ferry Tip
You will have the closest and best view of Opera House like this:
I recorded some parts of it but since the wind was very strong, I decided to simply enjoy the ride.
On a clear day, you will be able to see the edges:
I reached Manly Wharf at around 12 PM. I got a call from home and while towards the beach I told them what the status is for that day and what all I am going to do.
Manly beach has a couple attractions (Aquarium?) if you are interested but most famous is Manly to Spit Walk. This is around 10 km which would take you 4 hours. I decided not to do, but spend some time in Manly Beach itself, but I did not know I will be doing a lot of walking in the new few hours.
There are nice-walking paths and I decided to go for around 1.2 km walk to Shelly Beach. Time was around 12:30 PM now.
There are many places to sit and relax in between.
At one of the locations I was trying to take a picture of myself and the selfie stick tripod fell to ground which resulted in phone screen guard cracking.
Scary moment!
This is where I realized that I should use my bag as well for stabilizing.
After walking till the end, you reach Shelly Beach:
Time was now 1 PM and next to Shelly Beach are a couple of restaurants to have lunch. I went to one of the restaurants, “The Boat House”.
I used their washroom, filled up my water bottle. Then I wanted to eat but saw the prices on the menu chart:
Lowest vegetarian food was 15 AUD and I knew this is not going to fill me up by looking at plates they were serving. This is the same mistake I committed on Day 6 which I will tell later.
I took a snap of this and started walking back to Manly beach to search for at-least vegetarian restaurant.
Time was now 1 PM.
Before coming to Sydney, I also heard of a bowl, known as “Acai Bowl“. I saw a shop and decided that since I have walked so much I should treat myself with Acai Bowl. Acai Brothers was the name of the shop. I told the owner that I have only heard about Acai and I am trying it for the first time. Acai Bowl is frozen bananas, frozen strawberries, frozen black grapes over ice-cream. Of course you can choose your toppings.
He suggested me to go for a medium one and told that it should fill you up. He also told me that he had been to India and was able to speak a few Indian phrases as well.
This is how it looked:
Looks tasty, correct?
Can you guess how much time it took me to finish this bowl? 45 minutes. Why? It was freezing cold ice-cream base which was tasteless as well. So, after eating the toppings, I was slowly eating the ice-cream base. After 20 minutes, I took out peanuts which I purchased on Day 1, put some of that into it and then it really tasted well.
My view about Acai Bowl!
Time was now 2 PM. From my earlier research, I knew there are two lookout points: NorthHead Lookout and FairFax Lookout points. They were around 4.4 km away from there. Google Maps was suggesting that there was a bus but I was not able to see any bus there even after standing for 10 minutes (which I realized later in the evening that I was standing at the wrong bus stop! There indeed was a bus).
I took a decision to walk all the way!
Good decision? Bad decision?
On the way to North Head Lookout Point:
On the way, I took a small detour to see a MBA college from outside:
I continued walking. I was thinking all along the way, why am I the only one here.
After walking a bit more, I reached a place which seemed like an entrance:
Time was now around 3 PM and I was walking…stopping…snapping….and walking.
Walking…Walking…Walking
There were some barracks on the detour but I did not go in. Reason is I was still under impression that I might have to walk all the way back.
Again walking….stopping….snapping….walking. This was my theme for Manly beach.
At 3:30 PM, I reached Northhead Lookout point. People come here with their cars with families, pay for parking and enjoy this view:
You can basically see the entire Sydney from here. From here, I went ahead for 20 minutes, I reach FairFax Lookout Point:
I spent around 10-15 minutes, just sitting there and enjoying the view and the breeze.
Time was now 4 PM.
I again had some peanuts, I did not want to walk 4.4 km again. I again searched on Google Maps, the same bus was suggested from North Head which was around 20 minutes walk.
I started walking back again. I saw the bus and I started running towards it and driver tells me we would leave in 7 minutes.
I took a snap of the time-table was well for reference: [station name: Quarantine Station]
I happily took that bus reached back Manly Wharf at 4:45 PM.
Since I was unaware of my mistake, I again took the fast ferry back to Circular Quay and reached at 5:10 PM. This cost me 9.5 AUD deducted from OPAL card.
From here I took a train to Town Hall Station. As you exit town hall station, you will see heritage-listed Queen Victoria Building:
This is now basically converted into a very big mall. You can still traces of architecture inside the building:
So basically there are 3 or 4 floors and from the basement you can move to another part of the building which is again a very big mall. Christmas was nearby so it was already stocked up:
If you see things at slow pace, QVB can consume 2 hours and remember most of the shops close at 5 PM.
Somewhere in the basement, there’s a huge food court which had a lot of shops. Time was around 6 PM and even I was hungry. I wanted to try something which I never had before.
So, a shop which caught my eye was selling yoghurt with lot of combinations like this:
I took mixed berry yoghurt small size which cost: 6.50 AUD.
The food court basement has ample places to sit. This small bowl would take 30 minutes to finish since it’s cold and while I was having it, a kid was staring me at all the time. I could not stop myself from taking a snap:
While eating my yoghurt, I was deciding where I can go next. This is where I remembered a tip from youtube video that if it’s the sunset, you can go to other side of Harbour bridge to see Luna Park and to get a good view of both Harbour Bridge and Opera House.
I exited QVB and again went back to TownHall Station. I took a train to Milsons Point station. From there it was a 500 metre downhill walk.
This is the view you will get:
There are stairs here where you can actually sit and enjoy the sunset with a cold breeze.
I was waiting for sunset and it happened around 8 PM.
The night view is also stunning:
Luna Park is a place which was just next to this and best viewed at night. It is a place with ferry wheel and small games area. The entry gate of this place is a tourist spot:
I helped met a group of some old Japanese women who were trying to take pictures of themselves. It wa
I did not know Japanese and they did not know English but I was able to make out by their facial expressions that they were very happy people.
I did not know a thing; Luna Park is closed on Wednesday, so when I entered, no one was there and I was able to take this snap:
The time was 8:22 PM. From Luna Park you can come back to Circular Quay by taking a ferry and here you have tap the card at the station. I joined to queue and realized that I did not tap on my card. When the ferry arrived, I asked can you wait for a minute so that I can tap on my card and back. This time he told if you have not tapped on your OPAL card, pay 2 AUD extra and get on the ferry. It felt like a bribe and besides when you reach Circular Quay you will have to tap off your OPAL card.
I refused this 2 AUD offer and waited for another 30 minutes at the ferry point near Luna Park itself. I suggest anyone who is visiting Australia to follow the rules.
The next ferry was at 9:10 PM. I took that ferry. This will also go close to Opera House which looks stunning at night.
From Circular Quay, I took a bus to Sydney Central. At Sydney Central, I again had Hungry Jacks’s Rebel Whopper Vegetarian Burger. This was for around 8 AUD.
The balance on my OPAL card by this time was going low. My cash was also getting exhausted. I also realized on Day 2 itself that 300 AUD was not going to be sufficient and with the help of my flatmate I reloaded by card with 200 AUD more just to be extra safe.
At 9:50 PM, I took the bus from Central and reached back my hostel by 10 PM. I wanted to have a good sleep because next day was about to be more hectic.
Expense sheet for the day:
- Travel to Royal Botanical Gardens – 2.52 AUD deducted from OPAL Card. [Travel by bus/train is deducted from OPAL card. Also when you complete 8 journeys in a public transports you will be charged half rate of the normal rate.]
- Travel to Manly Beach – 18 AUD – 900 INR (which should have really cost maximum 9 AUD – 225 INR)
- Lunch: Acai Bowl at Manly Beach – 14 AUD – 700 INR.
- Yoghurt bowl at QVB – 6.5 AUD – 325 INR.
- Ferry was again around 4 AUD deducted from OPAL Card.
- Dinner: Rebel Whopper Vegetarian Burger at Hungry Jacks: 8 AUD – 400 INR.
Total cost for the day: Rs 1425. I do not include amount deducted from OPAL card.
