Ten Days in Sydney - Trannys, HQ and Lots of Alcohol.

Okay, So this is another shortcut. Here it goes....

In Sydney I stayed at a Hostel called the Backpackers' HQ in King's Cross, Sydney. If you like nightlife, this is the place to stay. Most of the guys there are long-termers, so it's so safe and secure. HQ also had an activity organised every night, either a visit to a bar or the legendary Sausage Spectacular on a Friday night where, for a mere $3, you can get all you can eat sausages and all you can drink goon (box wine). It is a great laugh, and everyone got pretty drunk. There was a rumor that one swiss girl got so drunk that she couldn't see and had to get helped to bed. There were a few highlights of my time in Sydney that weren't alcohol related, but I'll get to the good parts first! I did have a few good nights out in Sydney, and here are the best bits. On nmy first night out we visited the Old Fitzroy theater. There was free pool, cheap food, and $3 beers. Need I say more? I ended the night by having to get Jo (one of the guys from the hostel, from england) To escort me to the nearest McDonald's, and then back to the hostel. Another place we frequented regularly was the World Bar. One memorable evening was the karaoke, with free drinks for the singers. I teamed up with a Swede and an Aussie and we completely ruined the Queen classic "We Are the Champions". And of course, the most memorable of all the nightlife in King's Cross has to be 'Tranny Bingo' at the King's Cross Hotel. They were taller than me! Some of the calls were very un traditional. 88 became two fat s**ts, and 1 is a skinny b***h. Right, not for the less alcoholic highlights. First there was manly beach, a ferry ride away from the city. It was quite nice, but it was too windy and cold to go swimming on the day we went. Next there was the Harbour Bridge and Opera House. This may seen strange, but they are a lot smaller than you think they are, and because you've seen them before, you don't really get that sense of 'wow'. But in my eyes, the best highlight was the trip to the Blue Mountains. We took a 4 hour walk though the valley, and the views and waterfalls were immense! There was a bit of a slip-up, where I accidentally put my foot straight down a hole which was full of water. My trousers got soaked right up to the knee. All I can say is, thank god no-one else did it, because they'd probably have ended up waist deep in water! Another highlight of the day was the 'adventure lunch'. we took our pies and salad out to a rock hanging out over the valley, with a 200ft drop on three sides, and no safety barries, nets or others. Now that puts a whole new meaning on 'al fresco'. So that's a quick summary of the best bits of Sydney, and you wouldn't have got much more anyway, because i was pretty drunk quite a lot of the time, and the rest is a bit blurry. So - to give a briefer do and don't. Do - go to the Blue mountains, and do stay at Backpackers' HQ. Don't - expect to be overly wowed by the Opera House or the Bridge and don't drinkk too much goon in one go. It's not good for you. Now this shall be the end on the 'Diaries' Blog for now. I'n now gonna go onto a Sub-blog, The Flying Scotsman's Travel Journal.

Day 18, 19 and 20 - Three Days, Three sets of wildlife.

Okay, so I;'m cutting a corner by sum,ming up 3 days in one post, but I need to get this finished. I am going to sum up the last days of Singapore in this post, and then Sydney in another. On day 18 I visited the Nght safari, which is right next to the zoo. I would have done both in one day, but I got up late, and by the time I got to the park it wouldn't have been worthwhile. I got into the park and took the tram tour aound. It was quite strange staring through the gloom at all of the nocturnal animals, with the lack of visible bars making it seem like the animals were roaming wild. Some of the more tame animals actually were roaming wild, coming up really close to the Tram. I then took a walk around the park on foot and saw all of the other animalw in the park. I also found out an interesting fact - did you know that girrafes only sleep for 3 hours of the day? On day 19 I got up a bit earlier and headed back out to the zoo. I took a tram around the zoo, and then I took a walk around the park. I saw some very interesting animals, such as the Lars Gibbon, which looked a bit like MJ. (It was black furred with a white face and hands). I then took a boat cruise around the lake to the other side of the zoo. Okay, so I know this blog is a bit dry, but the pics are pretty good to make up. I then headed to the sea life show and stood at the back while this sealion was doing it's thing. Then the guy asked for a volunteer. Here's a bit of advice - NEVER volunteer! I made the mistake of doing so and was asked to do one simple thing - Throw a frisbee for the sealion to catch. That should be easy. (Or so I thought). I took aim, got ready and - right into the big pole which was holding up the roof. Ok, try again - and right into the post again. Ok, one more go - guess where it went? Yep, right into the pole. So then the guy, who was in his element with a guy making himself look like a right idiot, and him being able to rib me senseless. So he led me right to the side of the tank. Right, one more go. Bingo. Sealion executes a perfect catch. Glad that's over. Or not. After the crowd had started to clear, the guy led all the vbolunteers up to the side of the tank. (Me, a Woman, and two kids), and we got to meet the sealion. I got a very whiskery kiss, which was documented on a picture on the camera of the zoo, meaning I had to then go and pay for it go get a copy. Oh well, it was worth it. After the show, I took an elephant ride.it was quite fun, sitting on the back of such a large beast, if not slightly unnerving due to the side to side motion of it gait. I then looked at more animals, of which there were too many to list. I was ther until closing time, and I'm still not sure if I saw them all. Day 20 was another trip to a wildlife park, this time the Jurong Bird Park. This was slightly  different, with the opportuniy to feed Lorys and Other birds whose names I can't remember, but which were very beutiful (you should see the pictures, which i will try to upload as soon as i reach a computer which will let me). I also took a ride on the monorail, which encircled the park. The other highlight of the day was seeing the feeding of the pelicans, the only opportunity to see them feed underwater in the world. It was really something to see. Okay, so that was pretty much Singapore. It was a wonderful city, much cleaner than Hong Kong, and less humid. I would definitely recommend this over Hong Kong, even if some of the laws do seem a bit imposing. The three top attractions for Singapore would definitely be: Sentosa, Zoos and the Singapore Flyer. Okay, so on the next post I'm gonna skip the flight (It was uneventful and so uninteresting) and go straight to a summary of Sydney. Sorry about the lateness of the postings, but I am gonna finally get up to date.