PART 4 -AUSTRALIA
Truth be told, by the time I left New Zealand for Australia I was about ready to head home. 3.5 weeks into it at that point, it had been an awesome trip. I thought it would have been a great time to end, on a high note and back to the homeland. Instead I was heading to a land where I had one contact who happened to be out of town that weekend. But as it turned out, the week exceeded all expectations. I am very glad I didn't miss it.
Sydney, the biggest yet best City I visited on the trip.
I spent a few hours exploring one of their engineering masterpieces, the harbor bridge.
They have an opera house that isn't bad either.
And they have a lot of beaches! Bondi.
The Toronga Zoo bird show was worth the zoo trip.
A native....glad to see her only in the zoo.
Not native....be she's always sleeping when I visit our zoo!
Sydney's Darling Harbor with lightning.
Since I took over 200 pictures in the same spot, I'm compelled to post two. Lightning strikes occur quite randomly I discovered. OCD? Maybe. But I deleted most of them if that helps my case.
The 2000 Sydney Olympics whitewater park was impressive. Bummer I was 8 years too late for the event. Maybe she's training for Bejing?
And into the wild I went........
Probably the most beautiful scenery of the trip was the Wentworth Falls area of the Blue Mountains. I was fascinated by the sandstone cliffs, waterfalls and vegetation. Not to mention the nicest maintained hiking trail I had ever been on. I'd like to go back....can I be your tour guide?
They are called the Blue Mountains for a reason....all that blue haze is from Eucalyptus (Gum) trees.
Then off to birds and kangaroos on the coast south of Sydney
The coolest noise award went to the laugh of the Kookaburra
Wollongong area
Thanks this time to the Graham's, Brodie's and Collin's families for making Australia a week to remember. The words fail me a bit to summarize this whole thing....but if I somehow didn't make it clear in the previous posts, it was really a most amazing trip. I feel very fortunate.The end.
A few statistics:
11 flights on 6 airlines came to 26,000 airmiles
1000 miles driven on the wrong side of the road
2,500 photos taken; 2,000 kept
Set a really high bar (standard) for future travels
I better stay home for awhile
1000 miles driven on the wrong side of the road
2,500 photos taken; 2,000 kept
Set a really high bar (standard) for future travels
I better stay home for awhile
15 comments:
Very enjoyable blog entries. Thanks again for sharing.
We did enjoy these pictures and reading about all your adventures! Wow...what a great 4 weeks! Drew especially enjoyed the underwater pictures from Saipan they were amazing.
We checked your blog at just the right time! What a fabulous trip you took! We're glad we could enter in a little bit with your pics.
Great photos!! Almost like being there. Since so many photos were taken, I hope a few more make the cut in the coming days :) Looked like a fantastic time
Wow - what a fabulous trip, Justin! Thanks for sharing the photos and tidbits from your time there. Glad the underwater camera bag worked!
Outstanding Justin,
This trip was probably hard to beat but hard to believe life just gets better and better!
Rob Ogle
Thanks for all the nice comments. If your future travel plans include any of these places I now have some great contacts who say they like to have visitors! Let me know! Or better yet....take me along! :)
finished looking at your blog while listening to the itunes you let me "borrow". love the lightning. and I could say as well, thanks for sharing.
-Janae
Again - beautiful pictures, thanks for sharing. Looks like a fabulous trip!
Wowzers, you get around man!
What a great trip...don't think we'll be doing anything like that till the kids grow up :)
Australia is on the top of my list, a tie for first place with Africa.
Thanks for sharing your beautiful pictures!
Alane
WHOA! mate' good pic's and details,makes you appreciate the world & people when you travel....look forward to hearing the gory details in person sometime.
and the other 1,976.5 pictures ;)
Shouldn't have shown this to Ivona, turns out Australia is one of the places she has 'always' wanted to go, and with people like you around, things like that start to seem 'possible'. Fabulous pictures and memories!!!
Hey Justin..! It's Pete & Ashley! Gosh...you have some amazing shots from over here!! Much better then I have, and your trip was shorter..something is wrong here! =) Great to catch up with you at Paul & Kims..it's been forever! Just saying HI!
Hey Justin! I'm Angi(from Romania)!I like your blog and beautiful pictures.I think that your trip was very nice!
Wow...from Australia and Romania! Hello to Angi, Pete & Ashley. Thanks for saying Hi. Good days to you all in your faraway lands!
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