Sydney hosted the 2000 Summer Olympic Games. The Olympic Park is to the west of Sydney, and has a collection of stadiums and fields all within walking distance. Unfortunately, the cauldron was locked away, as it was located in a recently closed exhibition. Apparently the main stadium (Telstra Stadium) is now only used about 20 times a year. We played Olympic Park mini golf, for the ultimate mini golf bragging rights… and tied. [ www.sydneyolympicpark.com.au ]
Further west of Sydney (maybe 100 km) is the well known Blue Mountains. In all truth, its not blue, and its not a mountain. It is actually a plateau that water has carved canyons out of over time. And its collection of over 100 eucalyptus plants all emit oily vapours into the air, which create a blue haze when struck by sunlight. On our particular 6km hike through some of the area, it was rainy/misty, so it was more grey than anything, but still scenic. While I didn’t get a good photo illustrating the Blue Mountains, here is the [ Google Image Search ] of some other photo on the internet.
After a week of relaxing in Sydney, we said goodbye to its overwhelming army of surly bus drivers, and headed north to Newcastle, Australia’s second oldest city. This city is famous for its beaches and surfing, and believe it or not, exports sand to Hawaii! Here is an excerpt from my journal:
[On April 7]… we went on the Sand Safaris Quad Adventure in the sand dunes. This was the greatest thing we have done in Australia so far! This was a two hour quad ride through sand dunes, which was very surreal. Whats interesting is that the tracks from the quad in front of you can disappear quite rapidly, so there isn’t much reliance on a well-used path. These sand dunes tend to move inland at a rate of 2-5 metres per year, so they don’t stay the same for very long. We got to drive around at speeds of 40 km/h, and sometimes up to 67! In total, we drove about 30 km. [ www.sandsafaris.com.au ]