See ya, Sydney

Having toured and traipsed all over Sydney, we are now driving home through the country towns along the coastal road.  I will readily admit, I was never too keen to see Sydney, but so many people were thoroughly convinced it was a good idea, so I assented to the trip.  With Ian and Joan as our guides, it would have to be fun, whether or not Sydney was as fascinating as people said. 

We stopped in Canberra (can-bruh, remember?) and continued to Sydney the next day after seeing Parliament House and the War Memorial.  Upon arriving in Sydney, we checked into our hotel and set out in search of food, like nocturnal animals coming out to hunt in the jungle, except this was the urban jungle and we aren't nocturnal.

Anyway, we wandered into Chinatown and down a stairway following a neon sign that read "Food Court".  I can tell you're intrigued.  You should be, unbeknownst to us, we were headed into the black market of Asian food.  When I say Asian, I mean Asian.  There was Thai, Japanese, Chinese, and probably other "ese"s that I couldn't distinguish, being rather illiterate when it comes to Asian food. 

As for being the black market, that's mostly because it was downstairs, chaotic, and most of the small shops looked a bit dubious in the hygiene department.  I wandered around, weighing my options.  I decided deep fried or vegetarian were my best options for avoiding food poisoning.  I queued  up at a busy window plastered with pictures of Chinese dishes.  A girl wrote my order for vegetarian fried rice on a piece of paper, took my money and handed me a number.  After a few minutes, a plate came through the window heaped with fried rice.  Bingo.  Dinner.  Joan, Ian and Sarah, were sitting at one of the center tables and I ploughed through half of my pile of rice.  Sometimes you eat to stay alive, not because the flavor of the food compels you to eat.  This was an occasion of the former case. 

The next day, we toured the Queen Victoria building, an old market that's been converted into a shopping center.  We ducked into the ABC building and the Sydney Library (which used to be the customs building).  We bought tickets to go up in the Sydney Tower.  WHAT A VIEW.  Wowza.  I had no idea Sydney Harbor was so beautiful.  It has myriad nooks and crannies, most dotted with the masts of sailboats.  SG and I snapped off photos like it was going out of style.  We stopped for morning tea (of course) before walking down to the harbor. 

I didn't really know much about the Sydney Harbour Bridge before I came to Australia, and I had only seen the Sydney Opera House on The Amazing Race a couple of times.  Let me tell you, it's worth the trip.  Seeing the giant arc of the bridge over the sparkling water stops you in your tracks.  Just to the right is the Opera House, made to look like ship sails full of wind.  Taking the ferry from Circular Quay ("key") to Manly, we could see the bridge and the opera house from the water, which made me even more glad that I'd come to Sydney. 

We stopped for lunch in Manly at a little Italian sandwich café where I had the best chicken wrap I've ever had.  From there, we wandered down the beach and met some Americans.  It wasn't on purpose, but as we watched the group of high schoolers walk past, their Chacos and Nalgenes were a dead giveaway.  Ian marched right up to them and started talking, as is his custom.  We soon followed and found out they were a group of high school kids on a service/travel trip.  They asked if there were Outback Steakhouses in Australia.  I said no. 

The next day we set off for the Elizabeth Bay house, but it was closed, so we toured an apartment for sale instead.  We made a quick stop at the Cruising Yacht Club and toured the Kathleen Gillett, a historic boat with a great story.  We continued to Vaucluse House, owned in the mid 1800s by W.C. and Sarah Wentworth.  I like historic houses.  It gives my imagination a good workout, and I'm partial to architecture.  Ian took us to Centennial Park, a huge park in the middle of Sydney where their son in law used to work.  Being the 4th of July, I was determined to have a hamburger.  So I did, I even ate the beetroot, which comes on all good Australian burgers.  I had another hamburger today, but I'll tell you about that in a minute.

The next part of the story is on the extraordinary side of things.  Back when my mother was in town, we went on a road trip and ran into some students from the Hillsong College up near Sydney.  They said the Hillsong conference was to be the first week of July and we should come up.  That was around the time we were planning to visit Sydney, so I checked it out online.  When we got to the city, I phoned and asked for more information.  They said the evenings were free and the conference was being held in the Olympic Park. 

I wasn't sure it was going to work out, but Ian and Joan were willing to go with us, so we found the place using Ian's iPhone.  Now Ian and Joan go to church with us, but they are over 70, and not the sort of raise your hands when you worship over 70 year olds.  SG and I weren't too familiar with the doctrinal soundness of the Hillsong Church, only that they were a bit charismatic.  All this to say, we were a bit nervous taking Joan and Ian to Hillsong, but what the heck, the conference was on and we were in Sydney, of all places.  We could hear the music pumping walking over from the parking garage.  We hoped it wouldn't bother Ian's hearing aids.  We were a little late, but they found us some seats in the nosebleed section. 

The first thing they did?  Take an offering.  Who gave the giving spiel?  Joyce Meyer, herself.  Yes, she did get into a little prosperity gospel nonsense (if you give money to God, He will bless (pay) you right back), but maybe no one heard that.  They played a song and then some guy with a bass clef voice that sounded like he had laryngitis introduced none other than Louie Giglio.  What?!  Yeah, show up in Sydney and wind up sitting in the 2000 Olympic Park listening to Louie Giglio.  Pretty cool.  They ended with a beautiful hymn medley that we sang out lungs out to.  It is good to worship the God who sees.

This morning we had breakfast at 8 in Joan and Ian's room (the usual cereal and toast - Joan packed their toaster).  We were off down the southward coast road.  Ian saw a sign for a temple, so we stopped off at a huge Buddhist temple near Wollongong.  We wandered around, had morning tea and revisited the age old dilemma of Jesus being the only way.  (It's not really a dilemma, it's just less comfortable.) 

Not long ago, we stopped for lunch at the Bewong Roadhouse, where I ordered a hamburger more laden with trimmings than any I've ever seen.  As is customary of an Aussie burger, it had BBQ sauce, pineapple and beetroot.  It also had coleslaw, tomato, cheese, lettuce, bacon and a egg.  Oh, and the actually hamburger patty itself, though it might as well have been left off for all the other things that were on it.  It was a great spot.  If you're ever driving south from Sydney, plan to stop off at the Bewong Roadhouse.  It's a dive, and it's so worth it.   

That's all for now, folks,

Little Miss Sunshine, from her seat in the old Mercedes