Archnemesis: Sydney buses

Andrea and I started our plan to cram touristy things in during her time in Sydney and everyone recommended taking a ferry out to Manly beach. So last night we carefully plotted our route through public transportation and crossed our fingers for no rain. It poured buckets and did some serious lightning last night but this morning dawned sunshiny and lovely. After a skype date with the fambam we ventured off into the world of Sydney public transport.

Within the first 15 minutes of our meticulously planned 4 hour journey the bus had zoomed right past us, as we weren't paying attention and apparently standing at the bus stop isn't enough and you have to flag down the driver? or do a secret dance? or jump in front of the bus? (I will experiment and keep you posted on which of these methods actually work) So we walked instead, got to the train station and the train we got on had "limited stops" and unfortunately the stops it was limited to did not include the one we wanted. We watched our stop fly by, got off at a later stop and came back to the one we wanted. From there we got on ferries and it was smooth sailing. Two ferries later....we arrived.

Wanna see what we saw from the ferries? The view from the trains not so exciting, so you're not missing anything there. And the view from the bus.....well I'd share it if we had actually ridden the bus. But alas...

So this is the famed harbor bridge....and apparently I can't take a straight picture. But no worries it doesn't actually slope like this!

The closest Sydney has to Disneyland.......ya they totally fail in the theme park department. (check out the creepster face. definitely not the happiest place on earth here!)

TADA!!!!! my first time seeing it....we both decided that although it is definitely cool, it looks better from a distance and it's not what we had imagined in our heads.

Those wee little, blurry dots on top of the bridge are people! You can do the harbor bridge climb....looks a little unsettling, and is apparently very expensive. So I might be getting my city views elsewhere.

This would be above bridge those peeps are climbing across. 

Awesome view of the bridge and opera house together. Yes it was cloudy....but the sunny beach is awaiting us!

City+opera house+harbor bridge= an amazing view

View of downtown Sydney.

 You're already jealous right??And all this was just getting there!!! We hadn't even gotten  to the main event yet! So while our public transportation exploration wasn't perfect....It was SO WORTH IT! Manly is such a fun beach town. They have cool shops and restaurants. (We ate at MOO burgers...they had kangaroo ones, but we were chicken and stayed with good ol' beef ones.) And we had just missed the Australian Open of surfing which is hosted at Manly...so heaps of surfers and swimmers as well. We are both pretty awesome at being beach bums so that is how we spent our afternoon:)

Beautiful beach....ruined by people turning unnatural shades of brown and old men in speedos (my personal fav was the one that said "Manly" across the butt...)

Ignore the intense TOMs tanline....

Pre-awkward splotchy sunburns....

Well an early morning planned off to the Blue Mountains tomorrow...so off to bed for me. More of New Zealand is dying to be shared....but I just want to sleep:)