Goodbye Nowra, Nice Seeing You Blowhole in Kiama, Hello Sydney!
[Photos from Friday 27 March 2015, blogged on 13 April 2015. I suck at keeping up.]
This was our last day in Nowra, Australia. We checked out from our hotel beforeg 8 am, and headed for breakfast. Afterwards, we stopped by ‘Australia’s best coffee shop‘ on our way out of town. It only serves coffee, no real food, so we’d never bothered to stop by before, although we’d seen a constant stream of people waiting outside for their fix. The coffee was quite excellent (I am now a mocha lover. Yeah, yeah!)
We finished up at the factory, and set out north to Sydney around noon. We drove up by the beach until we hit Kiama, where we visited a natural ocean-side blowhole, and had lunch. We reached our hotel in Sydney around 5pm, after spending about half an hour just trying to navigate to the front of the hotel through a maze of one-way streets. Good times!
After a short unwinding period, we headed out to our last dinner in Australia, this time by Darling Harbour, which was within walking distance from our hotel. The food was very nice, and the surroundings bizarrely lively (it’s a harbour area! it’s evening! there’s a ton of people here!). We walked around afterwards for a bit, before collapsing into bed.
Photos! (63 images total!)
Goodbye hotel second floor hallway that’s been my ‘home’ for two weeks!
Goodbye balcony view!
Walking up to Hyper Hyper Cafe.
Coffee addicts lined up by the hole in the wall.
The inside of the house was very bare bones.
But also very cool.
The coffee grinder behind a glass wall at the back.
About to host the summary/departure meeting.
And then we left for Sydney!
Idyllic country life zooming by.
Mmmm… nice!
View like these pop up everywhere.
There’s a lighthouse by the Kiama blowhole.
Yes, the GPS wasn’t lying!
I was there!
This is what the blowhole does, it sometimes shoots ocean water up in the air. Apparently it can go really high if the conditions are favorable. This was more like a friendly geyser.
Blowhole, mid-blow.
Looking back towards land.
The mouth of the blowhole. The observation platform didn’t really allow for a good viewing of it.
Gulli modeling.
I. Was. There!
A super effectual warning sign.
The boys resolutely not looking at the spewing water. Oh, the power of the camera.
The view to the north was nice…
… and so was the view to the south.
Inside the cafe by the blowhole. It was surprisingly good, like most other Australian cafes we tried.
Strange looking fly.
Enjoying the sweet life!
It was getting a bit windy as we left. We almost wished we’d grabbed our coats.
Driving onwards…
Had to photograph this sign for a ‘Husband Day Care Centre’. The rest of the text read: “Need time to relax? Need some ‘ME’ time? Want to go shopping? Leave your husband here, we’ll take good care of him!”
We’d had enough of slow driving by the beach so we headed to the highway, which happened to be located at the top of that ridge, up ahead!
Steep climb up the hill. Our poor car almost didn’t make it!
Arriving in Sydney proper.
They were about to hold elections the next day, so there were ads all over the place.
Nice paint job!
Almost at our hotel, but stuck in a maze of one-way streets. Oops!
Yay! At our hotel!
Driving to the parking garage was yet another nail-biter, even though we had directions, because they directed us onto what looked so much like a pedestrian street that we punted on it. These are the directions to drive FROM the parking garage TO the hotel. We opted for just rolling our bags over when we left.
My room was pretty large.
Spacious even!
The bathroom was rather old and meh.
Old but not moldy, so that was good!
The view out the window. I mentally flirted with checking out the outlet market, but decided against it. Not only were we short on time, but my bag was also surprisingly full.
Looking towards Darling Harbour.
“We’re saving money, but pretending it’s for you!” Ok, fine, they may have a point!
Hotel hallway. Not terrible.
Proper foyer. The wireless internet was pretty bad.
Walking towards Darling Harbour, this is a part of the Tumbalong Park. Very swanky!
Photobombing tourists having a romantic dinner at the harbour while too busy to look up from their phones.
There were A LOT of people there.
Our restaurant was under the highway!
Seriously, that’s a motorway people!
Finnur sent me this back. “Aren’t you getting tired of the heat?”
Mmmm…
Mwahahahaha!!
After dinner, we walked around for a bit. That building on the right with the light-show is the club “Home“, which is apparently awesome, and we walked right by it because we’re old curmudgeons.
There were a lot of street performers about, doing fancy tricks, and very openly asking for money. Deservedly.
View of his platform and the audience.
There were neat things everywhere.
Me!
We walked a circle into the city, and back to the hotel, and saw some cool buildings. There were a lot of people about, and a surprising number of young kids too.
A cool alleyway by Chinatown, and very close to our hotel.
And then it was time for sleep!
