Day Five – Bondi Beach & Coogee Walk
Loving Aussie Life and the Land Down Under. However, the time change is still winning. We slept in today and made it to 3 am 😂. Another day waking and waiting 5 hours until you can do something…
One of the exciting parts of traveling is waking up each day with something new to do. Today is no different, as we jump in a taxi for a 25-minute ride out to Bondi Beach. Taxi isn’t always our preference, but without a direct route to get out to Bondi Beach would take a while via train to bus.
Bondi Beach, another surfing haven, with a beautiful white sand beach where brave locals were swimming in the iconic Iceberg swimming pool, fed by the chilly 16 degrees Celsius ocean water. Fun place to capture some photos from the air with this scenery!
We stroll along the promenade to the other side of Bondi Beach to the Speedo Cafe for breakfast.
Apparently, the Speedo Cafe is a very Instagrammable place to enjoy ocean views and a great breakfast. We definitely enjoyed the food and chill vibe.
A walk along Campbell Parade (pit stop for some Aussie merch at Rip Curl),
which runs parallel to the beach leads us to one of the main missions for the day: the famous walk from Bondi Beach to Coogee Beach. This cliff top coastal walk is well worth the trek. It takes some time, and you’ll want to stop often, but bring some water and enjoy.
Our weary legs bumbled through the four miles of incredible views, beaches, parks, cliffs, bays, and rock pools. Felt a little like walking along the coast of Northern California. Beautiful day, with only one thing missing, whale sightings. It’s high season for humpback whales to migrate by, but we unfortunately didn’t see any. Maybe they’ve already made their way north?
No doubt, we deserved some ice cream when we reached Coogee Beach 🙂.
Taxi back to Darling Harbour to rest for a few. Legs are getting a bit wiped after our first few days Down Under. But, not too much time to rest, as we head out to enjoy the sunset at the peninsula off Mrs. Macquarie Road looking out over the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge. Great spot to see the iconic sights of Sydney at sunset!
Our walk back through the Royal Botanic Garden got upended with the gates to the walkway being closed at 6 pm. Bogus! However, this change of route ended up taking us through city, and jackpot! DJI store! What you can’t buy in the U.S. these days, you can in Sydney, a new DJI drone. Scott’s been on the hunt for this for a few months now, and look no further than finding this gold mine of a store in Sydney’s shopping district.
Really a random, eye-opening walk around Sydney’s shopping district down to Darling Harbour, and we are quite impressed!
Takeaway dinner at NoodleFace and up to our hotel. We opted for NoodleFace over DoodeeKing 🤷♂️.
Over 20k steps three days in a row, and a battle for our bodies to stay up to an acceptable time has taken its toll.
Day Six – Out of the city and into the Blue Mountains
Up at 2:30 (ughhh). We will figure this out one of these days. It’s an early, dark walk through a few city blocks to meet up with our Blue Mountain guide Jay. Throughout the day, he brought it: passion, knowledge, and an enthusiasm for the Blue Mountains. To be honest, it felt good to get into the mountains. Shoutout to Sydney for offering a couple of iconic beaches, a vibrant city, and a short drive to the mountains.
Blue Mountains showcases waterfalls, incredible views overlooking endless eucalyptus forests, and steep cliffs throughout. This World Heritage Site is well worth the visit, even though we only got to take in a small fraction of these mountains.
After navigating our way out of the city streets and surrounding highways, we enjoy a scenic drive in our first stop for coffee, a croissant and warm donuts at the Bakehouse in Glenbrook Village.
From there, we head to Katoomba, the main attraction. We enter Scenic World, a popular spot to check out this World Heritage Site. Fun little venture, jumping on the world’s steepest railway. This area was originally used for mining, with these steep cliffside banks filled with coal.
At the bottom, we walked through the canopy one of a handful of small rainforests that make up the Blue Mountains.
Three Sisters Scenic World overlooking Jameson Valley. Maybe a good chance to explain why they call it the ‘Blue’ Mountains. This haze hovering over this vast mountain range is created by the scattering of sunlight by small droplets of eucalyptus oil released by the region’s abundant eucalyptus trees.
Over to Katoomba Falls & Echo Point for more looks at Three Sisters and the Valley.
We aren’t always ones who enjoy guided trips places, but we felt with just one day allotted to enjoying the Blue Mountains, we would take advantage of the opportunity to get an in depth look with a knowledgeable local, Jay. Interesting guy, who has traveled, worked in IT, has a passion for photography, and loves the Blue Mountains. His passion and joy created a fun day for us.
Drive through Leura to Elysian Rock. One last view of Jameson Valley.
Drive out of the Blue Mountains to Featherdale Wildlife Park. Featherdale is an old poultry farm that has been transformed into an animal sanctuary, giving guests and opportunity to learn more about the flora and fauna of Australia. Easy to see from the pictures how much fun this was to have up close interactions with Australia’s native species!
Rather than driving us back into Sydney, our driver opts to drop us off at the ferry departing from Barangaroo. Departing from here, gave us a unique perspective of the waterways that create this picturesque area of New South Wales!
Back to hotel to begin packing for the first of what will feel like one million on this month+ long adventure.
But maybe one of the coolest ways to say goodbye to a city, watch the Saturday night firework show from the 15th floor of our hotel room. A little extra special since we didn’t get to enjoy the Fourth of July festivities back home this year.
Thankful for a great first leg of our trip and excited to land in the Whitsundays on our next stop!
Two Wayfaring Wanderers 