Australia Day 4

The weekend fun came to an end and Monday rolled back around again.  Marc was off to work for the day so the girls and I decided to go to the SeaLife Aquarium.  The reviews were so great about this place, but I have to say, living in Georgia and having access to our aquarium made this one a major let down. We did see some cool marine life, but I don't think I'll complain about how expensive the Georgia Aquarium is anymore. 

The first stop was the duck billed platypus. I took maybe 20 pictures of this guy but it was SO fast this is the best picture I have.

 We saw several albino animals at the Wildlife Center, but I wasn't expecting to see an albino fish.

More cute penguins

A dugong (similar to a manatee).  Not the most flattering picture...

At the end of the visit there is a center for the kids to color underwater creatures or this submarine. You then scan the picture and it projected on this big wall.  The fish and everything look like their are really moving around.  It was pretty neat and I had to take a picture of the girls next to their creations.

The pictures aren't that great because of the quick movement, but Kayla's was the yellow striped fish.

Macy colored the submarine.

I overhead an aquarium worker say that you had to be careful around these guys because they will dice you up. Yikes!

Of course she put it on.

After the aquarium we headed back to the playground the girls had been eying ever since they first walked by it. 

The zip-line was the favorite activity for everyone, including Mom and Dad. :)

Playgrounds in Australia have a lot of the same things we have here in America, but there were a few interesting pieces of equipment.  Thankfully we had another local girl show us how this thing really works.

There was a fun water area that the kids loved too.  Here is a water wheel that picked up water from the bottom and dumped it in the channels coming out of the sides.

This screw also picked up water from the bottom and transferred it up the screw until it dumped out at the top.

 

We grabbed some gelato after the playground and I was reunited with my yummy strawberry and white chocolate dessert. We enjoyed eating it while overlooking the harbor before we headed back to the room to rest.  Dinner at Eat Love Pizza was yummy, but expensive - $22 for a thin crust 12" pepperoni pizza! The next day we walked more than any other day on the entire trip, so a good night's sleep was much appreciated once again.

Australia Day 3

On Sunday we headed out on the ferry to Manly Beach. A local had overheard us talking on the train last night about where we were going to eat dinner and what we were going to do tomorrow.  Like all of the other locals he was so kind and made a few suggestions for us. One of these suggestions was to take the ferry over to Manly.

Marc originally said he needed a picture at Manly Beach because in Mexico we went to Isla Mujeres (Island of the Women), but when it came time he chose to stay behind the camera.

I did warm up a good bit while we were there, but it was still winter, and we still wore long pants and sleeves.  We did let the girls roll their pants legs up to walk around on the sand a bit.

 

 Which quickly led to getting their feet wet in the cold icy Pacific Ocean.

 

Which then in turn led to getting wet up to their knees.

 Well, you know where this is going.  A wave crashed on Miss "I Don't Like to Get Wet in My Clothes." so she was done for the day. But the other two had a blast and didn't want to leave when I called them back. Mama has to make sure hypothermia doesn't set in.  Okay, that may be a bit extreme, but still, the water was really cold and their feet and legs needed to be done.

 

We went back up to some little fountains in the street, rinsed off, and bundled up.  They were quite chilled at this point.

We ordered a pizza and found a nice little area to sit and eat. The girls were so hungry! Brooke ate 5 pieces of pizza! We also bought some popcorn from the Popcorn Brothers. They cook it in a big kettle then season it in different ways. So it's kettle corn I guess, but not the traditional sweet kind. We did choose the "sweet and salty" version which was fabulous.  And the Popcorn Brothers continued to convince us that Australians really are some of the friendliest people in the world.

Pretty soon they were warmed back up enough to have a bit of gymnastics time.

 

On the ferry back to Sydney Harbour

The girls, especially Brooke, like to stop and climb on these particular columns.

We were just hanging out for a few minutes and all of a sudden an Asian lady walks by and gets so excited about seeing Brooke sitting on the column that she calls to her husband to have him take a picture of them.  You may think this is quite odd, and it is, but it's not a first for the girls.  A couple of years ago we were out and about and the girls were all wearing red, white, and blue.  We had another Asian family stop us and ask to have their pictures taken with the girls. I'm guessing they were on vacation and 3 little girls in the national colors excited them. But that's not all.

This had happened yesterday.

And this happened later in the week. It is seriously crazy. I told them that these people thought they were cute and wanted their picture with them.  The girls didn't mind.  I just hope that now that they are home they don't expect everyone to take pictures of them because they are cute. :)

Marc hadn't been by the Opera House so we stopped by on our way to dinner.

 

Another beautiful day in Australia!