June 8, 2014

June 8, 2014

Today we headed home. What an amazing trip! It surpassed even my wildest imagination. We are so lucky that Matt had this opportunity in Australia and that we got to create an awesome vacation out of it. We were sad to leave (Connor said he wouldn't smile in this picture because he was sad the vacation was ending), but once we got on the plane, we were ready to be home. We left Sydney at 11:30am on Sunday and arrived in SF at 11:45am on Sunday. If only it actually took 15 minutes. The kids did extremely well on the flight home, especially after having traveled around with no schedules or routine for three weeks. We planned and talked about this trip for two years. Three weeks ago, we couldn’t believe the trip was starting. Now we have incredible memories of our family together in New Zealand and Australia. 

June 7, 2014

June 7, 2014

Today was our last full day of our trip. I can’t believe our three weeks is coming to an end! We headed back to the Blue Mountains on a beautifully sunny day. The Blue Mountains are named from the blue hue that they get from the vapors from the eucalyptus trees. We were actually able to see the vapor in the air. Connor and Carolina weren’t too impressed with the blue color. I think they were expecting crayon box blue. The views were very pretty. We did a little bushwalking to a waterfall. 

 

 

Then we headed back to Sydney. We went to Luna Park, which is an carnival type amusement park that dates back to the 1930's. The kids each got to pick two rides. Connor chose a roller coaster and a ride that went round and round. It lasted forever. I couldn’t believe he wasn’t dizzy when we got off. Carolina picked a rocket ship ride and the carousel, which she loved. We decided to stay at Luna Park until it got dark and watch Vivid from the other side of the bridge. While we were waiting, we noticed a Vivid booth set up. We asked the guy what it was for and he told us it was to control the Vivid lights on the bridge. We had the kids get in line immediately so they were one of the first up. By the time it started, the end of the line was a two hour wait! 

 

Connor and Carolina felt very proud to design their own color schemes for the bridge. They got to do it on a touch screen computer and then hit a “go” button that made the colors come to life on the bridge. It was very cool to watch them do it! The pictures of the bridge after the pictures of each of them touching the screen are their creations on the bridge.

June 6, 2014

June 6, 2014

Today was a very rainy day. We were hoping for some intermittent showers, but this was not the case. It rained all day long. We started off the day with a trip to eat crepes for breakfast at a restaurant just a short walk from our flat. The crepes were delicious, and we are hoping to make it back one more time before we leave. Then we came back to the house and watched “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”. We had read the book during our trip and I had brought the dvd along just in case we wanted to watch the film. The kids really liked the movie, but it was fun listening to them point out the differences between the book and the movie. I don’t remember reading the book as a child and I loved the movie when I was little, but I must say that I liked the book better than the movie. I guess that is always the way though. After our rainy day morning inside, we headed to an indoor play center so the kids could burn off some energy.  The center had different rooms that were themed around careers or daily life. There was a fire station, a police station, a grocery store, a beauty parlor, a tv studio, and more. 

 

Carolina had an especially good time since the employee offered to paint her nails in the pretend beauty salon. Matt thought it was a pretend situation, but the lady actually pulled out nail polish and painted the girls’ nails. Carolina was beyond excited with her first ever nail painting. She kept looking at them and saying she was never going to take the paint off.  

June 5, 2014

June 5, 2014

Today we had an amazing morning (once we got out of the crazy Sydney traffic)!


We headed to Featherdale Wildlife Park. We knew we were going to see lots of Australian animals and were hoping to pet a koala. The first things we saw as we walked into the park were wallabies just roaming around and we were encouraged to pet them. It was so exciting to us! The next closure held the koalas. We got to walk right up to one and pet him. It was thrilling to be so close to such a cute creature. I know they supposedly smell terrible and scratch and bite, but, nonetheless, they are so cute! We loved every second of it. 

 

The next enclosure held more wallabies and kangaroos. In this enclosure, one could buy kangaroo food in an ice cream cone and feed it to the kangaroos. We must have spent $20 on kangaroo food. The kids absolutely loved it! It was very fun feeding the roos. We could also pet them. We spent a lot of time in this area as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

We also saw cassowaries, wombats, kookaburras, a tasmanian devil, a saltie and emus. The wombats were one of our other favorite animals. The signs around the wombats said not to touch them because they bite. We were admiring a wombat when one of the keepers came by. He told us we could touch the wombat as long as we touch it on his hind/rump area. So we got to pet a wombat as well! 

After Featherdale, we headed to the Blue Mountains. Unfortunately, the closer we got to the mountains, the worse the weather became. By the time we got to the park entrance area, it was so foggy and misty, we could not see more than 20 yards. We couldn’t see anything. It was definitely a disappointment. We are hoping to return before we leave. 



On the way home, we ate dinner at a hibachi restaurant in Mosman. It was extremely entertaining. The chef was very personable and involved us a lot in the dinner preparation. Part of the dinner included prawns. The chef cut off the heads and legs, but left them on the stove. He mentioned that he was saving them for the kids. I thought he was going to set them on fire at the end of the meal for show. He cooked them until they were crunchy and then gave each of us some of them to eat. He said they were really good and tasted like chips and then proceeded to stare at us in anticipation to try them. I was going to hide mine under some food, but Connor ate it and then the chef told Matt to go ahead and try it. Matt, of course, took me down with him. I was hoping that it would taste like a chip, but it didn’t. It was mushy and moldy tasting and disgusting. I wanted to spit it out. This was certainly the big joke of the night after we left the restaurant.