Forgot to say yesterday that in the afternoon a new 3rd person joined us in our little 4 bed dorm, a Chinese guy called Fred who has been working in Oz the past 4 years and moving around. He seems nice what I’ve seen of him, although we only had chance to swap names and find out about how long he’s here etc. He’s in our room till Friday so we will leave before he does so let’s hope we don’t scare him off with our snoring.
Just before we turned in for bed last night, contestant number 4 arrived. A stocky looking guy who grunted a miserable “alright guys” and then threw his stuff on the bed. I got the impression he didn’t want to be in the Y-hotel and judging by his luggage (one carrier bag of stuff) he hadn’t planned on staying either. Phil was reading his newspaper, I was filling in my journal and Fred was watching a film on his laptop as it was only about 11.30pm. Grumpy guy (as he will be known as, since he didn’t volunteer his name) got undressed then said “Guys can we have the main light off and just put that reading light on”, there was just the one table lamp between bed’s B and C (Fred n Me). It didn’t really sound like a request so I flicked the lamp on and then Grumpy guy switched off the main light. I hadn’t locked away my rucksack in the small metal lockers we had in the room, but as it would be noisy I decided not to bother and just put anything valuable under my bed until morning.
Woke up at about 7.30am to the sound of grumpy guy speaking very loudly on his mobile phone saying “yeah yeah I had to stay over and I’ve slept in so I will be there in about 5 minutes, no its okay I’m just on the corner of Oxford Street” and with that he was up and gone. It didn’t look like he was going though as he left his bits of stuff at the side of his bed.
Went back to sleep and then woke up at about 9am and Phil and Fred seemed to wake up around the same time. Me and Phil got showered and then went to breakfast. It was like a large cafeteria on the ground floor and seemed very busy. With our £14 bed for the night we also got a “light” breakfast voucher each morning. This was tea/coffee, juice and toast with preserves, not bad when you’re only paying £14 a night really. You could buy extra stuff from behind the counter like hash browns, bacon etc but we just stuck with our free one. Saw Grumpy guy rushing round the breakfast area, gulping down juice and grabbing a handful of bread and jams and then he was gone. Obviously not got time for breakfast being high flying executive with his stuff in a carrier bag!
After breakfast we went back up to the room to decide what tour we wanted to do tomorrow as it’s our last day and we were planning to do the Blue Mountains tour but various companies offer it. When we got up to the room Grumpy guys stuff was gone so hopefully that means it was just a one-night stop.
Phil decided to do the Stadium Tour but I didn’t fancy it so thought I would have a kip and upload some of my photo’s around the corner at the internet café (as it was cheaper than our hostel). Managed to get yesterday's uploaded so I am now up to date and uploaded my blog.
Didn’t really end up sleeping in the end as I started reading the book I’d swapped with Sam. Its called Farang and is about a guys experiences while living in Thailand and is made up of lots of short stories. At about 4pm we started to head over towards Sydney Harbour for our bridge walk. On the way we stopping in at St James Cathedral and took a few photo’s and I lit a couple of candles for absent friends and family.
When we got to the Bridge climb centre we had to watch a bit of an intro video and then had to get all geared up. You weren’t allowed to take any loose items up with you, this included; camera’s, money, watches etc in case anything came off and dropped down on to the traffic below. We were given a jumpsuit to put on that zipped up the back and also a pair of water proof pants to put over the top as it was raining still.
Once in our fetching jump suits we had to clip on various bit of kit. First there was the metal thing that attached to a thick wire all round the bridge and this kept you attached to the bridge. You had to pull this around with you as it often got stuck on corners. You also had small flashlight that went on a strap around your head miner stylee, as we were doing the twilight walk so it we would see the city go from dusk to evening (or we would if it weren’t so bloody grey and wet lol). Then you had the option of a beanie hat that also clipped to the back of yer suit. We had a quick practice going up and down ladders (what like it’s hard? Lol) and then we were off to climb the bridge.
I was behind a couple from London called Phil and Michelle and we got chatting and they were asking us about our trip etc. They are going to a wedding in Wellington in a few days and will be there when we are there, but I’m sure it is a big place so doubt we will bump into them. We stopped at various places along the climb and had photo’s taken by our guide. The rain held off most of the walk and only rained towards the end of the 3 hours.
We got back down at about 9.30pm and bought 3 of the photos to prove we did actually do it as there would be no proof otherwise (me thinks that’s the whole point of the no camera rule really ;-) as you’re bound to buy one aint yer).
We headed back to our hostel in search of food, Phil got a Kebab and I ended up giving in to Macdonalds.
Hit the sack at about 12.10am as we’ve got an early start tmrw for the blue mountains tour.
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