Sydney, Australia 3-20-10

I’ve always loved semi-trailer tucks (Mack trucks). I was the little kid on the school bus pumping my arm up and down every time a big truck passed so the driver in the semi next to us would honk his horn. Now, I would be riding in one!

Joel, my driver, parked his semi as close to Jason’s house as he could (he couldn’t get over the bridge and around the round-about because of his truck) and I walked over the bridge with my massive backpack on my back, smaller bag on my front, backpackers’ sash over one shoulder, and grocery bag filled with food in my hand as I walked towards him. Joel had to hold himself back from laughing at me when he saw what I was carrying, but he managed to help me heave my heavy backpack into the bed of the truck (literally) and then I climbed up a few awkwardly placed metal footholds to throw myself into the passenger seat. What a way to travel!

Joel, the 38 year old truck driver, comes from a small area just outside of Sydney and grew up with a truck driver for a father. He sort of just fell into the job after a few summers of helping his dad out and now this is his permanent job. He’s been driving for about 13 years and still enjoys it. We made some chit-chat and found out a little about each other and then Joel cranked up the music. Turns out, even Australian truck drivers love American Country music! How great it that?! He was playing Kenny Chesney, Garth Brooks, Keith Urban, you name it.

A few hours into the drive we stopped for food and fueled up. We took three breaks from driving along the 10 hour ride, but mostly just cruised on the road headed straight for Sydney. I got sleepy 5 hours into the drive and was falling asleep in my seat. Joel suggested I climb into the bed (there is a mattress, sheets, comforter, pillow and all) and I had a good sleep before we stopped again for food.

We arrived in Sydney around 8pm and Joel dropped me off at the train station. We said our good byes and he told me to call if I ever needed a lift somewhere... he’d be happy to take me if he was headed that way for work too.

As luck would have it, one of my friends from UF is currently studying abroad in Sydney. Shamila is doing a Masters in International Business, which is ironically, the program I was in the process of applying for when I changed my mind and decided to save up money and travel instead. If I had stuck with the program, I would be in Sydney at this time studying abroad.

I had directions from Shamila of how to get to her place from the train station. I switched trains a few times and then hopped on a bus which took me to Bondi beach. I only had to walk two blocks and voila!, there was her apartment!

Shamila lives two streets away from Bondi beach, in an apartment building with 30 other students who are studying abroad. They are all doing different programs and are mostly from all over the US, with the exception of a few from Europe. Each individual apartment has 5 flatmates, a kitchen, living room, washing machines, and a couple bathrooms. It is an amazing set-up.

When I arrived I met all of Shamie’s roommates and then was introduced to everyone else as they popped in and out of her apartment. In the apartment downstairs I met Katie (from NY), Jenna (from Ft.L), and Kim (from NY) and we all talked for a bit before I headed to Sham's couch to sleep.

The next day was St. Patties day and I had a few errands I needed to run before the festivities began. Shamila, Katie, Jenna, and I took a bus to Bondi Junction (a shopping district/city area nearby), and I set off to take care of the things on my to-do list.

While I was in Bali I bit down on a hard piece of coconut and bent the permanent retainer I have on the inside of the bottom of my teeth. I found an orthodontist in Bondi Junction who could fix it for me for $100, but after hearing my coconut story and that I was a backpacker, he decided to fix it for free! Such a nice man and he did a really great job. If you're ever in Sydney and need an orthodontist, check out Dr. Martin Fine.

I went into the mall afterwards and splurged on a couple shirts I liked, I’ve been getting tired of my backpacking shirts so it was time to add to my backpacking wardrobe. Before heading home with the girls, I picked up some groceries and then we caught the bus to Bondi.

We hit the beach for an hour, then showered and got ready for St. Patties day festivities. Everyone in apartment got together to pre-drink in the apartment downstairs (Katie’s, Jenna’s, and Kim’s) and then we all went to a backpackers' hostel called Noah’s where we drank $3 cups of green beer.

From there our group of 20 loaded the public bus and made our way King’s Cross, a bar district in Sydney. We filled up the entire bus and were yelling and singing and laughing the entire trip. I felt bad for the passengers on the bus who weren’t headed to the bars, because we were completely taking over!

Our group couldn't decide where to go and we wandered around to six different pubs without ever walking inside one. Every venue had a line and no one wanted to wait. Finally, I asked a police officer which bar stays open the latest and he pointed me towards one called Jackson’s. The decision was made. As soon as we walked in, the Guinness flowed from the taps and we danced and drank, danced and drank, until finally stumbling into taxis around 4am.

The next couple of days I spent laying on the beach and hanging out with the girls at night, either going out for dinners or cooking together. I spoke to my Subaru Kangaroo group from Melbourne and they were all scheduled to fly into Sydney the following day.

I met up with Sanjeev and Jonatan in Sydney's city center and we explored the city's highlights for a couple hours. We checked out the opera house and watched street performers in the heat while eating gelato ice cream.

In the afternoon we headed back to Bondi and met up with everyone from the apartment on the beach. All 10 of us decided to walk to the rocks on the edge on the shore where kids can always be seen jumping into the water. When a wave would surge in we’d all jump off the rocks and play in the water. A group of us walked further around the coast where we heard there was a pool of water inside of a rock crater. We crawled through rock tunnels and tip-toed around sharp barnacles on the rocks and eventually found the pool of water. To get there was extremely painful because of all the sharp barnacles (and none of us had shoes), but we made it and a few of us jumped in.

All of a sudden, a huge wave washed up and swept a few girls away with it. Jenna went sliding off a rock, Kate was swept past all the rocks and the current pushed her into sharp barnacles, and Katie stepped on a sea urchin and had huge black spikes sticking out of her foot! I pulled a couple spikes out of Katie’s foot and then we were all ready to get the hell out of there.

Every person had cuts on their body and was bleeding, Katie was limping around while only putting pressure on the heel of her foot because of the urchin spikes, and we all had to cross over these sharp barnacles AGAIN to get back to safe grounds. As we rounded the corner, bondi beach was in our sights and so were a couple lifeguards who were bandaging up a boy who had sliced his foot on a sharp rock.

I called over the lifeguards and they immediately went to work on everyone. I only had a very tiny paper-cut scratch on my hand from a barnacle, so Garrett and I were the two “survivors” as he called it. The lifeguards wanted to call for backup and bring the boats over because we had 6 limping and bleeding people in our group, but Katie was too embarrassed and wanted to get treated at the lifeguard stand instead. In the mean-time, every guy was competing and fighting over each other to get the chance to pee on Katie’s foot to fix her pain. Unfortunately, none of them got the chance.

The less injured soles recovered by laying on the beach for an hour or so, and then we headed to a burrito shop for some amazing food. Later we went out to a bar called Revesis and had some expensive drinks in an upscale after-work type two-story lounge.

The next day, Sunday, a group of us got together to head to Manly beach and meet up with Tim, a friend of a friend, Ilene, from back home. Tim lives ON the beach in Manly in a beautiful apartment and he invited us over for the day to check out his place and explore Manly. I was thinking about living at Tim's place for a month after getting back from NZ, but was offered a place to stay for free with my Bondi beach girls, so had to choose to stay with the girls. 

Shamila, Katie, Jenna, Sanjeev, Jonatan, and I spent some time with Tim and had lunch at a pizza restaurant. We all walked through the outside markets and then went to the Warf bar to have some drinks and watch the sunset.

We took a ferry back to the city center and were able to see the lights of the city and Opera house reflect off the dark water. Jonatan and Sanjeev went back to their hostel in the city while I went back to Bondi with the girls. I had to pack an overnight bag since I would be meeting up with Jonatan, Sanjeev, and Isabella in the morning to take off to see the Blue Mountains (another “must do” for Sydney).