This trip has been on my mind for awhile. I’ve always wanted to visit Sydney and I knew it would a great place to escape the northern winter in Taiwan. Well, I finally did it. I booked my trip in November and since then Sydney has been on my mind.
FUNLIDAY
My co-worker showed me this travel planning app. If you are the type of person who likes to plan out your trips, this is the app for you! I absolutely loved this app. It was so helpful. You can build your itinerary and it’ll figure out for you how long it’ll take from one place to another. The times were really accurate for me, so I knew if I had enough time to do something and how much time I should spend at a certain place. It also gives location hours, so I didn’t have to look up every point of interest to figure out how much time I had before they closed.
FLIGHT
My parents opened mileage accounts for my brother and I since we were born. So after 24 years of flying back and forth between the U.S. and Taiwan, I’ve racked up quite a lot of miles. I then traded 40,000 miles for a round trip ticket from Taiwan to Sydney. The flights left and arrived at reasonable times, the food was great, and with the layover, it was about a 15-16 hour flight one way. The best part was I only needed to pay the taxes and fees which came out to $113 USD.
LAYOVER IN SOUTH KOREA
Going to Australia, I had a layover in South Korea. A little weird because South Korea is in the opposite direction of Sydney, but I was flying a Korean airline which was how I found myself wandering around Seoul International Airport.
After grabbing a quick bite at Taco Bell (yeah, not a typo), I came across the Korean Traditional Cultural Experience Center. You can go there and make many different Korean handicrafts. It’s a free event that is open only to foreigners to promote Korean Traditional Culture. I had plenty of time before my flight so I made a type of tray using hanji (Korean paper). The experience reminded me of paper mache. They provided all the materials and basically for this craft you put paste on one side and place the paper on the cardboard tray provided. The Korean paper makes it look pretty.
With still more time til my flight, I went to the gate and watched an episode of Suits using Netflix. Can I just say, Netflix is amazing! Love it. I never saw the need for it, but they recently added a new feature where you can download shows and watch later without wi-fi. This came in handy when sitting on an 8-10 hour flight. I’m a big fan.
FEBRUARY 4, 2017
SYDNEY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT – 8am
I arrived at Sydney International Airport without any problems. Note: U.S. citizens do need a visa. I got the e-VISA for $20 AUD.
MONEY EXCHANGE
If you can exchange money at a bank in your home country, do it. I did my research and everyone said not to exchange money at the airport, but I was like, “how bad could it be?”. So, I went to the money exchange at the airport and gave them $50 U.S. dollars and if you know the exchange rate, they should have given me back somewhere around $60 AUD. Instead, I got back $36 AUD. This is after a $15 AUD (exchange?) fee. It honestly felt like they were stealing my money. But I needed some cash on me right? Whatever, I let it go. Later, I would go to a different exchange place near Circular Quay and they gave me $55 AUD for $50 USD. So, lesson here is next time I need to go find a bank because they usually give the best rates. I’m not too upset because in the end, I used very little cash because they accepted cards at 90% of the places I went to.
SIM CARD
Next stop after the money exchange was to get a SIM CARD. I cannot live without wifi and I needed it for Instagram (priorities). Anyways, I’m very happy with the SIM CARD I got. I went to the OPTUS booth and bought a SIM card for $20 AUD and I got unlimited international calls to the U.S, unlimited text and minutes, and 12 GB of data! woo hoo! More than I’ll ever need for 7 days and all of that is good for 28 days. So, If you’re staying in Australia for a month, get on that. They changed the SIM card and activated it for me. The whole process was so easy and took less than 10 minutes.
AIRPORT TRAIN
Okay, now that I’ve got everything, I wanted to get to the hostel and drop off my stuff. There are car services trying to sell their service. A train into the city is around $18 AUD. They offered door to door drop off for $22 AUD. I eventually decided to take the Airport Train. 1) A single woman traveling alone should not get into cars with strangers. 2) I wanted to save the $4. 3) Airport train is only 20 min. 4) I wanted to familiarize myself with the city’s public transportation.
OPAL CARD
Get it. You’ll need it to ride the metro, the bus, and the ferries. It’s also free! Taiwan charges 100 NT for a metro card. I actually love their OPAL cards. They look nice, and they’re sturdy. I loaded $40 AUD onto the card because it was $18 just from the airport to the city. (At the airport, you can only add in increments of 20.)
SYDNEY HARBOUR YHA
After doing tons of research, I decided to stay at Sydney Harbour YHA for the duration of my trip. It’s truly a great location. It’s close to the ferry, metro and downtown. They have a roof top view of the Opera House! It’s the only accommodation in The Rocks at a low price. I paid $47 AUD per night for a bed in their dormitories. Note: Online it says they have luggage storage, but what they mean is that they have a lockers that you can pay $5 AUD to keep your stuff in. Considering the plane landed at 8:10am, I’m impressed that I left my hostel ready to explore the city at 10:40am.
DAY 1
THE ROCKS MARKET
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I loved this market. It’s located in the Rocks District and there’s a bunch of stands selling hand-made things. There’s handmade clothing, soap, lights, etc. You can find a lot of unique things at the stands,. I really liked the jewelry I saw at the Rocks Market. There’s a little food as well. I was hungry and bought two tacos.
CIRCULAR QUAY ~ CAHILL EXPRESSWAY
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This might have been better if it wasn’t so cloudy, but still a great place to see Circular Quay (pronounced “key”). I wouldn’t say this is a must-see, but if you’re walking around the area and you have the time, it’s not a bad view.
THE STRAND ARCADE
At this point of the day, I’m a little worn, After re-hydrating at a convenience store nearby, I continued to walk to the central buisness district (CBD) and do a little shopping. Retail therapy was what I needed. Little did I know, all the shops were super expensive. Sydney has great clothes, just out of my price range.
ROOFTOP @ SYDNEY HARBOUR YHA
So, I walked back to the hostel a little dejected that I didn’t find anything, and checked-in to my room. After a long shower (remember I haven’t showered since I got off the plane), I was feeling a hundred times better. I was going to take a power nap, but then I met one of my roommates and decided to be social and headed up to the roof top with her to check out the views. They didn’t disappoint.
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CHUR BURGER
Remember the last time I ate? Yeah, it was those tacos at 11am. By now, it’s past 6pm and I’m starving. I’m also that person who already decided where I was going to eat. I did my research, and Chur Burger came up as a really good place to get a burger. I’ve been living in Asia for the past 5 months, so I was really excited for this burger. I actually got their “Special Burger”. The guy behind the register recommended it since the “Special Burger” often changes.
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DOUGHNUT TIME
Since I’m on vacation, I’ve also reasoned that’s okay to eat sweets. Doughnut Time came up a lot on my research, so I definitely wanted to give it a try. I went to the closest one to Chur Burger and bought one To-Go. I was still full from dinner so I took it back to the hostel to eat. I highly recommend this place. I only had one of their donuts, but it was so good! I wanted to try them all! I got the “Liam Hemsworthy” which is a red velvet doughnut with vegan cookies & cream frosting, crushed choc ripple biscuits and a vegan chocolate glaze drizzle! It’s times like these where I wished I was staying in Sydney for a few months so I could try a different flavor every week.
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Having skipped my nap, I decided to call it a night and skip Darling Harbour. Day 2 coming soon!
Much love, Tina. x.
