Tuesday last week I was able to watch a Freedom of Entry military parade through Mosman (part of the International Fleet Review).  The parade was short, but it was really cool to see a few hundred people (many of them schoolchildren) turn out, many of them applauding the servicemembers.  That evening, I was uber-touristy and went to Madame Tussauds and the Sydney Tower.  I had arranged to go to Madame Tussauds first and then head to the Sydney Tower so I could be there during sunset.

The tower wasn’t far from touristy Darling Harbour.  On the way there, I happened by the Queen Victoria Building (QVB), a large mall in a gorgeous historical building.  I’m going to have to take a tour of it at some point.

On Wednesday last week, I went to the suburb of Chatswood to see what I might find at the mall there.  The answer was a really large and confusing mall similar to those in America in that it did not have much that I cared for or would even use.  I did find that department store Myer not only had out their Christmas stuff (which involved snow and glitter–don’t they have any tropically-themed Christmas decorations here?) but was also having a fantastic book sale.  I had to tear myself away before I bought too much.

Friday I went to nearby Balmoral Beach and discovered that it was even more gorgeous (and much larger) than Clifton Gardens on Chowder Bay.

Sunday I took the ferry downtown and wandered around The Rocks, a historical part of town that is now home to a lot of bars and restaurants.  It so happened that there was a market where a large number of vendors were selling clothes, jewelry, and crafts.  After fortifying myself at Pancakes on the Rocks (where there are many  ways of making pancakes even more unhealthy than they already are), I decided to walk across the Sydney Harbour Bridge, which enabled me to get pictures like this one:

The bridge is not as long as you’d think:  It’s only 3,770 feet long.  There was another market happening in Kirribilli, just over the bridge.  I also happened to discover a bar that shows baseball, which surprised me, although on Monday I discovered that select NFL games are aired here on cable.

Tuesday night I wandered around Hyde Park during the Night Noodle Markets sponsored by the Sydney Morning Herald.  A ton of restaurants (almost exclusively Asian) set up shop here to sell small tastes or entire plates.  There were also several beer and wine gardens, too.  I was glad my host told me about this–otherwise I might not have known.  The setup was gorgeous.

I’ve spent a fair amount of today assessing which bank would be the best to go with and figuring out how to open a PO box here. Sounds like fun, right? Until next time…

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