What to do in Sydney?

[shiznitz]

Never been to Australia, but my job is sending me there and my wife is joining me.  We will have 4 days and 3 nights to do stuff.  We are willing to do tours into the outback if that is worth doing.  We aren't into drinking and clubbing all night at our middle ages.  We do want to have fun though.  Not often we can dump the kids on my parents for almost a week.  We won't be on a budget, but I am not looking to drop thousands of dollars either.  Airfare and hotel mostly paid for so that leaves us some juice.

[Count Nerfedalot]

Oooo Sydney. Possibly my favorite city in the world.  Although I haven't made it to New Zealand yet. Or 99% of the rest of the cities of the world for that matter! LOL

Unless you are disabled use the ferries to get around town. Cheap, often faster than taxis, and the absolute best way to see any city is from the water.  At some of the ferry wharves you can look down into actually clean water and see exotic reef-type fish swimming around.  Or you could 25 years ago anyway.

Sydney has a very nice aquarium, I think in Darling Harbour?

If you're interested in the strange Australian wildlife, Taronga zoo is nice, but mostly the same stuff as at any good zoo in the US.  There is a much bigger zoo out west in Dubbo I think? But that's like a 5 hour drive.  That does get you almost to the edge of the real outback though.  Given your short time there I actually don't recommend going more than a couple hours out of Sydney as you don't want to spend all your time driving back and forth.  Especially once you get over the Blue Mountains the scenery gets kind of monotonous.  Well worth doing if you have more time, but too much to see to devote such a big chunk of your limited time to.

For history, The Rocks has some interesting stuff about what life was like for the transportees (not pleasant) plus lots of touristy junk.

Are you going soon? It's early spring there now, not a bad time to get to one or more of the beaches although possibly too cold to swim yet.  Take the ferry out to Manly beach, and wander through the nice little town (like 3 or 4 blocks wide?) between the inland ferry side and the seaward beach side.  My favorite Sydney seaside was the South Head area.  Some nice restaurants plus spectacular views of waves and rocks but I don't recall if there was a beach there.  Again, water taxi is the fun way to get out there.  Bondi seemed overrated and overpriced to me, but still nicer than the South Carolina beaches I grew up with. 

See if something interesting is playing at the Opera House - it really is a nice venue but be sure to pick something you're actually interested in seeing, the variety is all over the map.

An early dinner at sunset in the Sydney Tower is probably going to be expensive and not that great of food, but the view is fantastic and doubly so if you get there at just the right time to see it both in daylight and twilight/evening.

Australia has some wonderful food.  The seafood, lamb and range-fed beef are all superb as are the wines.  And they have lots of asian food options as well, the best Sushi I've ever had was at a place on Military Road in North Sydney, plus Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese, Indian, etc.

Katoomba and the Blue Mountains are great for a day trip if you want to get in a little hiking.  There's nothing like the smells of walking through a eucalyptus forest.  I think it's still early enough in the season to avoid the flies, though the timing may have changed due to climate change.  If the flies are out in force you'll probably want to stick to the ocean area where the sea breeze keeps them grounded.  There's a park/forest just south of the Sydney sprawl who's name escapes me that's also real nice. I didn't see any Koalas there (I think they may be completely gone from the area now) but I did see a couple wild wombats and lots of birds.  They had bad fires about 10 years ago all around Sydney so find out from the locals what's currently the nicest places to visit.

The Royal Botanical Gardens are pretty, but very much in the British over-manicured style.

Speaking of manicured, the Chinese Gardens in Darling Harbor are spectacular.

A Balloon ride in the Hunter Valley is lovely, combined with wine tasting to make a nice full day trip.  Best to get in on a tour/excursion for that though, as that generally entails a very early morning drive out for the just-after-sunrise balloon ride, and you need a driver if you're going to be doing much wine tasting anyway!  But they do make some fantastic wines there.  And probably better ports than Portugal!


And 4 days is just about enough time to get over the jet-lag, just in time to come back and have it all over again!  From Charlotte it was 24-26 hours of airports and airplanes till landing in Sydney.  My preferred practice was to stay up all night the night before the flight, then sleep pretty much all the way over (wake up to look if you pass over the Grand Canyon or Yosemite if the weather cooperates though!).  You typically land in Sydney in the morning so you have a whole day ahead of you and your body is waay confused so get all the sleep you can on the flight over.  And hope you have a decent room service in your hotel because you WILL get seriously hungry about midnight the first couple of nights!

Get Bill Bryson's "In a Sunburned Country" and read or listen to it before you go/or enroute there.

Get the best sunscreen you can find and use it diligently.  They're still cutting cancers off of me from the year I spent there.   

[Tale]

I live in Sydney. Will you be here soon? The weather is warming up - we are in spring, heading into summer. The sun here is really strong.

Australia is huge. The size of the 48 contiguous US states, but with only 21 million total population, almost all in coastal cities. Sydney is an international city of 4.6 million, on the eastern edge of the nation. Seeing the real outback is probably not possible in the time available, unless you make the outback your focus (if so, fly to Alice Springs and see Uluru and the West McDonnell Ranges). However, you could get out of town on a day trip or two.

You'll find it expensive here, because we are in a boom time due to China's massive demand for our mineral exports, which shielded us from the GFC. Our dollar used to be worth US$0.60, but is now worth US$1.02 so effectively prices have nearly doubled for you. All the world's boutique brands have set up shop here, as they can make a sizeable buck from imports.

Things I would recommend doing:

- Get on a ferry from Circular Quay (centre of the city) to Manly. It's a great cheap way to see the famous harbour. Walk down The Corso (main street of Manly, mostly a pedestrian mall) to the ocean beach and relax, until you feel like catching the ferry back to the city.

- If you like food and drink, it's worth wandering around Darlinghurst and Surry Hills (inner-city suburbs) which have exploded with small bars, gourmet cafes and bakeries. Lots of young hipster types around there, but it's worth experiencing.

- Visit our Chinatown and the areas around it - we're next-door to Asia so it's buzzing.

- Take a day trip to the quaint town of Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, to visit the lookout at The Three Sisters, a rock formation in a canyon type area that gives you an idea of the sheer magnitude of wild nature that exists... you're on the edge of a true wilderness there, and it's just near Sydney.

And breathe the air. It's clean here. The tap water is great. The beaches are awesome and the Pacific water is clean and full of life. It's not quite so harmonious among the population, as the political climate is leaning to the right, with racial tensions... but you probably won't encounter that as a tourist.

We have good cold beer and excellent local wine. Fruit, vegetables, fish, meat and Asian cuisines are all amazing here. Enjoy yourselves.

P.S. Bondi beach is very famous, but not that great IMHO. It's also subject to massive road congestion, overpopulation in the area, and high prices. The northern beaches stretching from Manly to Palm Beach are more beautiful and quieter.

[lamaros]

Random thoughts (I live in Sydney):

The beach is pretty good. It is warm enough to swim at the moment if you're not too fragile.

Depending what you're interested in the location can vary. Sydney is often referred to as a "city of villages", and it's somewhat correct, in that the different pockets can be very different and somewhat disconnected.

Sydney is one of the best cities in the world for eating in my experience, so if you like that I encourage you to get out and enjoy it. There is stuff everywhere, from the harbour to bondi to surry hills and further west, with almost any cuisine you might enjoy. (Depending on when you are coming you might need to book soon if you want to go to anywhere really well known!)

You can't really get to the 'outback' or anything like that from Sydney without making it a major focus of your trip.

Taking a ferry is massively cliché, but also one of the best things to do to see a bit of the harbour. If you're up for it taking a ferry to the north side of the harour will get you to a few nice walks, or Manly.

I can't recommend the Zoo. The setting is nice, but it's expensive and the zoo itself is a bit meh. Just talk a walk around some of the bays instead.

The Blue Mountains is a pretty good trip if you're into that sort of thing. I hope you like walking, because it's the best way to see parts of it.

If you really like food I might recommend Melbourne for a day, though it's not really the best time of year to go now.

But yeah, it's a big city. There's lots of stuff around so it very much depends on what you want to get our of your trip if you want really good recommendations.

EDIT: Canberra is the capital and only 3 hours by car, but don't waste your valuable time, seriously.

[Tale]

EDIT: Canberra is the capital and only 3 hours by car, but don't waste your valuable time, seriously.

This. Canberra is just a small Washington DC wannabe, planned to imperfection around an ugly artificial lake. Sydney and Melbourne couldn't agree on which would be the nation's capital, so they built Canberra in the middle, inland. Meh.

[Lt.Dan]

I lived in Sydney for almost ten years and loved it.  Definitely second the suggestions above, especially the manly trip. I'd also add checking out what's on at the opera house or other venues.  I'd also suggest Sailor's Thai canteen for a lunch or dinner but I should caveat that with the fact that I haven't been there for a few years.

[Chimpy]

As others have said, take the train out to Katoomba and walk/hike a bit around the Blue Mountains. That was one of the best parts of my trip there almost a decade ago.

[Shannow]

EDIT: Canberra is the capital and only 3 hours by car, but don't waste your valuable time, seriously.

If only the rest of the country could live by this advice. 

[Count Nerfedalot]

As others have said, take the train out to Katoomba and walk/hike a bit around the Blue Mountains. That was one of the best parts of my trip there almost a decade ago.

This, this and the subtext there too!  Unless you discover when they open the doors of the airplane that you are allergic to eucalyptus (happened to a friend's sister who discovered this when she landed in Sydney with her immigration papers) in which case you're screwed.

Don't bother with renting a car unless you are dead set on spending hours in it for some reason.  The trains, buses and ferrys can get you most places and taxis and walking for the rest will save you enormous headaches from dealing with traffic, parking, and the quaint local expectation that you drive on the left side of the road. Plus you'll get a much broader experience of the sights, aromas, sounds and people of the city.

If you do drive take extra care with right turns and roundbouts. And you'll probably discover repeatedly that they've swapped the turn signal and wiper controls on you!

[UnSub]

As others have said, taking a day to do a ferry trip around Sydney Harbour is a good option, or at least out to Manly and back.

You can walk on top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge if you don't have any physical condition problems and are willing to pay the not-particularly-cheap fee to do so.

If you are walking through Sydney, be aware that parts of it are quite steep since the land slopes down to the Harbour.

If you are trying to find something to watch at the Opera House book sooner rather than later.

EDIT: Should have asked: what are you and your wife into ( )? Food? History? Shopping? Nature? That might help provide a clearer path.

EDIT 2: The Luxe Guides have usually been pretty good and Sydney has one. Try to get the paper guide - everything I've read about the app screams to stay away.

[pants]

Other pointers from an ex-Sydneysider.

The place is crazy expensive.  Every time I go back to Sydney I can't believe how expensive everything is.  You'll be shocked coming from the US.

Bondi beach I personally think is overrated, but if it happens to be a hot weekend when you're here it can be worth a few hours of peoplewatching.  (Or at least drunk english backpacker watching).

Kings Cross is overrated.  Shifty looking bars and strip clubs.

Just repeating the others - ferry trip, blue mountains, food is all good.  If you are a bit of a foodie, smh.com.au is the sydney morning herald, check out their food reviews section.  And booking especially for a Fri or Sat night is good.  Some of the big places you need to book months in advance.

If you have a sunny day, sydney tower is touristy but a great view across Sydney.

[shiznitz]

We are going the week of Thanksgiving in the US (Nov 18-14).  The first few nights we are at the Westin (my job pays for these nights) then we are moving to the Bayswater which was highly rated on TripAdvisor and seemed reasonable at $150 a night.

We would be willing to head to Melbourne for a night or two if there is cool stuff to do there, not just a different set of bar/restaurants.  I really have no idea what we plan to do.  My wife will be googling furiously for the next month, I am sure.

[Tale]

We are going the week of Thanksgiving in the US (Nov 18-14).  The first few nights we are at the Westin (my job pays for these nights) then we are moving to the Bayswater which was highly rated on TripAdvisor and seemed reasonable at $150 a night.

We would be willing to head to Melbourne for a night or two if there is cool stuff to do there, not just a different set of bar/restaurants.  I really have no idea what we plan to do.  My wife will be googling furiously for the next month, I am sure.

Melbourne is not as scenic. It has a grungy, cool, arty, more European cafe and chic small bar vibe. Sydney is trying to mimic this, having changed the liquor laws to allow small bars, and it's working. But Sydney is mainly the glitzy glamour city, beautiful views everywhere, over-the-top events/festivals and a big gay scene.

The main difference comes from their layout: Sydney is hilly and broken up everywhere by branches of the harbour and rivers. It becomes dysfunctional easily when a road, bridge or train line is blocked, because there are hardly any alternative routes. Whereas in Melbourne there are always eight different ways to get somewhere, because it's a flat bayside city with one simple river.

Pronunciation guide: Melbourne = "Melb'n". Brisbane: "Brisb'n". Mate.

[Tale]

The first few nights we are at the Westin (my job pays for these nights) then we are moving to the Bayswater which was highly rated on TripAdvisor and seemed reasonable at $150 a night.

The Westin is right in the heart of the city. Perfect place to be. Celebrities stay there, and it's next to Macquarie Bank, the merchant bank of the wealthy. I used to have a parking spot there for work.

Bayswater is a fancy way of saying Kings Cross, Sydney's red light district. I don't know the hotel, but see what pants wrote: "Kings Cross is overrated.  Shifty looking bars and strip clubs." Safe most of the time (lots of people love the area) and still a useful base for everything, just watch out for the bad craziness of the streets after 1am when public transport stops.

[UnSub]

Pronunciation guide: Melbourne = "Melb'n". Brisbane: "Brisb'n". Mate.

The lazier you are with your english, the more Australian you'll sound.

Sydney is the busier, more business-y city with more recognisable landmarks, Melbourne is the more cultural, alt-chic, cafe-based kind of place. If asked which one you like the most, it's the city you are currently in. 

In some ways I'd suggest you pick one location rather than two for the amount of time you are staying, but if you just want a quick tour of each it would be very doable.

For restaurants in Australia, I usually scan Urban Spoon (http://www.urbanspoon.com/c/70/Sydney-restaurants.html) for some idea of what's available. If you like Vietnamese food, The Red Lantern (on Riley, since I see two listed) was very good last time I was there.

[Tale]

For restaurants in Australia, I usually scan Urban Spoon (http://www.urbanspoon.com/c/70/Sydney-restaurants.html)

Agree re UrbanSpoon. It's worth browsing http://www.au.timeout.com/sydney for some ideas.

I'm a fan of Glebe Point Road in the inner suburb of Glebe. Great bookshops, cafes, bars and restaurants of all kinds. Can't go wrong.

A fun Japanese restaurant near Chinatown is Wagaya, at 1/78 Harbour Street. You order from a touchscreen on your table, and someone appears with your food, which is very good and well priced. Popular, but it's big enough to just walk in and get a table, and has a good vibe.

[lamaros]

For restaurants in Australia, I usually scan Urban Spoon (http://www.urbanspoon.com/c/70/Sydney-restaurants.html)

Agree re UrbanSpoon. It's worth browsing http://www.au.timeout.com/sydney for some ideas.

I'm a fan of Glebe Point Road in the inner suburb of Glebe. Great bookshops, cafes, bars and restaurants of all kinds. Can't go wrong.

A fun Japanese restaurant near Chinatown is Wagaya, at 1/78 Harbour Street. You order from a touchscreen on your table, and someone appears with your food, which is very good and well priced. Popular, but it's big enough to just walk in and get a table, and has a good vibe.

TimeOut can be a good read. Urbanspoon can be very random with its ratings.

I used to live in Glebe and can't honestly say there is any reason to go there, apart from one very obvious exception: The Glebe Point Diner is an excellent restaurant.

Also I really don't like Wagaya. It's fun in Tokyo, but feels a bit naff in Sydney (also I would argue with this food being 'very good'). My favourites are Toko and Wasavie. There's also Tetsuya's, which is probably booked out for most of the rest of the year already, and many many others (a lot of which I have visited - if Japanese food is your thing ask away).

Edit: On the Melbourne thing - I would have said visiting for a day or two would have been good if you could go and catch an AFL game at the MCG (if you like sport) or other major events were on (Melbourne Cup, etc), but you look to miss most of that stuff with your timing, so I'd give it a miss.

[shiznitz]

The first few nights we are at the Westin (my job pays for these nights) then we are moving to the Bayswater which was highly rated on TripAdvisor and seemed reasonable at $150 a night.

The Westin is right in the heart of the city. Perfect place to be. Celebrities stay there, and it's next to Macquarie Bank, the merchant bank of the wealthy. I used to have a parking spot there for work.

Bayswater is a fancy way of saying Kings Cross, Sydney's red light district. I don't know the hotel, but see what pants wrote: "Kings Cross is overrated.  Shifty looking bars and strip clubs." Safe most of the time (lots of people love the area) and still a useful base for everything, just watch out for the bad craziness of the streets after 1am when public transport stops.

This makes me a little nervous, but my wife and I are not likely to be out and about after 10pm, so maybe it is ok.  Hotels quickly got to $250 a night after the Bayswater.

[Chimpy]

I stayed at a place that I thought was nice and was really cheap in Kirribilli called the Glenferrie Lodge. It is more of a hostel/guesthouse with the rooms not having adjoining bathrooms (there are a series of individual shower and toilet stalls on each floor). But it was in a nice and quiet residential neighborhood like 2 blocks from the ferry wharf. There was only one night the entire time I was there that I needed to get a taxi home instead of just taking the ferry because it was like 4 am and the ferry had stopped running.

Mind you, this was 8 years ago so things may have changed, but if you are not expecting an American-style Holiday Inn type place I thought it was very good. You might want to check it out.

I am sure the crime level is probably pretty low as the Prime Minister's Sydney residence is about 50 yards away.

[Mosesandstick]

Is Bayswater the area with the gay bars/restaurants? I stayed there last time (thanks Mom!) and it was pretty pleasant.

[lamaros]

Is Bayswater the area with the gay bars/restaurants? I stayed there last time (thanks Mom!) and it was pretty pleasant.

That's more Oxford street in general. The Byswater is right across from some Kings Cross clubs like World Bar.

Of course if you enter from a different street (or before 10) it is something of a different world, so I wouldn't worry too much.

[Count Nerfedalot]

I got to spend 3 weeks in Melbourne after my year in Sydney.  I like nature and scenic views a lot more than clubbing or galleries or pub crawls and the like, so I really didn't like Melbourne much until I got out of town.  My 12-14 hour workdays didn't help - although it was interesting to learn what happens when you drop a 1-ton roll of newsprint on it's end from 20 feet up.  It bounces.  And makes a remarkably loud booming sound, at least in an empty warehouse the size of a football field with a parking garage underneath it.  And crumples like an accordion.  So YMMV and all that. 

Anywho, I found I liked Victoria (the state Melbourne is in) more the farther I was from Melbourne (and my workplace! LOL).  To the east is Philip Island, where you can get up close (like within a couple feet) of hundreds of fairy penguins when they come ashore at sunset.  To the west is the Great Ocean Road, a drive that may be even prettier than California's Pacific Coast Highway, with it's fantastic views of ocean and cliffs and sea stacks and forests and whales (depending on the season) and beaches and waves and the like.  It was meaningless but still awesome to look out to sea and contemplate that there was nothing but water between me and Antarctica.

Either of those does require a car though.  And driving in Melbourne (for the average suburban American, at least) is ... interesting. Over and above all the normal left side stuff, Melbourne adds interesting twists like trams sharing (not politely) lanes with cars, "Right Turn from Left Lane Only" intersections (for real.  I got a picture of that sign somewhere!  basically you move left out of the way until the signal changes then you and maybe one other get to scoot across the intersection before it fills with the cross traffic  ), and some law about someone turning across traffic lanes has right-of-way over someone turning with the traffic - so someone turning right across the road in front of you has right of way over you if you are turning left into the same side street, but not if you are going straight.  I think.  Like most strange-seeming Aussie stuff, those all make sense in a weird sort of way, but remembering them in the heat of the moment while also dealing with an entire country full of people determined to drive on the wrong side of the road can be challenging. 

[lamaros]

Driving in Melbourne is heavenly compared to Sydney.

[UnSub]

basically you move left out of the way until the signal changes then you and maybe one other get to scoot across the intersection before it fills with the cross traffic 

Hook turns. Confuse the hell out of me too.

[Azazel]

I think the theory behind them is to get people who are turning right the hell out of the way of the tram lines, instead of clogging them up. Of course the fact that Hook Turns are pretty much only located in the Central Business District makes it all the more awesome.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hook_turn

[lamaros]

Yeah, it's because of the trams. They're also pretty easy and make sense once you understand the logic behind them. You are just moving into the from row of the cross traffic and waiting for their green light.

[Tale]

Even as a Sydneysider driving in Melbourne, hook turns freak me out.

[lamaros]

To continue this detail a little more: As a Melbournian who has now lived in Sydney for a few years I have to say Sydney's "hello, surprise one way street! You're fucked! Please do a convoluted 20 min u-turn to get one street over" are far far worse.