Just pulled the trigger on tickets to Sydney where my youngest is spending the semester. we will be on the ground for 7 days. Looking for suggestions…restaurants, tours, wine touring, must sees. Want to do at least a full day trip from Sidney to a close wine region. Anyone have a guide or company that that they have successfully used in the past? I am totally ignorant here as I didn’t think this trip was even an option with my wife’s schedule.
I haven’t been to Sydney for 25 years, so not a lot of current advice. I’m sure there are Hunter Valley tour companies out there still. Also, walk the bridge, visit Taronga Park Zoo and Bondi, eat bugs and spend a lot of time on the Harbor (we took a nighttime water taxi from Doyle’s on the Beach (meh) to the city that was fabulous). A fabulous town.
Oh, and fix the title
1 Like
I loved Ho Jiak Townhall and Mr. Wongs. Incredibly fresh seafood prepared in Malaysian (jiak) and cantonese (Mr wongs) styles. Both fairly higher end spots.
I rented a car and just drove around.
Can’t speak to wine tasting etc.
Ho Jiak Townhall was great (thanks CFu!).
St. Peter was awesome for fish!
Kiln was excellent as well (great views).
I’d say pricewise, Ho Jiak was medium, St Peters pricey, Kiln in between.
For me, the best things were taking the ferry and walking the great beach path. Bondi to Coogee was fabulous. The walk around South Head (Sydney Harbour south entrance) was better than great. Manly is fun and a long beach if you want a third day.
The Capitol Theater is stunning, check out the lobby if you aren’t going for a show (it’s close to downtown and Hyde Park). I wanted to take the tour but the timing didn’t work out.
Maritime Museum was my favorite museum but only because of the show - award winning ocean photography ( very extensive). Art Gallery of NSW (the major art museum) was good, but not great.
Walking around the Rocks (oldest part of Sydney) was interesting albeit touristy. Plenty of casual food, and an outdoor food center closest to the bridge.
1 Like
yesssss taking the ferry was fantastic.
We did a ferry to Manly and the beach was a short walk through a bunch of restaurants/shops from the ferry stop.
I love Sydney-I’m hoping to go back in the next year or 2. I want to wrap it into a trip to New Zealand, a work in progress.
Last year we stayed near Darling Harbor. Lots of wonderful breakfast/coffee cafe’s near the Star City Casino.
Darling Harbor is nice to walk around, but pretty touristy. Numerous bars and restaurants to choose from. All depends on your mood.
The Harbor Bridge and the Sydney Opera House are walking distance if you have the time. There is a cool “tour” of the Harbor Bridge if heights is not an issue for you :).
You don’t really need to walk as the boat transit system is fantastic. All kinds of stuff around Circular Quay-The Rocks as mentioned above is right there, the Opera House, and all kinds of things. You can take a boat transfer over to the Taronga Zoo which overlooks the water and great views of Sydney. The Sydney Zoo is much larger, but we had a great time at the Taronga Zoo.
Regarding the Sydney transit system-you can buy a day pass which is good for the boats, buses, and train system. Your cc gets charged as you get onto any of these-once you have been changed a certain amount for the day there is no further charges. As I recall that amount was $16.80 or so. One day we had a lot of time to kill so we hopped on and off each stop around Darling Harbor and Circular Quay and had a drink at numerous locations. The boats come by every 15-20 minutes depending where you are.
The Opera House has many different tours-all depends on what you want to see and how long you have. We took at hour tour which was perfect for us. It included lunch which really wasn’t necessary-it was just a voucher to the outdoor restaurant out in front of the Opera House. It was right on the water-great place for a beer and something to eat however.
Our evenings were mostly planned so we weren’t able to really explore the food scene like Charlie did. We did have dinner at Sokyo which was pretty good, but it wasn’t Nobu/Matsuhisa/etc. but we enjoyed it.
Bondi Beach looked great but we happened to go there the day of the “worlds largest fun run” which concluded there. I believe there were 90,000 people there. We did that walk from Bondi to Coogee out of necessity as we couldn’t find a way out of Bondi.
My favorite part of Sydney is the underground bar scene, Speakeasy’s, etc. There is an adventure under, above, and around Sydney. I was also surprised how clean and safe the city seemed. We walked down alleys, into basements, behind buildings and I never felt unsafe. Sounds crazy I know, but it just works there somehow.
Margaret and Mr. Wong’s are wonderful. Quay has great views and a stellar reputation but their preparations are a bit avant garde and the value is risky depending on whether the ingredients employed that night resonate with your tastes.