Taronga Zoo Sydney

Taronga Zoo in Sydney sits perched on a hill with glorious views of the harbour, if you're into that sort of thing. You have two main options to get there, drive and park there ($17 for the day) or catch the ferry from Sydney over to Mosman ($12 for an adult return ticket). There is a ferry stop right at the zoo and from there you can catch a gondola to the top of the hill, where the main entrance is. We recently spent half a day meandering our way down past the numerous exhibits on a sunny Saturday. I would recommend no more than half a day, as adults, unless you're super keen on staring animals down. If you're searching for a map like we were, they are given out at the information booth at the top before you enter the actual zoo.

Tassie Mini travel guide - Hobart and surrounds

Freezing on our Bruny Island cruise

Having been to Tasmania three times I'm pretty much an expert... Ha, no... I'm really not, but I thought I might share some of the things to do on Australia's little apple isle. Considering how small Tassie is there are many, many things you can do while you're there!

4 tips to save money at the Australian ski fields

We have just returned from a fun few days at Thredbo, with loads of washing and loads of sore muscles. Australia probably has some of the poorest ski slopes in the world and also some of the heftiest prices. For this reason you'll often hear people questing why you would go to Aussie slopes when you could go to New Zealand. The main reason for Aussie skiing is that, if you live close enough, you can slip away for a couple days rather than taking at least a week off. And of course, skiing is skiing!

The Fernleigh Track: Neat things in Newcastle

Nearly died taking this shot. Not really...

Running from Adamstown to Belmont, the 15km bitumen shared used track is a fantastic place to ride, run or skateboard. The track was build along an old coal train line and is now hugely popular.

Munmorah Conservation Area

Not far south of Newcastle is Munmorah Reserve, a patch of bush with rocky coastline and a couple sandy beaches. We have driven past many times and wondered what's in there. We finally decided to take a quick trip and have a look see.

Jervis Bay

Last weekend we headed down to Jervis Bay, Just South of Sydney, to do some diving. We booked another stay through AirBnB, and other than our host being exhaustingly chatty, it was a good stay.

This isn't us, just some randoms on the beach

Tunneling into history: Fort Scratchley, Newcastle

Fort Scratchley sits atop a hill overlooking Nobby's beach in Newcastle. The number of times we've driven past it or walked near it, and not given it a second thought must be quite significant.

Coffs Harbour

Coffs Harbour has become a bustling little city and quite outgrown it's small town street planning. It makes getting around frustrating, but the coastline is beautiful. We had planned to dive the Solitary Islands, but since Brandon had a cold and I had a stomach bug we had to cancel. The Solitary Islands are a chain of small islands and are in a protected marine park. They are rated as one of the best dive sites in New South Wales. We will definitely have to go back to do the dive!

Dorrigo National Park

Nestled in the mid-north New South Wales coast hinterland is Dorrigo National Park. Accessed from the aptly named Waterfall Way, Dorrigo has a number of waterfalls and plenty of walks to keep you busy.

At the bottom of Dangar Falls

How to survive a multi-stop plane flight, badly

You, or maybe a friend, booked a cheap flight with a few stop-overs. At the time, you didn't think about it much. I mean it was CHEAP. But now, as you actually calculate how long you will spend waiting in various airports, you begin to question your past self. But you're still positive you can survive this, it will be worth it.

This is actually not on a plane but you get the general idea.

A stay in a Buddhist temple

Some other pretty temple; not ours, ours was down a dark alley

When I discovered we had an extra night at the end of our trip and no hotel booked, I thought it would be easy to find a night in Osaka two weeks out. Not so much. After much stress and searching everywhere possible on the internet, I started looking at options outside Osaka. And that's how we came to stay at Koyasan.

A deer little place: Nara

On Friday morning we got up bright an early to catch the train to Nara. Nara used to be Japan's capital, until the capital was moved to Kyoto to prevent the Buddhist monks from getting powerful positions in government. There are quite a few temples there and most are located around a large grassy park that is inhabited by many, many deer. You can buy deer biscuits from any one of the numerous stalls all over the park. Just watch out, the bigger deer get quite unruly when they don't get their way.

Osaka in a day

We bought ourselves Osaka 1 Day Amazing passes when we first arrived from the information centre in Osaka train station. The pass allows you to use the subway, selected private railways, the bus system and enter some attractions for free. We started off our day on Thursday at Osaka Castle. The pass included Osaka Castle Garden too, but we didn't bother since nothing was in flower it just looked like a bunch of dead trees.

Osaka Castle from the Osaka Museum of History

Ryoan-ji and Kinkaku-ji

We were going to get up early to get to our last two sights in Kyoto before the crowds filled them. I am so glad we opted to have a sleep in and worry about the crowds when we got there. It was kind of disappointing again.

Around Kyoto Station

As I said in another post, we have a pretty awesome view from our hotel window. The bathroom may be musty and have clear sings of mold, but we can see To-ji Temple if we hang out the window enough.

The view from our window

The Philosopher's Path and Arashiyuma

Breakfast is included in our hotel here in Kyoto and we were excited. We hate traipsing the streets in the early morning, hungry and half asleep. Usually finding nothing appetising anyway. Breakfast was, interesting. A bit of en eclectic mix of noodles, pasta, bread and jam, mini buns, cabbage, tofu, eggs and some kind of deep fried potato fritter things. Our plan for the day was to tackle Ginkaku-ji and Nanzen-ji in the morning. Followed by a stint at Arashiyuma in the afternoon.

Ginkaku-ji

Fushimi Inari

We arrived in Kyoto in the early afternoon on Sunday, to find it colder than Hakuba. The original plan was to put our luggage in a locker and see a couple temples in the north. Kyoto is a busy place it seems and all the lockers were in use. So instead, after arming ourselves with some maps from the information place, we walked to our hotel. Which turned out to be very close. According to Brandon it was also very close to Fushimi Inari.

Our night in a traditional Japanese Hotel

I really wanted to stay in a Ryokan at some stage in our trip, so I specifically planned it so we would stay in Nagano Sunday night. We were lazy and caught a taxi when we got back to Nagano from seeing the snow monkeys. Our Ryokan turned out to be in a very traditional part of town, and right near a temple. Check in went a little bit awkward. Luckily, again, I had read you need to leave your shoes at the door and make sure not to step on the outside floor with your socks. After putting on our slippers we were taken to our room and served tea. I hadn't read that you aren't supposed to wear your slippers on the tatami floor, and we got scolded for that.

Looking tired because we just woke up!

Jigokudani Yaenkoen: Snow Monkey Park

On Sunday we caught a bus back to Nagano in the morning and caught another bus to Kanbayashi Onsen Guchi to see the snow monkeys that bathe in an onsen. There are two options for seeing the snow monkeys, which are actually macaques. You can do a tour for about $50 per person or you can go yourself. There is a one day snow monkey pass for a bit over $30 per person that includes transport to and from the monkey park and entry to the park. 

Snow day like a ski day

On Thursday it rained. Oh it rained. ALL day it rained. It was very depressing. Although I did finish a book I had started the day before. We decided we would take the free shuttle to Goryu, a nearby mountain, on Friday to test out it's slopes.

Snow and a private Onsen: Hakuba

Day two of our skiing time and we are both stuffed! I'm not a very good boarder yet, and so there have been plenty of frustrated moments on the mountain. We have been skiing at Happo, which is the closest mountain to where we are staying. Because it is the end of the season there is only one other guest at our hotel. What that means is we basically get free run of things. I'm pretty sure during high season they run shuttles to town at particular times. We can just chose a time and a restaurant and get dropped off as we wish. So nice!

Spectacular views on the way down

Historic Nikko

Today we did a little day trip to Nikko, about 2 hours by rapid train out of Tokyo. Thankfully all our other day trips will have shorter travel times because today was massive. We left the hotel at about 6:30am and stepped off the train in Tokyo at about 7:00pm. We chose not to upgrade to limited express train tickets, to save money, but it mean an extra 40minutes on the way home. Nikko is a small town that has a lot of shrines and temples in a small space and so it is very popular for day trips.

A day in Tokyo!

View from the Tokyo Government Metropolitan building

Last night we landed in Tokyo to start our two week ski and sight-seeing holiday. The airport is a bit over an hour from the city centre and we opted to catch a limosine bus (roughly $30pp). We knew our hotel was close to a train station but had no idea how to get from the station to it, so after the bus dropped us at Tokyo train station we just caught a taxi to the hotel. Surprisingly it was less than $10, but it was only a short trip.
Before we left, we were talking about how every time we go to talk to someone in another language Spanish just pops into our heads. As we collected our bags from the bus, the baggage handler asked (in English) "two bags?". "Si," Brandon replied, and I wet myself laughing.

Diving Fish Rock: South West Rocks

Originally I had our Australia Day long weekend all planned out. We were going to do the main range track in Kosciuszko National Park, but then most people I asked didn't want to (maybe couldn't) go, and others didn't really give proper yes or nos. So our plans changed and we ended up at South West Rocks to do "one of the best dives in Australia" at Fish Rock.
There aren't many places to stay in the area and so I decided to try out Air BnB. Although I felt pretty awkward rocking up at a strangers house to stay there a couple nights, it was actually pretty great. I think we would do it again in the future if it worked out cheaper than other accommodation.

Sharks!

South West Rocks

The locals at the light house

This weekend we headed to South West Rocks for a couple of nights. On Saturday, after we did a double boat dive (and Brandon had a nap) we drove down the coast a little way to the highest lighthouse in Australia. The view from the top was pretty great. We could see Fish Rock, where we were diving earlier in the day. 

Dudley Beach

Late last year we went to Dudley beach a couple of times. It's a really nice but small beach tucked in between two headlands and sheltered from the city by a reserve. This gives it a really secluded feeling. Either end of the beach has a lot of rock pools filled with little sea stars of all different colours, and other sea life. I've never seen so many sea stars in my life before and it was really cool to be able to get really close and see the little suckers under their arms.

My Top sights of South America

I should really call this "My top sights of Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia and Chile", but that's too long of a title. There were countless people who asked us what our favourite part of our South America trip was. It would always result in a huge pause and umms and ahhhs. It's far too hard to pick just one favourite part because there are a few that blew our minds equally. So here is the wrap up on our top favourties.

Yes, I am secretly a complete dag... Yes, that is an I love boobies t-shirt...

Swansea Bridge dive, No Fear!

Today we did a morning drive at Swansea bridge again. I was rather nervous on the way there because of how my last dive went. You can read about that here. But we have already dived Swansea Bridge, we have met the instructor before and it's a pretty shallow dive, Maximum about 11m. So I dosed myself up on antihistamine nasal spray and sucked it up.