33°53′23″ S 151°16′31″ E
Bondi Beach, Sydney, Australia

G’day Mates! After an epic journey we have finally landed in Sydney, Australia on the first part of our “down under” adventure.

We started a few days ago at home in London. Our friend Barb Ford was in town from Winnipeg to have a brief visit with us & to attend a high school reunion. Sunday afternoon she & Emily took us to the airport to catch our first flight – a 2 hour hop from London to Ottawa.

After a brief layover in Ottawa we boarded a 5 hour flight to Vancouver. This was starting to feel like a long day – & we had just begun!

Next came a 4 hour layover in Vancouver & then at midnight Vancouver time we boarded our 16 hour flight to Sydney. That’s a whole lot of open water to cross!

All of our flights were as comfortable as they could be – when flying economy. We watched a lot of movies & napped as best we could in-between. Needless to say we were pretty tired when we finally landed in Sydney at 10:30am local time.

We took a taxi from Sydney Airport to the Bondi Beach area. That was an adventure in itself! I think we stopped at every red light along the way. What was supposed to be a 20 minute ride took almost an hour! Oh well, we made & that’s what really counts.

We are staying at the Bondi Hotel, which is right across the road from the beach. This hotel was built in the early 1900’s & still has the same facade as when it was first built. Thankfully the rooms & the plumbing have been modernized. Very clean & comfortable! I am sure we will enjoy our stay here.

After securing our room we walked down to the beach to see if we could spot Dr. Chris (the Bondi Vet) out for his daily jog but we must have just missed him. Maybe tomorrow.

Being down under in Australia takes a little bit of getting used to but we soon got adjusted to the orientation of the planet & the gravity settings here.

That’s much better!

The weather was very sunny but the wind was quite strong, with gusts up to 70 km/hr. Surf’s up & there were a number of people out there taking advantage of it. There were more people with surfboards than there were people on bicycles!

The commercial area of Bondi Beach is heavily oriented towards beach lovers & tourism but it is very well done. Lots of choices for fast food, casual dining & shopping.

We grabbed a bite to eat at a very nice little bar overlooking the beach & then went on a walking tour to explore the area some more. We were pretty tired from our trip but we’re determined to stay up & outside for as long as we could to help us beat the jet lag.

Big plans for tomorrow. We need to be well rested – especially Catherine as she has something special planned.

Cheers!