finally-an-update

Phew! It’s been a hectic couple of weeks. Animania Sydney was awesome! I will put up a dedicated page at some point with photos and comments from the actual event. The trip to Sydney was rather chaotic. There was a stuffup with our accomodation when we arrived on Friday. The place we were supposed to stay was renovating so they called us earlier in the week to say we were being sent elsewhere. When we arrived, the new place were told we weren’t suppose to be arriving until Saturday. The ultimate solution was to spend one night at the original place, then move to the other place for the following two nights. Due to the stuffing around required on the Saturday (and the ‘condition’ of our second location), we decided to scrap it all and find accommodation elsewhere. A ferry ride, Internet cafe stop, train ride and hike later, we were finally settled at the Travel lodge in the city. So much for my day of shopping!

Saturday evening afterAnimania, Eastonroyce and I got the chance to catch up with my uni friend Chris! She introduced us to the wonders of the 24 hour pancake place at Darling Harbour, and the oh-so-delicious Lindt cafe (I still daydream about their famous hot chocolate drinks – pure melted chocolate and hot milk!! YUUUUUUMMM!!). My waistline would have been the better without these two stops but damn it was yummy! Plus, it was lots of fun catching up with Chris’ crazy work antics and salsa dance lessons.

Sunday Eastonroyce and I did the touristy thing and went to Centrepoint Tower. Things have changed lots since I was last there – they now have one of those great virtual reality tours where the seat moves as well as a rotating hologram display. Arriving at the top of Sydney tower, we took delight in spying on the food stalls at Animania, and identifying the cosplayers costumes through the binoculars. We then returned to the Animania convention for a while, stocking up on DVD box sets and even more manga, and sat through a few more events. Loaded with merchandise, we headed back to the hotel. We spent the evening at the outrageously expensive cinema in the city to watch Star Dust which is a brilliant movie, followed by a light dinner and an early night.

Monday morning turned out to be a disaster. Thinking I had booked plane tickets for Monday evening, I discovered I had booked Monday morning instead – after I had already missed that flight. I could get no tickets for the evening flight, nor the Tuesday morning. The next available was Tuesday evening. I attempted to get train tickets, but we had already missed the Monday train, with the next available being Tuesday morning – which in turn wouldn’t get into Narrabri until Tuesday evening anyway. It was a call between the train and the plane, and deciding to extend the holiday a bit, we went with the plane, giving us pretty much all day Tuesday to do as we pleased.

We spent most of Monday shopping in the city, browsing book stores, David Jones and comic bookshops. We then spent the afternoon hanging around Darling Harbour, watching Buskers, more shopping and watching a 3D movie at the IMax theatre. Unable to resist, we had dinner followed by HUGE sundaes for Baskin Robbins. YUMMY! Baskin Robbins icecream is like American Jelly Belly beans. Their flavours are EXACTLY how they describe! I swear the choc-chip cookie dough tasted just like frozen cookie dough – texture and all. *^_^*

Tuesday, our extra holiday day, was spent down at Darling Harbour at the aquarium. I’ve been there twice before, but Eastonroyce had never been, and I swear he was just like a little kid! Face lit up with wonder! Being the start of the school holidays, there was heaps of little kids and families there, but not overly crowded. I loved the platypus, seals and the crocodile. The crocodile tank has an open roof and an upstairs viewing deck which looks down into the tank labelled with a warning sign:

DO NOT ENTER

IF THE FALL DOESN’T KILL YOU, THE CROCODILE WILL.

…followed by an image of a crocodile with an open mouth and a stick figure man falling into it.

The one thing that had both Eastonroyce and myself fascinated though was the barrier reef display with all the tropical fish. There is one room which is completely dark with an ampitheatre set of steps leading down to this one massive wall which is just one big glass window the size of a movie screen. The window looks into a huge tank filled with corals and tropical fish of different colours, shapes and sizes, all swimming in schools. The effect was just magic, and I could happily spend all day in that darkened room just watching the array of colours and listening to the underwater relaxation music.

The aquarium was followed by a quick lunch (Eastonroyces’ was free!) and a hike back to the hotel to retrieve our luggage. I got to show Eastonroyce the delights of Sydney airport – all the shops, cafes and dammit! – a Darrel Lea!!! How cruel is that?! By the time we got home, we were both tired and extremely broke, as we went way over budget with the extra day and travel changes. It seemed the weekend away was a huge series of first for Eastonroyce – first time in a plane, first time up Centrepoint tower, first time at the aquarium etc. It made the trip lots of fun! Overall we had a great time, however, it will be a while before we can manage another trip. Maybe we can scrape together enough money to go the Animania next year?… maybe if I start saving now…