I visited Australia for the first time in 2018. Had a fantastic time in Melbourne, Adelaide, Kangaroo Island and Coober Peddy, an opal mining town in the outback. Visiting Australia is something like visiting the United States. You can’t see it all and you need to pick a few places to concentrate and then come back for another visit.
Australia has a very interesting history. While Australia and the aboriginal culture is very very old (50,000 – 65,000 years ago) colonization of Australia and the founding of various cities isn’t that old. In fact, it seems like explorers, while believing Australia existed, kept missing it in their navigations. The first European landing was by the Dutch in 1604 on the west coast. They did map a portion of the west coast, claimed it for the Dutch, named it New Holland and left. There was no talk or plans to explore any other area or try to colonize what was seen.
James Cook, in 1770, mapped the eastern coast of Australia and claimed it for Great Britan. By the mid 1800s the rest of the continent had been mapped and claimed entirely for Great Britan. The country was divided into 6 colonies or states.
Aboriginal Australian culture is considered one of the oldest continuous cultures on earth. It has been estimated that at the time of the Dutch contact, there were somewhere from 300,000 to 1 million Aboriginal people. This was spread between many different groups, villages, economies with a focus on working together. Their values are based upon reverence for the land. It is their responsibility to tend and take care of the land, so the land will take care of them.
Once the European colonization occurred, their fate was somewhat like the American Indian. Introduced diseases killed many Aboriginal people, some estimates as high as 50% of the population. Land was taken and lives lost in the process. Australia at one point, had a policy to remove aboriginal children from their home to be educated in orphanages – for the betterment of the child.
Once Great Britain lost the American colonies, they were no longer able to transport their convicts to America. The British prisons were overflowing with criminals – many to most charged with petty crimes ( stealing bread, yelling at a policeman) and ages ranging from 7 to 87. Great Britian determined that Australia would be an excellent location to open penal colonies and Sydney was formed in 1788. The prisoners were often forced into labor for willing immigrants but at the end of their sentence could assimilate into Australian society.
With a series of gold rushes starting in 1850 a couple of things happened. First the transport of convicts to Australia was stopped. The ‘threat’ of being sent to Australia was no longer a crime deterrent or horrible sentence but an opportunity to riches. It also opened Australia to a rapid influx of people from various countries/cultures all vying to become rich. This influx caused resentment and discord that saw discrimination and hatred to anyone not fitting the European ‘standards’. Australia instituted a ‘White People Policy’ to protect the rights of white people and disenfranchise nonwhites. This policy continued until 1974.
Please keep in mind that the above are a series of interesting points that I learned and discussed with some guides and residents. It is not a comprehensive history of Australia by any means. The Aboriginal history is extremely intriguing and extensive by itself.
Australia has been expanding their population starting with a post WW II plan of ‘populate or perish’. Tracked in 2022 around 40% of the population are foreign born. The Australian population is approaching 27 million and about 70% live in the urban centers of 5 cities along the eastern coast – Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Canberra. Taking the continents land mass into consideration, Australia is also one of the least populated countries looking at the # of people per sq km. The outback is vast and most of it is not populated at all.
The cruise concentrated on Sydney and Brisbane on Australia’s eastern coast. I was excited to visit new to me places and planned to get off the boat in Sydney and do an overland trip to meet up with the boat in Brisbane. This gave me several days on land that would have been spent sailing between the 2 cities. 1 hour plane ride, 8 hour car ride or 2 days at sea steaming at glacial speed. Not a difficult choice.
Sydney’s population is around 6 million and was a very fun city to visit. It is also one of the most expensive cities in the world. They are in a housing crisis of both cost and availability. Trying to find a rental often means you are vying with 40 other applications. Talking with some residents, it was described as a young city - a great place for 1-2 people but when it comes to raising families, it is best to move to other cities such as Brisbane where your money goes further.
I enjoyed Sydney because it is almost cashless in all their transactions. Uber is very popular, taxi's take credit cards, there are no threshold amounts to charge on a card. Even their extensive public transportation (all well laid out and heavily used), ferries, trams, metro, light rail are all tap on and tap off with a credit card. The cashless culture was a product of Covid and everyone has full on adopted it. Being someone who rarely has cash on hand, I was loving every minute. At one point, I was looking for an ATM and even using google, could not find a working one and people I asked, had no idea.
We arrived in Sydney right before sunrise. I was startled to realize I had a super view out the cabin. On one side of the boat, the Sydney Opera House. The other side had a nice view of the Harbor bridge. We were docked right down in the Harbor Bay, alongside the ferry traffic and old downtown. Fantastic location to explore.
As we arrived the moon and sun were exchanging places. I'm not sure if it is a star or planet to the left of the moon. But it was such a pretty sight - a quiet time before the city stirred.
With a little more sunrise, details on the Opera House were more visible
Another lovely view from the other side of the boat - the Harbor Bridge
We docked in the area call the 'Circular Quay' - the hub of ferry terminals, transportation, historic areas, museums and very walkable.
Sydney has a huge amount of skyscrapers – one of the leading cities by # of buildings.
But I appreciated that not every old building was pulled down to make way for progress. Walking the streets you could find patches of original buildings used for business or residential buildings. Of course, historically significant buildings were preserved but could also have other uses with restaurants etc. now part of the building. This was right outside my hotel of 34 floors.
Flocks of Black faced Ibis roamed the city - not only in the parks but wherever they chose - traffic and humans did not concern them.
Sydney consists of multiple areas ( Chinatown, garden district, the Rocks) all accessible and very different. A quick ride on the light rail gave a great introduction which I followed up with a city tour. Here are some highlights:
Commons House used for tax collecting long ago. Now a combination of museum and bar / restaurant.
Queen Victoria Building
State Theater opened in the 1920’s and is active today as people lined up for a matinee of ‘Elvis’.
Bondi Beach- is probably the most well-known beach in Sydney. Like Malibu Beach in California there was also a section devoted to serious weightlifting and working out. In the mouth of the bay is a shark beacon – if a mass of a certain size is detected, sirens sound and everyone knows to get out of the water now. Surfing is huge. I learned that Australia was the first country to train ocean lifeguards. Created to assist people with the wicked undertow and rip currents.
The Rocks – one of the original poorer areas of Sydney. Next to the harbor, today it is vibrant with restaurants, breweries, markets and is highly sought after and expensive to live there.
View from the wealthiest area ( 1 smaller house recently sold for over 150 million AUD or 97 million USD). Sitting on a patio with that view wouldn't be too bad.
Sydney University has about 60,000 students and I was told that over 65% were foreign students. The comment was – ‘we are educating Asia and then they stay to work’. I had a hard time validating those figures but Education by dollars is the third highest export of Australia. The original buildings all consist of local Australian sandstone. Excuse the finger on the photo. I was going to play with editing it but after all the uproar with Kate's editing, it is what it is.
It seemed gorgeous views were on every corner. The mouth of the Sydney Harbor contained ‘Suicide Rocks’. Sadly the name was given because it is a popular place for people who choose to commit suicide. The path along the cliff was loaded with CCTV cameras all for the intent for interceding / stopping those plans. My guide shared that anyone who could manage to jump was 100% successful due to the all the rocks below.
I also spent a day outside the city in the Blue Mountain area. That is about an hour west of Sydney and covers about 4000 square miles of canyons and mountains that are prominent in Australia’s history. Not only spiritually important in the Aboriginal culture but also the site of the 1850s gold rushes. The Blue Mountain name is due to the blue color that occurs with sunlight reflecting off the oil on the leaves of the eucalyptus trees. I hope you see some of that in my pictures. People often think it is a hazy day but, it really does look blue. It was a nice drive to the area to see small towns and suburbs of Sydney and we stopped at less touristy outlooks until we reached Three Sisters which is iconic for the Blue Mountains. Enjoy.-weather wise it was a perfect day as the area can be quite foggy.
This is not haze or clouds but an example of the blue light reflection of oil on eucalyptus leaves.
The Three Sisters
Brisbane
Brisbane was a much different experience. It isn’t as large (slightly more than 2 million people), not as many skyscrapers and more family oriented. Downtown included more residential buildings then Sydney. It was walkable and didn’t have or perhaps need the same amount of public transportation. The main downtown area was pedestrian only.
I did learn that Australians love their casinos. Australia as a country has one of the highest number of casinos in the world. Perhaps 1 reason is that Australia does not tax ‘luck’. That includes not only casino winnings but things such as lotteries as well. With the exception that while winning at a casino is considered luck, if you go every day, it is considered your job, and you are taxed. I don’t know how they monitor that. But I did figure out that if I needed an ATM, I looked for a casino!
They had a lovely vast public park and botanical garden that culminated in a mountain top viewpoint.
I actually had a mission for Brisbane. If you spend any amount of time with me, you can figure out that I think animals are better than most people. This mission was special.
Yep – I held another Koala. I was able to hold Koala’s during my first visit and I’m telling you, it doesn’t get old. They are cute and cuddly, smell like eucalyptus and since they sleep 22 hours a day, not that rambunctious. Australia is quite strict in their laws of koala holding to make sure the koalas are respected and not stressed. You can only hold a Koala in 2 states. Very few places will let you reserve a time to hold in advance. It must be disappointing to visit a place and then be told all the slots are full for today. My options were short, but it all worked out.
I also spent some time feeding Kangaroos – they are always fun as well. Look at the back claws on a kangaroo. This was a small female but I wouldn't want to be on the angry end of those claws.
The Roos were more interested in eating than fighting and adapted to human presence and touch. Some had learned to hold your hand. More so to indicate they weren't done eating - just had to chew what they had taken.
All in all, a good choice to be on land for several days.
The next installment will be Papua New Guinea. Another place that was never on my list to consider visiting. But the more I read, the more intrigued I'm becoming. I don't know what reality will bring - it's an adventure for sure!
Hooroo!
As always, so interesting! Thanks for taking the time to write it all down!