Taronga

Today Kim and I (and the rest of our Marine class) had our fieldtrip to the Sydney Aquarium. The weather was beautiful, and we had to get up bright and early to be there by 8:45. So I go and grab the 8am bus. Outside the bus is ALL of the americans living in Coogee that are in this class. Bus comes and we FILL the back of this buss, so much that when two Aussies got on board, one of which sat next to me, they made the comment "whoah, what's with all the americans." Being inquisitive folk, they ask me if I am American too and I tell them 1) yes and 2) why we are all on the bus. So this is a 30 min bus ride. I spent the entire time talking with this random guy about everything under the sun, mostly about American/Aussie stuff (similarities/differences).
We got downtown and went to the aquarium. I met with Kim and we waited for the place to open. Got our assignment and were two of the first people in. Having both been there before, we decided that we didn't need to see it all again and instead did the fastest scavenger hunt of all the info on our questionaire. We blew through the aquarium and the 20+ question in about 40-45 min thinking we could head on our way to meet with Aliza and Alex to go to the zoo. We got out and found none of our professors there. One group of girls eventually went back in and fetched them so we could hand in our stuff. So we turned it in and caught a bus up to Circular Quay. Aliza and Alex were on the way but a little behind so Kim and I sat down for a little b-fast before our outing. We scouted some cafes only to find the first one we check was the cheapest. I got a nice eggs/bacon thing while she had something a little lighter, yoghurt I think. Bout that time the other girls showed up and we boarded the ferry over to Taronga. Cool boat ride.
The zoo itself was pretty spectacular. It's located right along the water on the side of this massive hill. You get of the ferry and get on a gondala up to the top and then proceed around the park. Kinda nice on the way up because you could scout the exhibits and where you wanted to go. We planned this loong winding path to hit just about everything in the zoo (editing out a few uneventful parts). They had all manners of creatures in there from native Aussie animals to African animals etc. Couple cool things we saw were right out of the Planet Earth series. One was in this aviary. We looked to the side and found the bird that in one fo the episodes put on the display. It's the one thats black with the blue throat that spreads its wings and twitches its head back and forth. We saw it DOING THAT. I took video. I felt special. I could be a planet earth videographer. (well, it's a nice thought). They also had that one really rare snow leopard in one of the exhibits too.
Anyway...MASSIVE numbers of pictures were taken. We spent roughly from 11am to 4pm at this place exploring with necessary breaks for food and icecream of course. A very worthy day in my books. Boat ride back was also nice because we stood on the bow taking pics of ourselves, the water, and the harbor bridge/opera house. More postcard photos.
When we got back we decided to head to Sydney University (where alex goes) to check it out since I hadn't been yet. Alex gave us the grand tour and took us back to here place where the girls freshened up a bit. I napped a little and Alex, Kim and I semi-finalized out trip to the outback. We grabbed a bite at a place on King St. (really crazy street right near their campus with tons and tons of shops/restaurants/bars/crazy places) at an italian place that had $10 bowls of pasta. Great for cheap dinner and/or drunken munchies according to the USyd residents. The girls had their night planned to go out on the town, and not wanting to intrude I made my way back to Coogee via multiple busses. Late night busing long distances = crazy stuff. I get back to Coogee only to see a stretch hummer and hundreds of people at the palace in costume. No idea why. I don't ask. It's Australia, anything goes. Anyway, twas a long day so I jut crashed back home.