Sydney Holiday - I

My much awaited trip of the year - Sydney was a good one. Except that I DID NOT skydive.What a disappointment. Sigh...

The  6 day trip started with a 7 hour smooth journey to Sydney. On the 1st day we visited  Queen Victoria Building located at the Sydney CBD. It is one of the most elegant shopping mall I've ever been to. The beautiful Victorian style architecture was a stunner.

The main highlight of the stay was the 3 hour  (but it lasted for about 4 hours, lucky us!) whale watching cruise for which we had booked our tickets from Singapore. True to the phrase "Money is best spent on experiences, not stuff", we thoroughly enjoyed sighting 3-4 pods of humpback whales waving at us gracefully. Truly a must do when you are in Aussie.

I was eagerly awaiting to click pictures of the Australia's of most recognisable landmarks Opera House and the Sydney Harbor Bridge. To my satisfaction, I did manage to get a couple of decent pictures. I was indeed stunned by the beautiful Opera House and the Magnificent Harbor Bridge which recently celebrated its 80th birthday.

1 day trip to Blue Mountains to see the famous Three Sisters rocks and riding the world's steepest railway (52 ° !) and getting to know some history about the Aborigines is all worth recording in this blog post.And how did we miss checking out the natives of Australia - cuddly Koala Bears and  bounding Kangaroos? No, we did not miss them at the Featherdale wild life park.

Based on my experience, Sydneysiders were very friendly, cheerful and helpful all the time.One more thing that attracted me was their love for fitness! So far, I was thinking that it is a Singaporean thing to work out even during the odd hours in order to keep fit. But Sydneysiders proved me wrong.Early morning/Afternoon/ Night - It was never an issue for them! Each time when I'm out, I see at least a couple of them jogging or walking their dogs. What an inspiration!

Visiting Manly beach and the world famous Bondi beach was a unique experience for someone who is from Asia. My favorite was Bondi beach as I found it more lively and I loved watching the boys surfing.

Now, time to switch back to the 'normal' life mode and time to complete the next set of assignments! :)

Sri

Sydney Holiday

Deadlines and Assignments! Finally I have managed to complete my 2 assignments before my trip and submit it for marking. So now time for a well deserved break before I take my 2 scheduled online quiz!! And this time Sydney it is! 

We decided to explore Sydney on our own. So I had to do a little reaserch on the internet about the main attractions and create a rough tour itinerary. Whale Watching and Skydiving is in the list. Provided that my parents let me jump off the plane to full fill my long time wish of Skydiving. I can strike one more item off my list of 25-before-25!  *fingers crossed* 

It is gonna be a 6-day trip to the Sydney city. My packing is almost done and I'm ready to board the plane! 

Love

Sri

Snorkelling in Tioman Island

One more item off my bucket list!! My virgin snorkelling trip to Tioman Island in Malaysia was a great success.

With lots of confusion over deciding the departure date, things were not certain until the last minute. After all the uncertainty, we finally concluded 11 July 2012 as our departure date . W booked our coach package from a Travel agency called Konsortium.

We took off at 6.30 am  from Golden Mile Complex, Singapore. The coach was very comfortable with nice reclining seats.The bus reached Tanjung Gemuk around 11.15 am. From where we had to catch the ferry which departed at 11.30 am. It is 1 hour 45 minutes by ferry to reach Tioman, the mini paradise.

We stayed at the Paya Beach Resort which is located at the Kampong Paya (Paya Village). After the check in at around 1.45 pm, we just threw our bags on the bed and quickly rushed the the local restaurant to satisfy our hunger. As we did not have any other activities planned for the day, we headed down to take a walk by the beach and click pictures.  Along the way, we discovered this 'amazing spot' where they had a hammock suspended between two coconut trees and 2-3 swings to play. I relaxed for a while in hammock overlooking the blue beach. 

Day 2 started off with buffet breakfast and then quickly we got to the jetty by 8.45 from where we were picked up for our snorkelling tour. The boat took us to Ringgis Island which is just 15-20 mins away. Ringgis island was nothing but a tiny piece of land with thick bushes. But the real beauty lies under the water! With the snorkel and tightly secured life jacket and 10 minutes briefing, we jumped off the boat into the chilled blue sea. Thousands of beautifully colored marine fishes.  The underwater world is so much beautiful than I could ever imagine! The fishes (which I can't even name!) were beautifully colored. The sea corals were also pretty and I managed to spot a few green colored sea corals too! The activities crew member Mr.Danker was  kind enough to guide me to swim a little further where he showed me a starfish.It was an hour of snorkelling here. I was very much comfortable with snorkelling because I've been swimming since 6. Thanks to my parents.

We were taken to a place called Marine Park, which is a man made conservatory of marine life. We had an hour to snorkel here too. Another hour of bliss! We reached resort by 1.00 pm, just nice for lunch. A good meal, then we were off the beach to get a sun tan. Evening was spent with some soverigner shopping and then again a relaxing walk by the beach (after all, it's a beach holiday!).

Day 3. Had to check out by 10.00 am after which we deposited our bags at the lobby and we took a beach walk, again! Then back to Singapore. This time, I alighted at the woodlands checkpoint and took the bus AC-7 which apprarently is very convinent for people living in north. $2 for a ticket and I was dropped off at my door step (just below my block) in 15 mins time from Malaysia! Wow!

Tioman had all the qualities to call it a 'beautiful deserted island'.It was a nice vacation just before the starting of a new semester at University. Great way to relax, relax and just relax!!

Sri

Spending your free time...

Numerous promises to blog more and I know I did not keep up my words. It's not like I'v gotten very busy off late, but yeah maybe!

You may expect a new travel blog post from me in near future, featuring some pictures that I managed to click using my iPhone on my recent trip to India. But for now, after thinking for about an hour on what to blog about, I thought that I should be sharing a beautiful piece of information that I managed to find while I was too bored and surfing away the internet.

So here it goes... Waiting to join a school to take up a degree and have 2 or 3 weeks to spare? Love to volunteer overseas but not sure where, when, what & how? If yes, then I think that Frontier is the perfect place for you that offers a plethora of opportunities ! Ranging from short paid work/ internship to Wild Life Conservation project, there is a plethora of volunteer opportunities available there. You just have to browse through the site to choose the one that suits you the best! The more you surf, the more you will be interested!

P.S. I am NOT in anyway linked to them or paid to promote their site. It's just a good source of information that I found online and I wanted to share with you all.

Happy Volunteering!