There is a great zoo in Sydney, but it's a bit far away from the main downtown area. In the Darling Harbour area there's also a big complex that has an aquarium (managed by the same company as the one we have in Bangkok!), a Madame Tussaud's, and a smaller "zoo" called Wild Sydney. You can get a combo ticket for many of the attractions, but we were only interested in the Wild Sydney one. They offered a breakfast package that included early admission, guided tour, full breakfast, and photo ops with the koalas. For a few dollars extra, you could also get koala ear headbands. Who could resist that? Not me!
It was the koalas that got us there, but the most interesting part ended up being the guided tour. Wild Sydney has representatives of each major Australian animal. Our guide was very knowledgeable and interesting. We were a pretty small group, and there was no one else in the zoo, so the kids could take their time and ask questions. A bunch of the animals are nocturnal, so we didn't want to take pictures of them in their dens, but the guide held up a light, so that the kids could see them. Elena was super excited when we got to the kangaroos.
She was less excited about the HUGE crocodile they had.
They've tried to put female crocodiles in there with him in the hopes of mating them, but he ate the two females they put in there! AHHHH!
The tour finished in a roof top area, where they had breakfast all laid out for us under the watchful eyes of several koalas perched in trees.
As family groups finished eating, the guide took us into the koala area for pictures. It was cool to see them up close, but they weren't really interested in cooperating with our photo plans.
Luckily, they're too lazy to really fight. It was more of a right of way dispute. Our photo buddy got resettled, and we got some more good shots.
After the photos, we looked through the zoo area a bit more, and then made our way to the exit. Of course the exit was through the gift shop. Elena has a toy koala at home, but she was not leaving her koala encounter without a stuffed buddy. It wasn't too expensive, so we caved. This is her victory pose ;-)
We walked back along Darling Harbour.
It was still pretty early in the day, so we decided to go back to the apartment and rest a bit before our afternoon adventure. On our second day, we discovered a cool walking path shortcut back to our apartment.
One of our favorite parts about the vacation was just walking and exploring. After resting our feet for a bit, we headed back out in search of lunch. This time we headed south from Darling Harbour towards a playground and a science museum. The playground was swarming with kids, so we told the girls we would come back the next morning when it probably wouldn't be so crowded. Instead we found a Brazilian steakhouse with outdoor seating. It wasn't as good as our favorite place in D.C., but who can argue with sitting outside and eating good food in beautiful weather.
We walked off our steak coma on the way to the Powerhouse Museum, a great science museum in Sydney. The kids got in for free and found lots of fun, hands on things to test out.
Of course, their favorite interactive part was a projection screen area. We spent a lot of time there.
They also had an interesting transportation section, including a special exhibit on different types of steam engines.
Last, but not least, there was a design section where we found WALL-E and other things made out of wood,
Each item had the design book in front of it, showing how the artist had come up with their design. There was also a clothing section. I thought the quilt dress was interesting.
Vivian preferred the more dramatic dress with hooded cape.
It was a really fun museum to explore, even if it was a bit of an uphill hike to get back to the apartment and another night of restorative sleep.
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