9/9: Sydney's Taronga Zoo & On The Rocks!

We’d been doing a lot of traveling the previous few days so, rather than going on a long day trip to the Blue Mountains located 2 hours west of Sydney, we decided to stay in town and go to the city’s Taronga Zoo and take a self guiding walk in one of the city’s neighborhoods.

To get to the zoo, we returned by train to Circular Quay and took the ferry to North Sydney which I had erroneously referred to as the North Shore in a previous post - oops - to get to the zoo. Steven has always been for more of a zoo fan than I but we were both intrigued by being able to see so many animals unique to Australia. Getting to the Australian Walkabout area in the zoo was far easier said than done however! We do pride ourselves on being decent map readers but our skills were definitely put to a test at the zoo.

Our hotel off and on for 8 nights in Sydney. Exquisite heritage building
and a perfect location but lots of issues.

So many homes in Sydney had beautiful iron balconies like this one.
They reminded us of our recent trip to New Orleans.

Alexander: This one's for you, bud.

Now, isn't he just adorable! I'm talking about Steven of course, not that stuffed thing!

Interesting

Quokka at the Tasmania Trail Exhibit; The mammal was one of the first to be seen by 
European settlers who thought initially it was a large rat, In fact, it's like a wallaby 
and carries its young in the pouch located on their rear, not the front like a kangaroo.

We had naively thought all kangaroos were the same but seeing red kangaroos
at Taronga proved us wrong. How lucky we had been to have seen kangaroos
running and hopping in their native habitat in Canberra at the Gardens.

Tasmania Devil: It's in dire danger of shortly becoming extinct in the next 15-20 years
because of a deadly facial disease wiping out the devils at an alarming rate.

Red Kangaroos

The zoo had an extensive ropes course that looked pretty exciting but we didn't
notice many participants trying out their skills to be hire wire artists at the circus!

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An echidna: its spines, which are used for defense, are actually long, tough hollow hair follicles. The animlas are found all over Australia from deserts to forests and even to alpine regions.

Never seen an emu before!

Kangaroo & Emu

The wallabies were a welcome sight too especially finding out 
about the differences between them and kangaroos.

What a perfect sign for the emu/wallaby/kangaroo exhibit!

Went into the Australian Nightlife exhibit hoping to see Prince George’s Bilby exhibit. 

Perfect if you were blind, I thought, but way too scary for me trying to get around in total darkness. I just wanted to get out of there as fast as I could.

Saw this lizard just crawling on the pavement, i.e. not in any of the exhibits.

Tree Kangaroo: it's an ancestor of kangaroos and wallabies who hopped on the ground much as they do today. Some however took to the trees to escape predators or to look for food. Over time they adapted to their new habitat above ground.

What a beautiful view of Sydney's harbor from the zoo.

Steven pointed out the 2 koalas nestled in the branches high above the ground;
 not sure if I would ever have seen the cute little things if not for him! 
There are apparently 4 koalas in the exhibit but only 2 were out.

There were a number of hands on exhibits, including the koalas above, throughout the zoo where people paid a hefty premium to get up and close to their animals of choice. But we figured spending AUD$ 70 plus was sufficient for us and that was with a coupon and a ‘concession fare’, i.e. a senior’s fare for you know who. Unfortunately, the Opal cards didn’t provide concession fares for international visitors as that would have saved us a chunk. As it was, we figured we spent AUD$ 100 apiece for all the ferry and train rides we took.

Komodo Dragon: This is the world's longest living lizard. I sure hope we'll see lots
of these in their native habitat on Komodo Island, Indonesia in a few weeks as
we're flying all the way to Labuan Bajo to take a day long cruise to see these animals!

Mata Mata: It looks more like a piece of underwater debris rather than a turtle.

I sure couldn't have told you the difference.

The Star Tortoise's shell pattern is good camouflage and only develops as the tortoise grows older.

 Fijian Banded Iguana

While Steven wandered off to see some animals I had seen at other zoos plenty of times, with some misgivings, I sat and watched the Seal Show because of all the negative publicity attributed to the care of whales at Sea World in the US. As it turned out, we didn’t see any seals at the Seal Show but rather sea lions from California! They were very appealing and did fabulous tricks that were a major hit for the younger set especially.

A while later, we made our way back to the Quay on the ferry and strolled over to The Rocks area, known as the birthplace of both the city and the nation as it was here back in 1788 that the first ship from Britain landed. Our walking tour guide had brought us here our first day in Sydney but we didn’t have time then to explore the small historic area.

I just couldn't see eating food from the cute animals. But many people must
as kangaroo meals are available on many menus.

First off though we detoured to the Sydney Harbor Bridge that you’ve seen in so many of my photos on earlier blog posts as we wanted to walk on the bridge for a bit and thus see the city from different angles. I’m not much of one for heights so doing the pylon climb or actually ascending the cables to the top AND paying a couple hundred smackeroos for that dubious privilege was not my cup of tea! 

A gorgeous view of the Opera House  above and the city center below from the Harbor Bridge.

Back down on terra firma, we set out to wander The Rocks with a self guiding walking map I had brought from home.

I wonder if Mum and Dad saw this church back in 1977 (?) when they visited Oz and NZ? 

The Hero of Waterloo is a contender for the title for first pub in Sydney. 
Look a few photos below for its rival.

On teensy Ferry Lane where we saw the foundations of Arthur Payne’s house;
he was the first victim of the 1900 bubonic plague outbreak.

The Rocks is a very touristy neighborhood with snazzy bars and restaurants on every block as well as upmarket jewelry stores featuring opals, Australia’s prized gem as well as swanky shops catering to the wealthy. It was great walking past all of these but Steven and I are not into the bar scene or foodies and I have some stunning Australian opals already, courtesy of my maternal grandfather’s trips to this land in the first couple of decades of the 20^th century.

Argyle Place: a quiet, English-style village green lined with terraced houses.
Must be a major development planned for the exquisite area because there
were a lot of signs up indicating residents’ opposition to it.

The rival contender I alluded to above.

Springfield Lodge: Our home away from home in Sydney for about a week.

Great getting back to the hotel before sunset as we had a long day planned to see the Blue Mountains the next.

With love to each of you from Annie & Steven (in Cairns on 9/15).  .