Day Two - Opera House, Darling Harbour, Hyde Park and Trivia Night
I woke up to catch the end of the Manchester United, Fulham match, which the Reds won 3-0. Nice! A quirky redhead trying to recruit my aid for Amnesty International pointed me in the direction of a cafe with free wi-fi and I enjoyed an egg sandwich and mocha while catching up on e-mail.
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(Click to Enlarge)By noon it was about 85°F and quite sunny. Sunscreen is an absolute must in Oz and I was well-doused. I walked down to the Sydney Opera House, a very impressive structure. In fact, in 2003 received the Pritzker Prize, architecture's highest honor.
Despite its name, the Opera House contains multiple performing arts centers, rather than a single opera theater. The Sydney Opera House is a major presenting venue for Opera Australia, The Australian Ballet, the Sydney Theatre Company and the Sydney Symphony, as well as hosting many touring productions in a variety of performance genres. It also contains a number of restaurants and bars.
I strolled through Hyde Park, which is named after the original Hyde Park in London. Over the years, many different sports were played at Hyde Park including cricket, rugby, horse racing, quoits and hurling. It was also used as a military training ground, often in direct conflict with ongoing sporting events.
The Royal Botanic Gardens lie just outside of the Circular Quay and offer some of the best views of Sydney Harbour, the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge possible, on a good day. On this day it was beginning to rain, so my visit was cut short. There are also hundreds (if not more) of Flying Foxes, a large fruit bat that is common all over Australia.
After a full day of walking the city, I went for dinner and then back to Scruffy Murphy's for a couple pints. It turns out it was trivia night and I joined up with a couple guys from Dublin to enter the contest. We ended up in 2nd place, just one point behind the winner. Not too bad. I ran into some people from Canada and Norway and enjoyed speaking with them between rounds, as well.