Nothing notable on our 14.5 hour flight from Sydney except for my thrilling conversation with a fellow Phillies phan. We relived some plays, talked about spring training, trash-talked the Mets. I'm now sorry I didn't bring a Phils hat to share the joy with the rest of the world, as this forward-thinking phan had. We experienced some bumpiness landing in Sydney due to bad weather - it had been raining for 10 days when we arrived even with the record drought conditions (uncharacteristically, it DID NOT snow when we left Philly, so the bad travel weather karma transferred).
It cleared beautifully by the afternoon, though, and it's supposed to remain nice. Warm and surprisingly awake, we threw on summer clothes, visited Darling Harbour, had some lunch, strolled around the spectacular aquarium, ate some ice cream - all crucial preparation for losing our Lonely Planet Australia guidebook, which had the directions back to our hotel. I guess I was more tired than I thought. Happily, we recovered it at the aquarium ticket desk, where I had put it down to sign the first of many many credit card receipts.
We are staying at the Y Hotel City South - we've had great luck with Y Hotels elsewhere in the world, as they have clean though small quarters, good prices and they're usually centrally located. This one is centrally located all right!! Laura took an instant loathing to the place, assisted by anemic air conditioning and strong sun through our window. We crashed at about 7 p.m., but successfully completed our fire drill a few hours later.
"What's that????"
"I don't know. It sounds like the fire alarm!"
"Did you put on the fan when you took your shower?"
"YES!"
The bathroom has a sign that says steam can set off the smoke alarm, summoning the fire dept., and slapping the offender with a $250 fine. Being cautious and blame-free, we trooped downstairs and stood outside watching extremely buff Australian firemen check out the problem. When I was in college, we loved fire alarms at night, since we got to see who was sleeping over with whom. They're not so fond of them here, as I discovered when I asked a fellow guest how long she'd known the guy she was with and if she'd thought hard about the risks she was taking. And who was the father of that baby, anyway? As we went back upstairs, Laura said, "Now you see my first impression of this place was correct." Her mood, however, might be influenced by another truism of our travels: she has a cold. Miraculously, Adam has not tossed his cookies. Yet.
I do apologize for my rather boring reportage, but I'm still pretty tired. In any case, I see the sun has come up and we're moving early enough to see the fish market at 7 a.m. More thrilling info later, perhaps. I'll write at length about functional air conditioning, I promise!
