Day 15

We went out straight out into the centre of Sydney and headed straight for the harbour. We had breakfast right in front of the harbour bridge looking at the opera house. We had booked onto a bridge climb in the morning so we had a look around the harbour and appreciated the bridge from the ground. We then headed up to the bridge to prepare for our climb - and take a breathalyser test! We had to take this to make sure we were in a suitable condition to climb the bridge! Once we had passed the breathalyser test we were given a safety briefing and given some overalls to change into. We were then given a quick tuition on how all of the ropes and clips work - and given clips to hold absolutely everything onto you. We couldn't take any of our own possessions onto the bridge since we were right above the traffic - so no cameras allowed! We were however given a space-aged headphone set which would keep us in contact with our guide. It was almost like putting on headphones - except the ear pieces were flat and sat on your jaw bone and you heard through the vibrations! It was very weird but it was to make sure everyone could hear and there was no distortions from outside noise, and you could still hear the noise from the city.

We walked into a warehouse type building that covered the door that led into the big stone stanchions. From here we walked through the newly created path and found ourselves standing on the lower part of the bridge. Straight away we were quite high - and knew it would only get higher! Some of the other people in our group included 3 older women who were in Sydney for a Christian conference, a couple of females travelling and another couple. The 3 older women were able to walk around as if there was no height at all! At the highest point we would climb to 134m above the road. We were attached to the bridge at all times with our safety cable. When we got to the top we had the most fantastic view of Sydney in all directions. We were right above the Opera House, and we could see all around the areas that we had explored that morning.

After descending from the bridge we went for some lunch, and amazingly found a German Lowenbrau restaurant with a view of the bridge! The restaurant sold large maß of beer - and sold all of the food that you would expect to see in Germany!

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around the city and decided to check out if there was anything on at the Opera House in the evening. We found out there was an Irish comedian, Jason Byrne, was there that evening so we got some tickets to see him. When we were waiting for the theatre to open we sat along the harbour front watching the city light up as it was starting to get dark. It was a good opportunity for me to grab some photos! When we went into the Opera House we quickly discovered there was quite a lot of Irish ex-pats living in Sydney after the comedian asked how many Irish people were in the audience.

Jason put on a great show and we thoroughly enjoyed it.