Opera House & Darling Harbour

You haven’t been to Sydney if you haven’t been to their country icon, the Sydney Opera House.
This is one of the most recognizable structures in the world.

It was designed by a Danish architect named Jorn Oberg Utzon who dreamed of having an architectural marvel that the world hasn’t seen before. He left Australia in 1966 before the building was completed due to disagreements in escalating construction expenses. Other architects were brought in to complete the project. The Opera House opened its doors in 1973.

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Too bad (again) that we were only given half hour to take photos. Subtract the number of steps one had to take to get-off the bus, walk to the Habour and back to the bus. We were left with 15 minutes photo-op!

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No time to get inside the Sydney Opera House.

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Construction of the Harbour Bridge took 8 years with 1,400 workers, 16 of those died during the course of the project. It was finally completed in 1932 and is now fondly called by Australian’s as the Coat Hanger.

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It was cold but sunny and glary.

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We haven’t seen our hotel yet. We went straight to the city tour from the airport. Edmund is feeling rayuma, tired and antok.
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I have been here during the time of President Fidel Ramos, some 18 years ago (more or less) for one or two nights. Our group took a boat to cross to the other side of the harbour. It seemed so distant and isolated that time. There were very few stores, restaurants and structures. Now, the place seemed a lot smaller. Once a dockside, it has now blossomed into one of sydney’s main tourist attractions with hotels, museums, shops, convention center, aquarium, restaurants and the Chinese Garden of Friendship.
There’s also a flyover.

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Time is up, time to ride the bus again…

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Our tour guide Rona Ho and bus driver Mark.

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