After spending a lovely day Friday on the Macquarie Uni campus, Kate and Amy planned a great morning for us, with a guided bike tour of Sydney.  Our tour guide, Latch (whom Christie insisted on calling Razor) was a Sydney local attending some highly unknown uni in Sydney (we tried to get him to transfer to Macquarie, but the kid was stubborn!). We went all over the place: to one side of the Opera House, under the harbor bridge, by numerous Quays, almost to the top of Lookout Point, through Chinatown (by Paddy's Market), to Mrs. Macquarie's rock, through the Botanical Gardens (which included a look at the other side of the Opera House) past the Opera House, and back to the Rocks.  And I expect you all to google maps all of these places to learn that we biked about 12 km in 3 hours ... a great pace, if you ask me!

Our tour ended, we parted ways with our wonderful Macquarie friends, and then headed out on our own for an open afternoon in Sydney.  Some of the group wanted to shop, some had meetings, and I just wanted to walk around, so we all split up, agreeing to meet back up for dinner that evening.

I walked all over the place; back to the top of Lookout Point, which is cool, although the city has been built up so much that even though the point is the highest natural point in Sydney, it cannot compete with the high rises. I walked all over the botanical gardens and then watched the sunset behind the Opera House, which was amazing!

We met up for dinner at Sailor's Thai, since we learned on our tour that "authentic" Sydney food, ie, what the locals eat, isn't actually roo and gator, it's Thai.  Well, heck, when in Rome (aka Sydney), right?  Dinner was amazing, and I'm totally kicking myself for not taking photos, because duck in wicked hot green curry is a woefully inadequate discription.

After dinner, we were going to take the train back to campus, but the trains were closed, so we were redirected to buses. Even then, it only took 40 minutes to get from Sydney center to the Macquarie campus, which is really quick, and was super easy!

The following day we were leaving for Newcastle, so we all headed to our rooms a bit early to pack and rest up.  These past three days have been the leisurely portion of the trip!