December 17, 2025 Arrival in Sydney
We waited almost an extra two hours to fly from Auckland, New Zealand to Sydney, Australia. The plane was delayed leaving its previous airport. The notification was sent while we were about an hour from landing in Auckland. The plane was about two thirds full for its flight across the Tasman Sea.
After the plane attained cruising altitude Australian Incoming Passenger cards were distributed by the crew. We had to pull out our passports and the address of our hotel and information for an emergency contact. We needed this form for Customs and Immigration at Sydney airport
Then a brunch was served. Choices were a cheese and onion omelet or yogurt with blueberry compote and chia, a packet of toasted berry muesli for topping. Also included with each choice was a cup of fruit - two orange segments, two chunks of honeydew melon, two chunks of cantaloupe and two red grapes plus a raspberry muffin. Coffee, tea, juice, water and wine were also available.
We landed at 12:10 p.m. and only took five minutes to taxi to the terminal. The last time we flew to Sydney (and as far back as the late 1980s or more) before the passengers left their seats at the gate, the whole plane was fumigated, fortunately that practice has stopped. We were wearing N95 masks so it would not have bothered us.
After Customs and Immigration we collected our luggage at about 12:30 p.m. then found the taxis. The ride to our hotel in the Potts Point area of Sydney took less than 30 minutes mostly through tunnels. We decided to treat ourselves rather than taking the subway hauling our luggage after such long flights. The cost was over $100 Canadian.
We were in our hotel room by 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday and had a short nap before going to explore the neighbourhood. We walked over to Bathurst and George to find our meeting place for tomorrow’s bus trip to the Australian capital city of Canberra. It as a little over 3 km each way.
The meeting place is near Sydney Town Hall which was built in 1830 near St. Andrew’s Anglican Cathedral, which was consecrated in 1868. A school adjoins the cathedral.
On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at Woolworth’s grocery section to buy salads and local strawberries for dinner and yogurt, croissants and tropical fruit juice for tomorrow’s breakfast since we will be leaving before 6:30 a.m., when the hotel restaurant opens.
Then we stopped by St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Cathedral, an example of English-style Gothic revival built after 1865 when fire destroyed the first church. Most of the construction took over 65 years up to 1930, but the southern spires were finally completed in 2000. Today began the church’s nine-day outdoor festival which continues until December 25th at the forecourt known as Christmas at the Cathedral Food and gift vendors were established under canopies and a stage could be seen for the live entertainment. There were close to 60 rows of chairs ready for an audience that will start to arrive after 5 p.m. daily. We noticed a police presence of close to 50 ordinary police members and groups of people waiting for the opening ceremonies to begin. They were stationed around all sides of the property. There is a light show at 8:30 p.m. each evening until December 25. The church is across the street from Sydney’s oldest 16 hectare park, Hyde Park.
The afternoon temperature was +26.7°C on this sunny afternoon with a strong northeasterly wind gusting up to 37 kph. On the TV news reporters were talking about the aftermath of the Bondi Beach shooting of more than 50 people gathered there for the first day of Chanukah celebrations, December 14th.
During our wandering we walked 6.94 km.
For dinner we enjoyed the salads that we purchased at Woolworth’s.
We have to be at the bus tour meeting point at 7:05 tomorrow morning, so we had an early night.
Today our step count was 14,024
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