Another rainy day...

I spent the day with Ryan's friend Jane, her boyfriend Daniel and Rebecca. They took us on an adventure to Manly Beach - one of the many coastal beaches around Sydney. It was cool though because we took the ferry over to the beach. We stood outside in the rain on the boat, so after the 25 minute boat ride we all looked like wet dogs...it was a lot different than my boat ride to Catalina and back! We saw a lot of the suburbs and beachs and harbors. One of the pictures is the Prime Minister's house when he is not in Canberra. There was also a sailing race going on, so we got to see some awesome sailing around the harbor. When we got a bit further out, the boat started going over some pretty hefty waves and was rocking back and for big time. We weren't expecting it at first and almost all fell over after hitting the first way.

So once the ferry docked in Manly, we walked over to the beach and saw an amazing sand castle that had been built. I went and touched the water (much warmer than San Diego!), but before that, I had to walk around the Blue Bottles that were all over the sand. They washed up from the rain. Blue Bottles can sting and hurt bad, but won't kill you. Daniel stepped on one to show us how they pop like the seaweed on the beach in Carlsbad...it was cool...After all that, we did the short coastal walk and saw surfers, wanna-be-surfers, paddle surfers, scuba divers, snorkelers, spiders, some type of lizard, and oh yeah, did I mentioned it rained on us the whole time?!?

After the walk we got gelato for the ferry ride back to Sydney...it tasted sooooo good. Because even though it is raining here, it is still humid and muggy and hot. We said our goodbyes after the ride back, but I will see them again tomorrow because they are taking me to the Sydney-Melbourne soccer game here in town. Yes, American soccer. The only other sports in season right now are cricket and the Australian Open. Daniel did tell me he would take me to a Rugby game in March, April or May when I come back to Sydney. I can't wait!!! It will be great to experience all the sports with die hard Aussie fans. I think Jane was happy because she said I could take her place for those games - she doesn't really "fancy" it - as she says...

It was nice to finally hang out with Australians for the day. We got a lot more history on the city and were able to get a little more acquanted with the area. I also got to see more of Sydney and realized it is not all like the area around my hostel (we are right next to Chinatown). It was beautiful where we went, but would have been even better if it was sunny...maybe next week...it is supposed to be like this until Wednesday...yuck!

After we got back and hung up our wet clothes and shoes, we ate some dinner and headed to the movies with Cory and Matt. We saw Juno, which I thought was great - very funny...see it if you haven't! We almost didn't make the movie though because we had originally gone to a movie theatre close to our hostel which had some current movies playing, but I don't think any of them were in English...yes, it would have been interesting, but none of us were up for subtitles...

It finally stopped raining when we got out of the movie theater, but it is 10pm now and we didn't feel like going to the bars tonight - there is really nothing else to do here that late. They are a fun group, but we are still getting to know each other, so it isn't quite like my night's out at home. It is nice though to have company and to not have to talk to myself all the time.

Tomorrow is another day and another adventure...until then!