"Let's go to the beach, beach. Let's go to the beach."

Yes, the title of this blog is incorrect lyrics of a Nicki Minaj song that has become my life motto, because actually all I do is go to the beach!!

Although last week was the first week of classes, I do not have Monday class, so I just went to campus and looked around for my classrooms and explored. Literally this campus is unreal. Madison is one of the prettiest campuses I have seen, but Uni Syd blows Madison out of the park. It’s a mixture of parks and campus buildings and the buildings are either really old and beautiful or really modern and beautiful.


Just a casual lawn chair park in the middle of campus

Tuesday I had my first class, Animal/ Human Cultures, both the lecture and tutorial. Although the lectures are 2 hours here, everything else is very similar to the way things are run in Madison, which is nice. On Wednesday (no class…again) I went to my first food and wine club gathering at a bar in Newtown. I met a few more Madison students in the club and a few locals as well! And yes, I did eat food and drink wine! (I love school here). Thursday there was a strike across campus so my Marketing class was cancelled, but I did still have Finance. I also have no class Friday (I know, I know…aren’t I supposed to be here for school?), so for the 3rd or 4th time I went to the beach : ) I returned to coogee beach, which has been my favorite so far, to work on my tan and do some homework.

On Saturday a group of us took a ferry over to Watson’s Bay. This is in the top few for my favorite areas of Sydney as it has a little bit of everything. Right when you arrive there are a few cute little restaurants, a beach, and a park. We ate lunch at Doyles On the Wharf which is famous for their fish and chips (although I got chicken nuggets) and then walked up to the Gap Bluff. It's basically just a look-out into the ocean and the whole area of Watson's Bay. One of the worst ship wrecks in Sydney occured here killing 121 of 122 passangers in 1850something. After checking out gap bluff we hiked around the rest of the bay, past the nude Lady Bay Beach (there was not a single lady on this beach, btw) to Hornby lighthouse on the South Head of Sydney. It was built due to the Dunbar shipwreck and overlooks the bay onto the north end of Sydney, Manly. We just sat and took in the view until sunset. The best part of the trip was our 7:10 sunset ferry ride back into the Sydney Harbor. We left just minutes after the sun started going down and I actually had to pinch myself the whole way home. Standing on a boat with a warm ocean breeze and looking at the city skyline, the harbour bridge, and the Sydney opera house with vivid oranges and pinks behind them is just not real life. I swear, seeing that view will literally never get old!

Watson's Bay

 

Hornby Lighthouse

 

 

 

Sunday we took another ferry over to Manly, with the beach as our final destination. Unfortunately on Sundays most things are closed or close early, so although it’s another very touristy area like Bondi, I definitely want to go back and check out some of the shops and restaurants. The beach was amazing and it was literally a perfect day—not too hot, but not chilly at all. I swam for most of the time and caught a bunch of waves body surfing but then the waters got really rough and the Australian life guard (hellloooo!) had to come tell my roomie and I and a few other people to head in since we were too far out, so I just continued to soak up the sun, as did my closed Marketing text book…ooops!

Yesterday I caught up on homework and went to a free massage class at uni. I learned head, neck, and shoulders and got a head massage as well!! Today was my first full day of classes with a marketing tutorial at 12, animal/ human cultures lecture at 1, and animal/human cultures tutorial at 3. Now I'm sort of settling back into a real world routine of classes and homework, but we'll see how "real" it actually ends up being with classes only two days a week!