They're Here and Happy New Year!

We met up in Sydney around one and headed out for lunch.  The girls had a good, but long flight.  We walked over to see the Harbor Bridge and Opera House, stopped at an Aboriginal art gallery and heard a didgeridoo played, and got ice cream.  We went back to the hotel to let the girls rest and we ran a couple of errands.  We walked over to the Rocks area of Sydney around 7:30.  Most of the streets in the Sydney CBD were closed for the fireworks so it was fun to walk in the streets to dinner.  We went to the Rocks Cafe where Ben and I ate twice on our first visit to Sydney and were able to get a table right away.  After dinner we started to look for a spot to watch the fireworks.  People had been camped out for hours and even overnight for the best spots but we found a grassy hill on the west side of the bridge, opposite the Opera House and waited for just under 3 hours.  Boats were decorated with lights and parading around the harbor and some teaser fireworks were shot off at intervals before the big show as a countdown.  The actual fireworks were like nothing we had ever seen before.  At one point so many fireworks were going off it looked like daylight outside and not midnight. 

It is hard to capture in a picture but the picture above was literally showers of sparks raining down from the bridge.  Amazing!  Making our way back to the hotel afterwards wasn't so amazing because the crowds were crazy, but we made it.  Today I think we are going to take the ferry to Manly beach.  Happy New Year everyone and Happy Birthday Dad!