Travelog for: Mario

We had to follow tradition and watch the hang gliders and get an ice cream cone from the ice cream truck at Stanwell Tops on the way home.
There weren't that many about as it was getting really late in the day. They're so brave! We all agreed that it's probably ok once you're up there, but taking that last step off the cliff?? No way!



BTW - That's the Tasman Sea you can see to the right of me!

Did you know that this area (called Bald Point) is important in the history of flight because in 1894 a man called Lawrence Hargreaves was the first man in the world to fly with the help of four box kites on the beach below here?

This afternoon we travelled into Darling Harbour to go the Backpacker and Adventure Traveller Expo at the Convention Centre to help Bec & Kalli with their travel plans.



Those white posts are part of the roof of the Convention Centre. The centre was built in 1988 as a part of the Australian Bicentennial celebrations and I guess they're supposed to represent the tall ships that bought the English to Australia in 1788?


After we'd collected a lot of information, brochures and other stuff we took some time to explore Darling Harbour. It was very crowded, probably because it was such a nice day after a week of heavy rain and cool weather.


This is part of the city skyline. The tall building in the middle is World Tower, which is the tallest residential building in New South Wales, and the second tallest in Australia. It is so big it has it's own postcode!


The playground next to Tumbalong Park with Sydney Tower in the background (plus Macca's and the funny red and blue building used to be Sega World, but is now an game centre)


The park around the lake is a great place to sit and eat lunch & in fact we did just that!



Buzzing around Darling Harbour are all these mini trains that take you from one place to another, as well as advertising various tourist destinations in the precinct. This one is advertising the Lindt chocolate café. Yum! My host would love to go there!



In the background is Tumbalong Park where very often cultural festivals are held. Today it was the Egyptian Festival.


The sun was getting hot and there is a great gelato stand ..... so we stopped and had gelato! Yum! I know it doesn’t look that great, but the strawberry and chocolate mixed together was great! It had to be eaten quickly before it melted everywhere.

This is the view we had while we consuming gelato. It was a very popular place to sit and enjoy the sun today.

After the gelato it was time to run and jump on a ferry to get to Circular Quay. My host tells me there's no better way to make the trip home from Darling Harbour, and on a day like today I'd have to agree. (Although the humans escorting us did get a little sunburnt sitting on the outside deck so us TV's would get a better view of the Harbour!)

The green trees are hiding the Sydney Observatory on Observatory Hill, which you may remember Mei visiting a few weeks ago? The colourful building are a part of the docks, where you used to often see giant fleets of cars being delivered by container ships. There are plans now to redevelop the land for residential towers. Guess the people in the buildings behind there (one of whom used to be Bec's boss!) are not happy about losing their beautiful views!



The famous Harbour Bridge and Opera House. Two icons in one pic!


And then it was time to get on the train and go home.

After these wonderful summer adventures in Australia I arrived at the opposite part of the world today: Vienna/Austria. It is really freezy here but I had no time to complain because right after I was unpacked from my envelpe my host put me into a suitcase and I was told that we would go to visit their relatives in Upper Austria and then continue our little trip to Salzburg for skiing.

I finally arrived in Austria after a looong journey from Australia. Immideately after I was picked up from the mailbox in Vienna my hosts told me that we would go on a skiing holiday to a place called Zell am See (near Salzburg).

And so we did! We had a great time there. Did a lot of walks through the town and the surroundings and the scenery was really beautiful. I'm in good company with some other Toyvoyagers so we have alot of fun! Some of us even went up a big mountain by cablecar (I couldn't because I was too big and didn't fit in the rucksack anymore... What a pitty, but I saw the mountains nevertheless and played in the snow and the others showed me a photo from the very top of the mountain...)

Here you can see me in Bad Hofgastein where we visited an indoor pool - very relaxing

Since my host loves Salzburg and since it was only about 100 km from Zell am See we once went there to do some sightseeing and enjoy a lóng walk through the city center. So I got to see the old fortress on the hill, had a walk through "Getreidegasse", the most famous street in Salzburg where I also saw the house where Mozart was born. Then we went to listen to the bells in a tower called "Glockenspiel", had a look at the big dome and we also visited Mirabell castle. I was told that it is very beautiful to walk through its park in summer when they have tons of flowers growing there!

We are back in Vienna now and already did alot of sightseeing! Unfortunately the weather is rather bad here (no sun at all for more than 3 weeks, after these wonderful days in Australia that's pretty hard for me ) so everything is a bit grey here. But I must admit, I like Vienna nevertheless.

A few days ago we had a looong walk through the city center. I saw Hofburg which was the BIG castle of the Habsburg family in former times. Nowadays I was told it hosts the President's office, the national library and some museums. Ah, and the Lippizzaner, the famous horses here in Vienna. Well, I didn't see them - but some other horses. They are everywhere in the city to go sightseeing with tourists and people call them "Fiaker"

Did you know that Vienna is full of cafés? Wonderful cafés I must admit - and they are full of delicious things: cakes, biscuits and whatever! I even saw this elephant made of Marzipan in one of the café's windows. Wow, hm?

I also got to see St.Stephen's cathedral, the very, very big church in the center of Vienna. And then there was the opera! Oh, là là! I would have loved to go inside but we couldn't since it was closed. They were preparing everything for the famous opera ball which will take place this evening. If I could at least go there... But my host said that would be impossible since I don't have my smoking with my and they have very strict rules concerning clothes there. But she promised me that we will watch it on TV! And we will have our own party tonight since it is carneval! My host said she has a surprise for me, Kanga and our friends living here... What will it be?

I also saw the Giant Wheel!!! It is sooo famous I was told! It is located in an amusement park called "Prater" but it was on winter holiday when we came there...

So we continued our sightseeing tour to the House created by Hundertwasser. Isn't it beautiful? I'd love to live in there! Next time I come to Vienna I'll search for a host living in this house because I was told that there are normal flats inside. So there must also be somebody inside who wants to host me - right???

Yesterday we went to Schönbrunn Palace. It was also one of the Habsburg family's castles - seemed to be a kind of "richies" these Habsburgs...

Oh, the castle was beautiful! And the park! Wow! We had a long walk, saw all these different fountains and even went up the hill to the point of view called "Gloriette". Wonderful, really! And then - do you know what we did then? We went to the zoo!!! There is one in the park of the Palace, a really big one and it was really impressive to see all these animals. My host got a bit angry because they have a new Panda baby there and she wanted to see it - but there were soooo many people waiting infront of the Panda house so we couldn't go inside. But all the other animals were fascinating, too!

Carneval in Austria! Oh, how funny! We had a real party, Kanga & I and all the toys living here! We ate these delicious things called "Krapfen" and danced and played some funny games!

Mario decided to come and visit Raina for awhile. It has been awhile since he had seen her. He is going to have a look around the convent before going on his way.