On 11 Jan, 2015 we were off again to Sydney to visit family and friends and to celebrate our 70th birthdays. At this time of year, winter in the Med, the trip to Sydney, Australia from Finike, Turkey is interesting as one is going from winter to summer via many modes of transport. This time our journey included: a 2 hour taxi ride, 3 flights (26 hours in total ) and a one hour car ride.We needed to be up at 4 am to begin this particular journey!
All went well with the transport until later in the day when we found ourselves watching the snow fall at Istanbul airport whilst waiting on our flight to Sydney.
The first thing we noticed when we arrived in Sydney was the sunshine, bird calls and bush smells. Neither of us had realised how much we missed them! The majority of time in Australia was spent in around Sydney, Newcastle and Windsor having fun with our family and celebrating some of their birthdays, as well as our own. As usual we ate and drank too much!
We ventured out on Australia Day, 26 January, hoping to walk across the Sydney Harbour bridge to watch the celebrations at Darling Harbour but "chickened out" due to the inclement conditions.
On another occasion 6 of us "intelligent folk" went to see the movie "Birdman". None of us understood it nor enjoyed it! Later we were surprised to learn that it won an Oscar so now we are all a tad worried about the "rest of the world." Are there any other "intelligent folk" out there?
All too soon it was time to join "the magnificent men in their flying machine" on their way to Turkey. As usual we were over loaded with "Tom's treasures!" We knew we would be ok on the International Flights but thought we may have to have very heavy " cabin luggage" for our Internal flight! As it turned out we were fine.
By 11 Feb we were watching the snow fall at Istanbul airport, again, whilst waiting to take our delayed flight to Antalya. Our 10 am flight had been cancelled due to heavy snow the previous days, so we had to wait til 1.45 pm for our reschedule flight. Later it rained and sleeted during our mini bus ride from Antalya to Finike but eventually we arrived back at 7 pm after 42 hours from "door to door!" It will be a while before we choose to take that trip again!
(Remember to click on the photos to enlarge them.) |
Here are 5 of our grandchildren enjoying a sunny Sydney.   |
View of Iron Cove on Sydney Harbour from our friend's home.
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| A snowy rainy Istanbul Airport |
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