Our second day

It is just fantastic here. Where else could you find a newspaper headline that actually says "Complaints beaver away at tampon ads"? Follow the link if you don't believe me!

Yesterday was another gorgeous day but a bit hotter than the first day. We had breakfast at the hotel and then set out to conquer the shopping arcades of central Sydney. Catherine thrives on retail-tourism but it isn't my favorite thing. We took a cab to the Pitt Street Mall which is a pedestrian area and went directly to the Borders - I kid you not. I wanted to see what Australian authors I could find and Catherine is ever in search of more magazines with pictures of Hugh Jackman. We made a few modest acquisitions. They are shockingly under stocked in any of the Australian writers I was looking for. One fortuitous find however was a book called 30 Days in Sydney by Australian ex-pat novelist Peter Carey. I'm already well into that one and it is fascinating. Catherine found about 4 lbs. of magazines which I then toted around - along with my books - next time we won't go to the bookstore first! Both the Pitt St. Mall and the Queen Victoria Building (or QVB as it is referred to here) have lots of up-market jewelry and antique shops - Catherine was in heaven, I was worn out much faster than usual. We made a stop for refreshment that enabled me to push on to yet one more mall but it was rough!

So without too much whining we wended our way back to our hill-top retreat. We had a refreshing swim in the hotel pool and then went to the spa for manicures and pedicures in preparation for the cruise. Thoroughly restored (well sort-of) we then headed out to Sydney's Chinatown area for supper at a restaurant that Cath had been longing to visit. I wasn't too keen at first but the food was definitely worth the trip.

This morning we woke up to overcast skies but still high temperatures. We're being picked up at 0-915 hours by our car and driver for an expedition out to the Koala sanctuary and then a tour of the outer Sydney beauty spots. Boy are we doing this in style!

Tomorrow we board the ship and that will mean getting repacked tonight but then we will be safely ensconced and won't have to worry about the luggage for 15 days. Here are a few snaps from the shopping expedition!