New Years Eve came a day earlier than everyone back in the states and the best way to begin celebrating was to..go to the aquarium. It turned out to be a good day to go indoors because as soon as we got there it began to rain. Perfect timing. The aquarium was not very aesthetically pleasing, nothing like the Atlanta Aquarium. But once inside, we began to see all of the different creatures that we had read about in the book "In a Sunburned Country". These creatures were all described as things in Australia that could kill you, some as small as a fist sized jelly fish and others as large as the Great Whites.
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| Deadly Jelly Fish things |
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| Great Barrier Reef display |
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| Lego scuba diver (20,000+ legos) |
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| Great White-Shark Week 2012 (hopefully not) |
After leaving the aquarium around noon, everyone headed back to the dorms to nap and rest up before the evenings festivities began. We headed down to the harbour around 6 and by the time we reached the water it was already too crowded to get a good spot to watch the fireworks. We ended up walking a few blocks down to the side of the bridge a sat down on the curb for the next 5 hours drinking wine. A 24 pack of beer here is forty dollars. Outrageous. So everyone stuck to the five dollar wine and champagne. Sitting in a crowd for 5 hours, we were able to meet and talk to the people around us. The two that ended up hanging out with us the most were a couple from Holland that were in town for business. Chiem and Nicole Van Houweninge (if anyone can pronounce that correctly kudos) owned a production company back in Rotterdam. We all rang in the new year together with plenty of drinks and plenty of good laughs and great memories made. That is one thing I have noticed the most about studying abroad or being able to travel is getting the opportunity to meet new people and learn about different cultures. After spending a lengthy amount of time with Chiem and Nicole and it was time to part ways, we swapped contact information just to keep in touch after having such a fun night.
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| Me and Nicole |
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| Our view of the Harbour Bridge for the fireworks show | | |
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The fireworks show was incredible. Far better than anything I have ever seen before. We might have been off to the side of the bridge without the best view of the harbour, but what we saw was still incredible and we all had a blast. The count down to midnight was illuminated on the Sydney Harbour Bridge and as soon as it hit midnight, it looked as if the bridge had exploded as the fireworks shot into the air. Even though we had people taking our seats and spilling stuff everywhere, everyone was one big family for the night (for the most part. After about 15 minutes of the most spectacular firework show, the crowd began to dwindle. We sat around and watched another couple Patricia and Alfred, a few locals, dance around the sidewalk trying to give us all dancing lessons as well as life advice as we waited on the crowd to thin out. They were obviously having way too much fun, but it was New Years Eve so who wasn't!! When we finally left the harbour and got back to our dorms it was 4 a.m. and time for some much needed rest after such a long yet awesome and memorable day. Not many people can say that they have been to Sydney on New Years to experience such an event. It is something that I definitely won't forget and will look back and compare every new years from here on out to. It is finally 2012 back in the state so Happy New Year to everyone back home! (More videos to come)
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| Matt, Patricia, and Alfred |
The fireworks show was incredible. Far better than anything I have ever seen before. We might have been off to the side of the bridge without the best view of the harbour, but what we saw was still incredible and we all had a blast. The count down to midnight was illuminated on the Sydney Harbour Bridge and as soon as it hit midnight, it looked as if the bridge had exploded as the fireworks shot into the air. Even though we had people taking our seats and spilling stuff everywhere, everyone was one big family for the night (for the most part. After about 15 minutes of the most spectacular firework show, the crowd began to dwindle. We sat around and watched another couple Patricia and Alfred, a few locals, dance around the sidewalk trying to give us all dancing lessons as well as life advice as we waited on the crowd to thin out. They were obviously having way too much fun, but it was New Years Eve so who wasn't!! When we finally left the harbour and got back to our dorms it was 4 a.m. and time for some much needed rest after such a long yet awesome and memorable day. Not many people can say that they have been to Sydney on New Years to experience such an event. It is something that I definitely won't forget and will look back and compare every new years from here on out to. It is finally 2012 back in the state so Happy New Year to everyone back home! (More videos to come)
Nice video of the countdown and intro to the fireworks show! Pictures don't do that experience justice, but the video does a much better job of relaying the atmosphere. Great shooting!
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