Manly Beach, Welcome Fest, and Luna Park

Tuesday was the warmest day we've had in Sydney since I've been here, so a bunch of us decided to take the ferry over to Manly Beach, which is on the other side of the harbor from a lot of the other popular Sydney spots. After a breakfast at the fun-named Hoochie Mamma cafe right next to our accommodation, we took the train to Circular Quay to hop on the ferry. Sydney really is so beautiful from the water, and on our journey we could see where the harbour opened up to the ocean beyond.

This picture is actually from the return journey, when it was starting to get a little cloudy.

Manly Beach was fun. A lot less crowded than Bondi, which was nice. And there was a neat coastal walk nearby that led to the smaller, protected Shelly Beach.

Manly Beach!

A view from the coastal walk

"Shell and Wave" - I needed to climb through this thing

At the end of our long beach day, we had dinner at a Chinese restaurant called Shanghai Night. I got beef stir fry with noodles, but other people got dumplings and I tried some of those, too. Everything was delicious.

Wednesday was Valentine's Day! I don't think it is as commercialized here as it is in the US, or maybe this is just the first Valentine's Day where I wasn't in a school doing class valentine exchanges or seeing couples with balloons and flowers all day.

Wednesday also marked the beginning of Welcome Fest at USYD (this is what I'm going to call University of Sydney from now on). On the most basic level, Welcome Fest is a club fair, but really, it is so much more than that. There were hundreds of clubs to explore - so many that I went both Wednesday and Thursday because I couldn't get enough the first day. There were also a lot of local bars giving out free drink vouchers, and big name brands were giving out freebies as well. I got a free Gillette razor and two mini mascaras from Maybelline. Those two major companies just had booths among all the normal clubs. Crazy!

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/063e13_f397d58bbb7244adaa6904b0cab9b308/720p/mp4/file.mp4

Wednesday afternoon, a friend and I decided to venture back out into the city. We went back to Circular Quay, where the Opera House is, and took the ferry over to Luna Park, an old-timey amusement park that was originally built in the 1930s but has had a long history of closures and reopenings. It is now operational again, although it was not open on the day we went and explored. I will definitely be going back though when it is open on weekends.

Opera House from an angle you don't usually see

Luna Park is known for its big smiling face!