We spent a month in Sydney Harbor. It is a huge sprawling city built around an unbelievable natural harbor with many inlets, bays and beaches. There are many places to anchor with small beaches everywhere. We spent a majority of our time in Rozelle Bay. It is at the southern end of the harbor well away from ferry traffic and is as such very quiet. There is public dockage in Blackwattle Bay and at the Sydney Fish Market. By the fish market you are very close to the main part of the city and everything is walking distance and very convenient. There are lots of parks for the kids, the best one we found was in Darling Harbor. When we were there they were doing nightly free movies and fireworks on Saturdays. The Aussie's love their fireworks and we have seen more fireworks in the last month than in the past five years. The bike paths in Sydney do not compare to those of Brisbane. We have done a few bike rides but mostly end up on main roads which is not as fun as the tracks in Brisbane. The following are the highlights of the month, but overall we have mostly taken the month off to relax and get caught up on school, so not a lot to report. In Darling Harbor there was a waterfall swing set up. It was a swing with water coming out of the top bar. The idea was that the water would stop just as you got to it and the swinger would not get wet. The water did stop but you still got soaked. We brought Zack's buddy Blake with us and the boys went for a ride. There was a half an hour wait for the swing and while we were waiting I started to chat with the couple behind us. They were on vacation from Boulder Colorado. Super nice and had an 8 year old son. The three boys hit it off and so we went to the park afterwards so they could all play. Afterwards we went to China Town for dinner at the cafeteria style local Chinese place underneath the expensive tourist restaurants. The food was better and a lot cheaper. A great night. On our first visit to China Town I had wanted to try street food. The boys were wary but indulgent. We had some pancakes with custard in the middle, pretty good. Then we waited in line for about half an hour, (a good sign?) for these amazing looking fried dough balls. The boys shared an order of shrimp balls and I went for the vegetable balls. They looked great with a crunchy crust and a delicious sauce. They were super hot and when you bit into them a weird white rice flour goo came out, basically tasteless. Disappointment. Next up meat sticks, they look great. David got a chicken and I had a fried tofu. Zack is over it by now. By the end of it David was convinced no chicken had been used, just pork fat and my tofu landed in the bin as it tasted of fish sauce. Even the Asians here are not vegetarians.

Sydney has a great public transportation system, there are trains and busses to everywhere. If you would like to find a bargain, just ask a cruiser. On Sundays in Sydney you can use all the public transport you like for $2.50. This includes busses, trains and ferries. They call it Family Fun Day Sundays. We decided to check it out and headed for the Blue Mountains to go hiking. We hiked a trail called the Grand Canyon in Blackheath. You do need to hire a taxi to get a ride to it after the train, as it is a 2K walk to the beginning. It is a great hike and takes about 4 hours. It starts out going steeply downhill into a canyon and continues through some nice rock formations. There is a waterfall in the middle to cool off and a small stream runs through lots of it. The end of the hike is the killer as you now have to climb back up the canyon. It is steep and there are steps in some places. One set was over a hundred stairs. The trail is well maintained and at the end you are rewarded with some gorgeous views. Well worth the hike. The issue is getting back to the train. We had the number for the taxi but decided to hitchhike and try our luck. We got a ride and made the train back to Sydney.

The next Sunday we made plans to go for another hike with the crews from Windarra, Xanadu and Perla Alba. It was raining and a miserable day but no one wanted to be the party pooper who canceled the day, so off we went. We went to hike the Three Sisters. It was so foggy when we got there that we could not even see the rock formation that is the Three Sisters. We took pictures in front of the poster at the tourism office. We decided to do a different hike, the Darwin Track. It was amazing. It starts out very easy, and you can do just the easy part if you like. It then turns into another trail which is a very steep descent to a waterfall. There is a staircase carved into the very steep rocks, thankfully there is a handrail and a railing to keep you from getting too close to the edge. It was really cool because the fog was so thick we could not see over the edge, so it looked like a great abyss. When you get to the bottom there is a great roaring waterfall crashing down. You get soaked which would be great on a hot sunny day. We were already soaked so no matter. There a steps carved into the rock allowing you to cross the waterfall, which is really wild. On this track you have to cross several waterfalls, making it one of our all time favorite hikes. It was another 4 hour hike, with lots of steep uphill at the end, ending at a closed restaurant. We had to walk back to town as there were too many of us to hitchhike. I can't imagine anyone would have picked us up anyway, we were soaked and wretched looking. It was a great day but we were glad to get home and have hot showers.

We left Rozelle to head over to Manly for a bit. We pulled up at the fuel dock for water and diesel. The pumps were not operating because the electronic payment was not functioning. We filled with water and were on our way. We hadn't gone far when David noticed we had lots of current against us and we were not actually moving forward. Weird, so we turned around to see if it was current or something amiss with the boat. It was the boat. I jumped into the dinghy and pushed us back to the fuel dock. We were glad the pump was broken now, as we were able to use the dock freely. David jumped in and discovered that the max prop was jammed. Bummer. Fortunately there was a haul out facility by the fuel station. David went over to talk to them and was quoted a price of over $800 to haul and relaunch. YIKES! After talking the manager agreed to give us the survey rate of just over $400 if we could haul and relaunch within an hours time. OK, I pushed the boat over to the haul out slip and we got ready to haul. Thankfully we have the old fixed 2 blade prop on board. We would just pull off the max prop and throw on the old one. They hauled the boat and as they did not have anyone else scheduled for that day they did not rush us at all. They were super reasonable and the pressure wash guy even sprayed the boat down, no charge. David was able to change out the prop and Zack and I scraped barnacles off of the bottom. We were back in in a couple of hours and all was good. David emailed the max prop guys in California and excluding shipping charges found it would be almost $1000 dollars to fix the max prop. Thanks but no. He found a prop manufacturer south of Sydney and had it fixed for about $150, not so bad.

We made it over to Quarantine Beach, by Manly. Manly is a great beach town but not a great anchorage. The ferries make it too rolly and uncomfortable. It is not a long dinghy ride so we opted for the relative peace of Quarantine Beach. We were able to pick up a free mooring for our entire stay. It is summer holiday here so Manly was packed. The beach is great and there are lots of waves for surfing. Zack had a great day out in the waves. It was a bit cold and he did find lots of Blue Bottle (Man of War) Jellyfish. He was a little hesitant after his 27 stings in Fiji, but he did get in and had a great time. On Friday nights there is a music festival with food from around the world. We went and listened to the band. It was good and the food idea was great. There were maybe 10 kiosks each with a different country theme. Each had 3 or 4 authentic dishes from their country and it all looked pretty good. We stayed till almost dark and headed back to the boat. We had wanted to head north to Pittwater but the wind came up from the north so we decided to stay in Sydney and wait it out. It was also raining and we don't do a lot in the rain. We were at Quarantine beach for Australia Day. We knew this would be crazy as the weekends here are mad with boaters. It was raining and miserable so we thought it would be fine. It was definitely more subdued that we expected but some were still out. The small boats seemed to stay in for the most part but lots of sailors were out there. A crazy lot, those sailors. We have seen some crazy anchoring by the weekend warriors here but this lot took the cake. I think alcohol may have played some minor role here. We just watch and laugh. It is obvious that most of these boats are kept on docks or moorings. The Aussies take the prize, (away from the French even), for poor anchoring. We watched one guy come up beside us and as he maybe thought we were concerned he quickly shouted over to us not to worry because he was going to end up "way back there" and therefore would be no where near us. We weren't really worried but he would have needed several hundred meters of anchor rode to get to where he thought he was going. He ran out of chain fairly quickly and was right next to us looking rather foolish as he surveyed his position. Comical. We were down below most of the day. We came up at one point for a look around to find a boat so close in front of us that we could have shook hands, our bow to their stern. OK , but as we were standing there looking at this boat a very large, at least 50 foot boat pulls in, flags everywhere, music blaring, decks filled with revelers, and drops anchor on top of the guy in front of us. It was dumbfounding, especially considering that the bloke in front of us was in the no anchor zone. The first boat quickly up anchored and got out of the way. As the new boat finished dropping his anchor it became evident, (to us, not him) that he would soon be hitting our boat. He was on deck looking like he had no intention of moving, so David grabbed out the video camera and started filming. He moved. That was most of the excitement for the day.

We reprovisioned the boat in Manly which is fairly easy and headed up to Pittwater, which is another amazing bay, well protected with lots of small bays to explore. Moorings are everywhere, and you can pick up pink ones for free. We are going to do a month of boat maintenance including painting the decks. Cruising is hard on the boat and it is time to pay our dues for this year.