A houseful of bears and then Runi

Hello all,

Well I have to say I loved Sydney!!!! This city is brilliant! Ed and Steve have been great hosts and have shown us a lot of the local neighborhoods. We have checked out Kings Cross, New Town, Waterloo, Crown Street, Downtown, Darling Harbor, The Rocks and also have gone to the Opera House and the Botanical Gardens. Everything is so pretty here and the weather has been great. The food also is amazing and you can get all kinds of food from anywhere in the world. After being in New Zealand which has a slightly weird take on food, it is great to be able to have more choice. The boys took us to a vegetarian traditional Indian restaurant that Runi loves!!!! I even tried it and it was pretty good , although I missed my meat curries!

It has been a real treat to not be rushing around ragged as well. It is more like we are living here for a few weeks as our hosts go off to work, we can hang around the house all morning and even stay at home if we want. I haven't been in any hurry to see the city and have been taking it slowly at my own pace. This is a lot different than the traditional American "vacation" where you rush around at breakneck pace seeing as much as possible in as short a period of time as possible. Having the home base, Internet access and local friends really has helped a lot to do this as a proper vacation!

This weekend I think we are going to do the spa and probably watch the Wallabies world cup Rugby match at Midnight on Saturday. We are also going to check out some of the local city stuff that is a bit outside of the city. Next week is more of checking out Sydney and maybe taking a ferry ride. Also next weekend we are going to the countryside to see some nature and get even more relaxation in!

Will keep everyone posted and put up some pictures soon.

Matthew