I woke up to find that Thomas had moved to the other bed during the night. I had not experienced any issues, but Thomas advised that despite spraying his sheets with a fabric cleaning agent (which wouldn't have worked anyway), he was still being bitten.
I went for a shower, and had to play a game a bit like the 'escape the room' challenges in order to make it work - the taps were not screwed on, and so I had to search around the other shower cubicles for them in order to re-attach to the pipes!
I checked out, and walked all the way to the new hostel, Lord Wolseley. The first part of my walk involved going along a long travelator, which took me to the main park for Sydney. In the park, I saw my first native birds - some Australian Ibis, and Australian Magpies.
At first when I saw the Ibis, I thought they were as mentioned but was unsure, so had to look them up later.
I managed to find the hostel after what seemed like a very long walk, though I suspect that was psychological due to the fact I was carrying all of my luggage!
I left my bags in the basement, as it was too early to check in, and made my way to the information center to try and figure out some things to do in Sydney and get ideas for the other parts of my Australian stay.
I managed to get some itinerary ideas, and messaged Di to find out what wuold work for her in terms of me getting to Adelaide. I let the information center know I'd do any bookings lateronce I knew what times I had to work around.
While I was there, I booked on to a blue mountains guided tour, and then went to explore around the area. The first thing I found was the Hard Rock Cafe, so I went there for lunch, and bought a fake denim shirt - now I can say I've been to Sydney Hard Rock, done it, and got the shirt :-)
I checked in to the Maritime museum next, as it happened to be right there, and the weather was not very condusive to doing many out door things. I was given advice on what boats closed when, so made my way first to the tall ship James Craig. This was slightly bigger than the Glenlee in Glasgow. The boat is still in active service, and is maintained by a group of volunteers, who take people out on sailings once a month.
Next up was a replica of the Endeavour, the ship that Lt. James Cook first came to Australia in. Originally the boat had been a collier ship, which was then converted for the task of coming to Australia, so there was an extra deck, making it have very low ceilings. The last room that I saw in the boat was for Joseph Banks, the person who funded the venture. It made me think that nobody really says much about the people who provide the funds for such endeavours (pun intended!), possibly because it's normally a syndicate rather than individual.
I proceeded on to the modern warship HMAS Vampire, built in the 1950's and in service with the Australian Navy until 1986, though was designated as a training ship after 1980. I managed to make it through most of the Vampire before closing time, but was reassured by the staff at the ticket office (where I had left my bag), that I could come back at any time inside the next few weeks and see the rest as well as the other areas that I had not been able to see. This really made the price of the ticket very worth while, and I decided that I would have a look at going back on the Thursday, since tomorrow was set for the Blue Mountains.
I headed back to the hostel and checked in, then met my first room mate there, Sam from Epsom. He was there on a working visa, and will be heading down to Melbourne to stay with friends over New Year.
I headed to the kitchen to check the facilities there, and discovered that there was no stove. I'm glad I checked, as I would have ended up buying things that needed a stove to cook at Coles.
The supermarket was pretty close the the Maritime museum, and I ended up only buying breakfast and lunch type things, not having a clue how to buy for microwave options. When I got back to the hostel, the last two room mates had moved in - Lukas and Korbinian from Germany.
They gave me some free chicken legs which was a great alternative to cooking for dinner! I enjoyed those in the kitchen, noticing that we had to be careful to keep the work surfaces clean, as there seemed to be an ant trail determined to harvest any left over crumbs!
It was so hot and humid that I didn't use the main duvet, preferring instead to sleep under just a sheet, but I did get to sleep ell enough, ready for my day in the mountains for tomorrow.