Travel 2004, Australia...
From Auckland we flew into Sydney, Australia and I had us booked at a backpacker on Bondi Beach, which is boasted as, "one of Australia's most famous beaches and among the world's most well-known beaches", although I had never heard of it nor had any of my friends from the Ice mentioned it. Still, we thought it would be a cool location to check out and, in fact, it left us a bit cold.
First bad omen was the cab ride to Bondi Beach. Our cab driver had something going on, either sleep deprivation or some kind of depressant in his system because he kept falling asleep at the wheel! Yeah, I'm serious, he was nodding off the entire trip from the airport to Bondi Beach and even zonked out at a stop light or two only to be awoke by the honking cars behind us! That was scary and once we arrived we called his cab company and complained and hopefully they pulled this guy off the streets before he killed someone. Note: this was the middle of the afternoon!
So, we get to our backpacker, Bondi Sands, and all I can say is that I made a BIG mistake with this place! OY VEY!! This was by far the nastiest place we would stay at during our trip and we tried our best to be troopers about the whole thing but were just completely dissatisfied with the entire place. Our room was the best they offer and for the price I would have appreciated a LOT better! Besides just being a messy little hole, the room was booked as a "Private, Ocean View Double Room", it was actually a hot and noisy little room that required the window open all evening to circulate air and that allowed the noise of a major bus route right outside the place to drift up and into the room. Then there were the filthy accommodations and the nasty, cockroach infested, "Self catering kitchen" that was SOOO small you could barely manage to cook a meal. The rooftop patio was a shambles and the BBQ didn't work and then the lounge that they advertised was just a mess and looked as if a high school party had been held there the night before. Anyhow, nothing good to say about this place but we stuck it out and we managed to have some good moments in the area. The highlight of this entire leg of our trip was the journey into Sydney on the bus and attending the Ballet at the Sydney Opera House
We saw the ballet, LA FILLE MAL GARDEE, "The Girl Runs Wild", which was a stunning comical performance based on the story of Romeo and Juliet.
The whole experience was fantastic and this nearly redeemed the accommodations at Bondi Sands... Nearly, but not quite.
Anyhow, overall we would have enjoyed ourselves MUCH more had the accommodations been better, but this doesn't mean we won't be going back to Australia to explore a bit more but we will be skipping Bondi Beach and, specifically, Bondi Sands!
From Australia we ventured off to Thailand and our first stop there... BANGKOK!
First bad omen was the cab ride to Bondi Beach. Our cab driver had something going on, either sleep deprivation or some kind of depressant in his system because he kept falling asleep at the wheel! Yeah, I'm serious, he was nodding off the entire trip from the airport to Bondi Beach and even zonked out at a stop light or two only to be awoke by the honking cars behind us! That was scary and once we arrived we called his cab company and complained and hopefully they pulled this guy off the streets before he killed someone. Note: this was the middle of the afternoon!
So, we get to our backpacker, Bondi Sands, and all I can say is that I made a BIG mistake with this place! OY VEY!! This was by far the nastiest place we would stay at during our trip and we tried our best to be troopers about the whole thing but were just completely dissatisfied with the entire place. Our room was the best they offer and for the price I would have appreciated a LOT better! Besides just being a messy little hole, the room was booked as a "Private, Ocean View Double Room", it was actually a hot and noisy little room that required the window open all evening to circulate air and that allowed the noise of a major bus route right outside the place to drift up and into the room. Then there were the filthy accommodations and the nasty, cockroach infested, "Self catering kitchen" that was SOOO small you could barely manage to cook a meal. The rooftop patio was a shambles and the BBQ didn't work and then the lounge that they advertised was just a mess and looked as if a high school party had been held there the night before. Anyhow, nothing good to say about this place but we stuck it out and we managed to have some good moments in the area. The highlight of this entire leg of our trip was the journey into Sydney on the bus and attending the Ballet at the Sydney Opera House
We saw the ballet, LA FILLE MAL GARDEE, "The Girl Runs Wild", which was a stunning comical performance based on the story of Romeo and Juliet.
The whole experience was fantastic and this nearly redeemed the accommodations at Bondi Sands... Nearly, but not quite.
Anyhow, overall we would have enjoyed ourselves MUCH more had the accommodations been better, but this doesn't mean we won't be going back to Australia to explore a bit more but we will be skipping Bondi Beach and, specifically, Bondi Sands!
From Australia we ventured off to Thailand and our first stop there... BANGKOK!
posted by Heather & Pauli at 7:24 PM
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