First thing in the morning we had a coffee and tour at the Opera House. 
The guide said funny Australianisms like, “chaps,” “g’day,” etc. Excellent. 
I guess I could tell you all the history of it, but who cares. I did think it was cool that the design mimics sailboats on the harbor. That seems obvious now, but in all those sweeping panoramas of the bay during the 200 Olympics I never quite picked that up. Cool.
I loved loved loved loved LOVED the architecture+fauna of Australia. That is exactly what I’d always pictured as the ideal combination. Who knew Australia was the place to find it??
I went on a volunteer-guided tour of the State Library. Chris and I are going to build a house someday called Krueger Keep. Chris wants a moat. I want a boudoir. Anywho, I sent him a postcard last summer when my sis and I were at Alhambra saying we should make sure we see the world before we build our Keep so we can incorporate all the best elements, particularly columns and arches and domes and stuff. What this has to do with Australia’s library is this: it was everything I’d pictured. Stone columns out front, an inlaid marble map of Australia in the foyer, shelves and shelves and shelves of books complete with rolling ladders….oooo! So maybe in the Keep we’ll have a map of….Texas? Florida? The South? The States?? THE WORLD?!?!! 
I met back up with Chrissy and we walked through Martin Place where saw some more of the many Chinese people peacefully protesting communism in their homeland on our way to walk across the Harbor Bridge. 
The clouds scattered in an instant, bathing the entire harbor in sunlight for the first time all day. Sailboats and tugboats wove across the water beneath us and the Australian flag–illuminated from behind–snapped smartly from the highest point of the bridge’s scaffolding (or whatever). 
“The Sydney Harbor Bridge
This bridge was declared open for traffic
on 19th March 1932
by
The Honorable John T. Lang, M.L.A.
Premier and Colonial Treasurer of New South Wales”
It was nice to be able to understand everybody. English, how novel! But you can’t say we totally understood everything. Huh?
Then dinner at the Sydney Tower Restaurant. It was expensive, served mostly Asian food with a chunk of dry kangaroo thrown in, and it didn’t open until the sun had already mostly set. But the chicken curry was really good. Not $65 good, but good.
