9 August 2016:

Day 7. Two days left! We went to Bondi Beach by losing our fats and calories. Or the other way of saying it, walking. I think I lost 400 calories due to this already. Oh at this time around the winter has become quite less cold. I no longer need to wear winter jacket. It was a very long walk, we passed by road by road, beach by beach, even graveyard lol. We passed by Coogee Beach before reached Bondi. The beach was soooo amazing it was really beautiful theres a lot of people over there but the shore was really vast all in all it was sooo mesmerizing. We then went to DFO by bus for a while before heading back to Kingsford.

10 August 2016:

Day 8. Since we still have some dollars, so we thought of going to Sydney Fish Market. How to reach there? Thanks to Google Maps. To go to Sydney Fish Market, first we went to the city by bus. Then at the harbor near the Sydney Opera House, we boarded the ferry from Circular Quay to Darling Harbor. 

The view from the ferry was very amazing. You could see Harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House slowly fading away. 

After we have arrived Darling Harbor, we walked a bit to the train station nearby. It was the Pyrmont Bay station. Take the train to Fish Market. You won’t arrive at the doorstep of Sydney Fish Market, so you have to walk again for some distance, and you could see from afar the signage. 

The price was quite expensive but it was so worth it looking at the enormous portion. Ours was $42 but I tell you it was really good, really fresh. Manhattan Fish Market really couldn’t beat it.

You can choose which set you want, or even if you want a la carte

We then went to Paddy’s Markets. Okay so we went back to the train station, and rode to Paddy’s Markets Station. This is where tourists buy souvenirs but I didn’t buy any hehe. 

We walked out from Paddy’s Markets and just follow the road even though we didn’t know where it was leading to. We got inside of this one expensive building which we don’t know of. But we took some pictures inside it.

Then we went to the Queen Victoria Building, and had ice cream at I-Creamy Artisan Gelato. This one, this one is really a must because this is the only place where they serve a flower as an ice cream! Nah of course it’s not a flower they just decorated it to look like a real flower. You can choose your flavor according to your taste. It was so pretty! 

Walk, walk, walk, we arrived at Hyde Park. 

It was almost night. I had come to realize that we had less than 12 hours being in Sydney. We will leave tomorrow. I felt very sad L we then rode the bus to head back to Kingsford. That night we spent some quality time with our friends who had been sooo helpful and kind throughout our stay in Sydney.

11 August 2016:

Day 9. Our flight was at 11am. Our friend sent us off to the airport and we thanked them for the very last time, wished them for their studies, and took some pictures before we entered the airport.

And, we boarded into the plane… We arrived Kuala Lumpur 7 pm Malaysia time.

I really couldn’t move on because the whole journey has become sooo splendid I could not describe in words I really could get teary when I think about it huhu it was so special.

Okay enough with being all sentimental. The journey indeed was a very memorable and treasured journey. I felt very satisfied with everything. The most important things that you must have, are your power bank, you Opal/PTV card, google map/PTV apps, and a water bottle (because they don’t have water pipes in the toilets). 

This is by far the longest entry I have ever written lol. Till then.

6 August 2016:

Fourth day. At this day we went to the famous Victoria Library (which reminisced me of Running Man because there is an episode where they did their shooting there), Melbourne Hall, Brighton Beach, Yarra River, and Shrine of Remembrance. We spent most of the day for Brighton Beach because it was not in the city and we had to take the train at Flinders Street Station. Mind you, we went to Brighton Beach by train, not tram, they both are not similar. Tram is like train but they use road in their route. Train is like the KTM here in Malaysia. In Melbourne, their ‘Tesco’ is Wools.

7 August 2016:

Fifth day. So I woke up at 3 because we had to gather at Box Hill. I went there by taxi. The bus for Mt Buller arrived at 5 am and we arrived Mt Buller at around 10 am. We played ice skating and all and were given time until 4 pm before the bus leaves. 

Sixth day. Okay so we were going back to Sydney at this date. The flight was at 6 pm, so we wanted to have a last go at the city. We actually wanted to go to the Victoria Market since it was on our list, unfortunately the market closes on every Monday, and so we missed it. We just strolled around the city just to kill the time. We had ice cream at Nitro Lab as well! One of my friends posted about it on Instagram and since we had found the place, so why not to give it a try. You must go there if you are at Melbourne City. 

At about 2pm, we headed back to Bundoora. We had a long chat and then off to the airport by taxi.

My friend paid for the taxi hehe, it was $50 guys. One tips, you can get discount if you know how to have a decent conversation with the taxi driver. We boarded at 6.30 pm, and arrived Sydney at 8 pm. Again, our friends picked us up hahah THANK YOU SO MUCH GUYS.

I'm done with Part 2. To be continued in Part 3.

I think it is about time for me to write an entry regarding my trip to Australia. I will try to cover as much as I can, from the ticket flight, accommodation, transportation, food, telco, etc.

My friend and I booked two-way flight tickets from Kuala Lumpur to Sydney and Sydney to Kuala Lumpur in May 2016. Our flight will be around early August 2016. The duration of stay would be 9 days. We bought the tickets early because they are cheaper if we book early. So after we bought the tickets, we started to plan the itinerary for the trip. Of course, we have to google for the interesting places at Sydney right? After we have done some research and read about Sydney trip from other bloggers, we found out that there are not so many places that we can cover. I could already guess that because based on the itinerary that I have planned, we can cover most of the areas in Sydney within two days only. If that’s the case, what do we do for the rest of our stay?

So we decided to go to Melbourne as well. But I did say that we have already bought our ticket right? If we were to reschedule our ticket we had to pay for the fees. If we were to just abandon our return flight ticket, Sydney-KL, so that we can just return to Malaysia from Melbourne, it would be a waste of money. In short, this would cost more expenses than it should. Therefore, we bought the Sydney-Melbourne and Melbourne-Sydney within that 9 days, means that we were inserting a slot for the trip to Melbourne within those days. So it will be, 3 days in Sydney, 3 days in Melbourne, and 3 days in Sydney. Ya it was quite ridiculous because we were like go here go there go here again lol. But, it costs lower amount of money, I have compared these two situations mathematically.

Oh anyway, the highlight for the trip to Melbourne is Mount Buller. It is a mountain full of ice (well not really full) which I don’t know whether it is man-made ice or natural ice. We booked the entrance ticket online.

  

 Air Asia two-way ticket (Kul-Syd-Kul)      = RM 2500

Tigerair two-way ticket (Syd-Melb-Syd)     = $ 30

                                                                               = RM 90

Entrance ticket for Mt Buller                       = $ 79

                                                                      = RM 237

Total                                                              = RM 2827

Tips:

-For the purchase of flight ticket, we used Skyscanner.com to compare the price.

-Because we have friends studying at both Sydney and Melbourne, so we spend 0 dollars on accommodations and food haha!

-If you want to bring any food with you, you have to make a declaration. Make a list of the food with the ingredients stated in the list.

-Toilets in Australia are dry toilets. They don’t have water pipes in the toilets. So bring along at least a water bottle for your ease because you won’t be comfortable if you just wipe with tissue.
-Google Maps is a really good help throughout the entire trip. Be it by bus, train, tram, ferry or even walking, you would know your route.

Alright enough for the introduction. Mind you we went during last bit of winter in Australia so it was still cold, so we brought some winter jackets.

2 August 2016 (a day before):

My friend and I went to the KL Sentral by KTM, and then we rode the RM10 bus to LCCT. We arrived KLIA2 at 6.30 pm. Our flight to Sydney was at 11.30 pm. It was an 8-hour flight so we slept throughout the entire journey.

3 August 2016:

First day. We arrived at 9.45 am Sydney time. We were 2 hours ahead. So it would be 7.45 am Malaysia time. Our friends picked us up at the airport by her car, ate nasi lemak (because they missed Malaysian Food I think), had a long chat, and then we went to La Perouse, by car as well. That night I just ate at my friend’s house.

4 August 2016:

Second day. I followed my friend to her university, UNSW, to just have a walk. The university is really just a stone throw away from her house. Then I went to the town to buy my telco. I used Optus because for the usage of one day, it would only cost me $1 and I can have unlimited call and unlimited high-speed internet data. I really would recommend Optus if you are ever going to Australia. My friend (the one who is in trip with me) and I then rode the bus from the town, which I couldn’t remember what number, to the city. Yes by the way here, they wont receive any cash if you want to buy the ticket bus because they don’t use ticket bus system. You want to ride the bus, then you have to use the Opal card. It is similar to the RapidKL card in Malaysia. We just borrowed the cards from our friends. We covered Sydney Opera House, Royal Botanic Garden, Art Gallery of South Wales, and Bourke Street. All these places were like grouped together so you can reach just with a 10 to 20 minutes walk. 

We also went to some places which were not in our list, but because they were seemed like worth a visit, so why not. After that we went back to Kingsford because it was almost night. We dropped by at the Coles, it was like Tesco but it was so much cooler than Tesco! They have this one machine where you can scan your things without needing to queue to pay manually. And, that 2L milk in that big bottle only costed me $2, insane! Haha! If it were in Malaysia that 1L milk already costed RM 12 heh. But of course this is because Australia is milk supplier, other than New Zealand.

5 August 2016:

Third day. Our flight to Melbourne was at 6.40 am. We got out from the house at 5 and reached domestic airport at 5.30 am. Thanks to my friend who woke up early to send us off at the airport huhu. We reached Melbourne at 8.15 am. It was really windy as soon as we stepped out of the plane! It was 3 degrees omg. We then rode taxi for RMIT Bundoora campus, to my another friend’s house, or hostel. We had a meal which she cooked, and then we off to the city by tram while my friend went to her class. The same concept here, you use card to ride public transport. But at Melbourne, it was PTV card. I think it stands for Public Transport of Victoria. We didn’t buy, we just borrowed our friends’ hehe. It was an hour ride because Bundoora is the last station and the city is as well quite towards the end of the route. We covered Fed Square, Hosier Lane, Flinders Street Station. We managed to cover most of the areas in the city before night. 

That's all for Part 1. To be continued...