13D12N Australia Trip: The Art of the Brick DC Comics, Powerhouse Museum (Part 1)

It was really an unplanned activity of the day. My friend wanted to celebrate her birthday in a fun way in Sydney but we totally ran out of ideas on what to do in this busy city of Australia. In one of the tourism brochure lying around in our airbnb's bedroom, we spotted that Powerhouse Museum Science + Design in Sydney was currently having a pretty interesting exhibition so there we were, after trying to find our way from Chinese Garden of Friendship. 

The exhibition is pretty much unique because apparently it is an installation of art display made from Lego. To be exact, have you heard the Art of the Brick exhibition by Nathan Sawaya? 

The exhibition held at Powerhouse Museum is not the normal Art of the Brick as Nathan has adopted DC Comics' concept in his latest exhibition. Even his trademark opening art has Joker face painted on it. 

Since it's DC Comics world, you could see a lot of DC superheroes made from lego bricks. Nathan is really such a genius. I played with Lego before but have never even thought of creating man out of those bricks. Let alone superheroes. Hahaha.

Wonder Woman and Superman in brick form.

Let's not forget the mighty Batman.

The last time I checked, the exhibition was over now but no worries, I had taken a lot of pictures during my visit so you can see the main items of the exhibition here. =)

13D12N Australia Trip: Chinese Garden of Friendship, Darling Harbour (part 2)

Having living in Singapore for a couple of years, I realise that not everyone have the luxury to afford a garden at their own yard. That's when a concept of a garden inside a bustling city has become more and more popular for a metropolis. Continuing on my post on the part 1 before, we continued to explore the Chinese Garden of Friendship in Sydney, Australia. There is a bridge which leads to the deeper side of the garden. 

The pathway to the pagoda which we saw earlier in my part 1 post could be reached from under those shading trees. In the middle of the pathway, we even saw a lotus pond. Too bad the flowers were not in bloom that day.

You would have to walk a bit uphill to reach the pagoda but I suppose it can be considered an easy feat because the elder lady in front of me could do that pretty easily. You could not climb to the top of the pagoda though because it is not for climbing. 

As you could see, there are no stairs leading to the top of the pagoda. 

We took a different path to come down to the entrance of the garden and we were so glad we did that because there is a small waterfall here. Chinese Garden of Friendship is really a nice place to take a peaceful stroll in the city of Sydney.

One last shot of the garden before we finished our journey here. 

13D12N Australia Trip: Chinese Garden of Friendship, Darling Harbour (part 1)

Sydney has its own garden surrounded by concrete jungle and skyscrapers and it lies right at the prime area of Darling Harbour. The garden is themed like a traditional peaceful Chinese garden and it is named the Chinese Garden of Friendship.

Admission to the garden is not free though. But I suppose it is somewhat reasonable at AUD 6 for adults. You can get cheaper price for family, students, pensioners or seniors. 

The Chinese garden is walled in all its sides so there is only one entrance/ exit door. The garden is filled with hidden pathways too and to be honest it is kinda fun to find your way in the garden. Our journey starts with the wall installation depicting two dragons fighting over an orb. A dragon ball?

You will be immediately led to a stone pathway surrounded by various green plantation. 

Once you come out from the pathway, you will be greeted by a serene koi pond with a pavilion at the opposite side with office buildings on the backdrop. A superb escapade for the office workers I must say, if they can find time to take a stroll in the garden during lunch time. 

13D12N Australia Trip: Axil Coffee Co, Kirribilli Sydney

During our stay at the second airbnb accommodation in Sydney, we managed to explore the neighbourhood of Kirribilli. Kirribilli is one of the suburbs in Sydney and judging from how the neighbourhood looks like, it seems to be one of the premier suburbs of Sydney (direct view of Sydney Opera House for goodness sake). Since Australia is well known for its breakfast habit, we explored the neighbourhood to find a cozy place to start the day and that's when we stumbled into Axil Coffee Co.

Axil Coffee Co has been described in TimeOut as a cafe with views that rival the prime minister's. We were kinda having doubt on this but as soon as we entered the cafe, all doubts are gone. Curious? I'll post the picture of the view at the end of the post. Hehe.

At this point of my journey, I don't feel like drinking coffee anymore and hence, replacing my usual latte order with a jar of fresh watermelon juice. 

My friend stuck to her usual caffeine fix, the latte and she said that Australian coffee never disappoints her. Glad to hear that I suppose, but I'm pretty much happy with my supposedly-healthier watermelon juice. =P

If you ask me to describe the food served at Axil Coffee Co with one word, it's pretty. My Friend's rhubarb, apple and greek yoghurt sourdough looks oh-so-pretty on the palate even though this dish is kinda too healthy for her taste. She did not even tough her rhubarb at all. LOL.

Even though my order may not be as pretty as the combination of apple and rhubarb in the above picture, taste-wise I prefer this big banana bread. The nuts and cream serve on top of the banana bread brings the dish to another level. The size may be too big for me but I suppose this size suits Australian just nice? Haha. If you are not a big eater, I suggest you share the food at Axil Coffee Co.

Oh right, before you left the cafe, don't forget to take a peek outside the window to see that million-dollar-prime-minister's-view. Does it meet your expectation? 

If it does not, you may want to start aiming to be the next PM. LOL.

13D12N Australia Trip: Delicious Pho and Wonderful Sunset, Sydney

The last time I've blogged about Sydney is about my impromptu visit to Symbio Wildlife Reserve because my cousin's car broke down as he accidentally hit the car in front. Oh well. The wildlife is not big enough for us to spend a long time inside but at least we managed to spend at least two hours inside by walking slowly, feeding wallabies and teasing koala. We spent another hour of waiting in the store which is equipped with an air conditioner, thankfully, while waiting for my cousin's friend to pick us up from...a place which is a bloody long way from Sydney.

Tired from all the waiting, we finally managed to escape from the accident site and back to the suburban area near my cousin's house. Feeling bad, he brought us to eat Vietnamese food at An Restaurant. My cousin stayed at a suburban area which is also known as Little Vietnam (or Little Saigon? I can never tell.). 

There are a lot of Vietnamese patrons when we are at the restaurant around 5PM on a Sunday. The restaurant must be good because I really think 5PM is not yet dinner time (unless Australian loves early dinner?). I order a bowl of beef pho which taste oh so amazing. It's definitely better than those pho(s) which I eat in some Vietnamese restaurants in Singapore. 

With full stomach, my cousin dropped us to the nearest safe metro station (apparently, not all metro stations are safe especially outside Sydney) so that we could ride the metro back to Sydney CBD safely. And just in time to wait for the sunset at Circular Quay. 

Sunset viet at Circular Quay in Sydney. Even though the day had been kinda rough, I was pretty grateful we managed to enjoy at least a pretty enjoyable evening (and yummy Vietnamese pho). 

Lesson learnt: Don't let my cousin drive again next time. 

13D12N Australia Trip: Symbio Wildlife Park, Sydney

If you love animals, you will probably enjoy going to a zoo in Australia. Our trip to the zoo (or they call it a wildlife park here in Sydney) was actually unplanned. I am not really an animal-lover and hence, I don't mind missing a trip to the zoo at all in my itinerary. However, my cousin just had to nudge another car which ended up in a K.O. moment for his own car. With a broken car, we had no choice but to wait for the tow truck to arrive. The funny thing is, there is a wildlife park right opposite the crash site. 

So my cousin's wife decided to brought me and my friend there so that we would not waste our time entirely waiting for a tow truck. Anyway, we got nothing better to do so let's just go check some wildlife animals living in Symbio Wildlife Park. The park is not that big but we did see some wild animals which we did not see anywhere else like this hairy monkey (I forgot the biological name of the monkey). 

This animal is named Meerkat if I am now wrong but I always feel like calling him, King Julian instead due to the movie Madagascar. Hahaha. I want to move it move it~~~

Despite the small size, there are a lot of activities going on in Symbio Wildlife Park. For instance, there is this feeding dingo session which is conducted behind the high fences. Dingo is a wild dog and it can jump up pretty high. It loves to play and eat meat. The zoo-keeper will purposely place the meat at some high places to make the dingo jump. 

There are two dingos that we saw but one of them prefer to just slack behind the house. While the other one, is so active, it keeps jumping here and there. 

After feeding the dingo, we are so motivated to feed animals too. But obviously we chose the "tamer" animal to feed, like wallabies. Wallabies are basically smaller version of Kangaroos. They are not scared of human and it was pretty fun feeding them as they will not bite your hands (unless you annoy them so much I suppose). 

There is only one koala in vicinity that time and he does what he does best, napping. When it's time for him to wake up, he refuses to face us and it took us a few minutes to make him turn his face and say hello to us. My cousin's wife did a lot of the noise and stuff to distract him of course. 

If it is not for unforeseen circumstances, I don't think I will purposely drive all the way to visit Symbio Wildlife Park because it is located at a pretty outskirt area. I would actually prefer to go to Taronga Zoo which is way bigger and located right in the city centre of Sydney. But, nonetheless, we managed to spent a good few hours inside Symbio Wildlife Park.