Sydney Camp

Bright and early on Monday morning, 35 students, 3 teachers and a bus driver named Chris piled our luggage into a coach and set off excitedly for Sydney.

By the time we reached the submarine at Holbrook, everyone was either buried in music and movies or fast asleep.

Our first night in Sydney, we set off for a stroll around Darling Harbour, had a late dinner and collapsed into our beds at the Woolbroker’s Hotel.

On Tuesday, we visited St Mary’s Cathedral, one of the first and most prominent constructions in Sydney’s history.

We walked from there to the Gallery of New South Wales, where we found two Picassos, five wire statues and a picture of a painter painting a picture that hung beside it.

From there, we bussed to the Sydney Opera House, where we were treated to a guided tour including the exterior ant the two major performance spaces

Afterwards, we became slightly lost on our way to the Harbour Bridge walkway. Nevertheless, we made it up the pylon in time to watch the sunset and see the sails of the Opera House fade to silhouettes.

Our first stop on Wednesday was the museum of Contemporary Art, where we split into two groups for a tour, including amazing artworks by Kader Attia.

We had a quick lunch on the steps of the Powerhouse Museum, then explored for a while. The Museum was featuring: steam, space, electricity, the Wiggles, 3D printing/interactive zone, and wedding fashion.

Then, we had special access to the Maritime Museum thanks to our bus driver Chris (the museum and Garden Island are currently closed for “security reasons”).

That night, after exploring the Maritime Museum and finding a memorial to our teacher’s uncle, we drove to the Quarantine Station for a ghost tour. Here, again, we split into two groups for a lantern-lit adventure.

Needless to say, we collapsed into our beds.

Thursday was a calmer day, and took us first to the Australian Museum, where we explored crystals, dinosaurs, Pacific cultures, mega fauna and live spiders. We were driven to lunch on Mrs Macquarie’s Chair.

From there, we walked to Wharf 3 on Darling Harbour. We missed our ferry, but another left in 30 minutes. After a short ride to Manly, we were set free to explore before the bus picked us up in the late afternoon.

That evening, we went out to dinner at Nine Dragons Chinese Restaurant. On our way back for our last night at the hotel, we drove through King’s Cross and visited a multi-storey David Jones store.

Friday brought us a wet day for the long haul back to Castlemaine.

We gratefully arrived to be greeted by our parents, who bustled us away to our warm, comfortable beds.

Written by Reuben McDougall-DiManno with help from Iliah Carolan and Yannan Mountain-Walker.