Yes, I'm an Olympic nut

Hello wanderlusters!

Today I’ve decided to blog about a different kind of wanderlust. Time travelling wanderlust! Sounds weird right? I guess it is, but it’s something I think about occasionally. No I’m not a Back to the Future movie lover, I’m just a really nostalgic person by nature, and while I’ve had an amazing adult life, I had an even better childhood, and often think to myself that if given the opportunity, I would happily go back and do my childhood alllllll over again. Why? Because it was the most simple, idyllic, happiest time of my life. I had a kick ass childhood, and I would be the luckiest person out if I could go back and do it over.

Anyways, but that’s not what I’m going to write about today. As much as I would like to regale you with stories of my childhood (nahhhh I wouldn’t do that to you….much) I wanted to find out from my readers what time periods they would like I go back to. Would you like to go back to just a day last week that was awesome? Would you go back to your high school or university days? Your travelling days? Is there a particular event in time you would like to go back to and relive, or be a part of (because you weren’t actually alive or old enough when it actually happened to enjoy it and be part of it)? Is there a place or a day or a group of people you’d like to be standing amongst again?

I have a couple, one of which I reckon I’ll tell you about today. As an Olympic Games tragic, I would love to go back and be old enough (perhaps 22 or 23 years old) to be in Sydney during the 2000 Olympics. I was only 14 when these Olympics were on, but I distinctly remember the build up all year to that September day when they began. I remember racing home from school to watch the Opening Ceremony. I remember my Dad shaking me awake the morning after the opening and saying ‘We’ve won our first medal! We’ve won our first medal!’. I remember holding my breath as I watched Cathy Freeman run in the rain for her gold medal in the 400m. I watched so much sport during those two weeks that it was scary, and let me tell you, my addiction had begun.

 

 

Now I’m not even a hugely sporty person. In school I played quite a few sports, but as an adult I only occasionally get out my tennis racket for a hit on my lonesome against a wall down at the local courts. But something about Sydney – maybe it wasn’t even really the sport at all – just hooked me in. I loved the excitement that seemed to be radiating all over the city during that time. I loved how many new people came to Sydney for the first time, and discovered my home country with wide eyes. I loved how god damn Aussie proud we all felt during the Olympics. I loved the whole nation getting behind Thorpey and Cathy. I loved how Sydney put on the greatest show on earth from opening to closing ceremony. Heck, I even loved the excited commentary voices of Bruce McAvaney and Sandy Roberts (still do, actually).

 

And ever since those Olympics I have wished that I could’ve lived in Sydney during that time. I wish I could’ve been in my twenties and maybe just doing some waitressing or bar job, but just BEING THERE during the Olympics. To be able to have felt personally swept up in the excitement of the world’s greatest sporting event right in my backyard. To have said hello and given directions on the street to foreign visitors in Sydney for the Games. To have sat at a vantage point in the city and watched the Opening Ceremony on a live screen and then stared in awe at the fireworks spewing out everywhere all over the harbour. To have gotten a cheap ticket to an event – any event – and witnessed the greatest sports men and women in the world battling it out in the greatest moment of their lives.

Yes that's me geeking out during a Stadium
Australia tour on the actual medal
dias used during 2000

I just wish I could’ve been there, in Sydney, for that whole month of September, so that I could’ve been happily swept up in it all. Swept up in all the excitement of this once in a lifetime event. Because dare I say it, it’s going to be a very long time before the Olympics are held in Australia again. I may not even be alive for it.

I recently had my VHS tapes of the Opening Ceremony converted onto DVD. Yes that’s right, fifteen years after the event, I did it. And it cost me $250. But it was worth it to have that glorious beginning moment of our golden era of sport and life – a wonderful, simpler time before September 11, before global financial meltdowns, before SARS and swine flu and wars on terror – on a DVD to be able to watch forever and one day show my own children. Maybe that’s cheesy and lame, but I don’t care. My friends have always said I’m the most patriotic person they’ve ever met, and this proves it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Sydney Olympics also made me fall in love with the city of Sydney itself, and played a huge part in my wanting to visit it on holiday for the first time in 2007, then countless times after until I finally moved there in 2013. The first time I ever caught the train to Olympic Park, hired a bike and cycled around the vast area all day long was the closest I’ve ever felt to being at an Olympics. I stopped at an intersection right outside the main stadium on my bike and closed my eyes for a moment, trying to picture what it would’ve been like in 2000. Tried to imagine the sounds of thousands of people milling around from every corner of the globe. Tried to imagine the smell of food for sale and the feeling of a brilliant Sydney spring day on my shoulders and face. Tried to imagine the sight of flags waving in the breeze, sports fanatics dressed up in their finest green and gold, pin traders doing deals with each other, exhilarated faces of fans emerging from venues at the end of gripping matches or races. Tried to imagine the energetic vibe that would’ve been pulsating through the entire area during those seventeen days in September. I wish I could’ve been part of it.

 

Photo cred: Australian Olympic Team Facebook page

 

This Tuesday will be fifteen years since the Sydney games began - and less than one year to go until Rio. This time I'm not going to miss out...I'll be in Rio, waving that green and gold proudly. Details to come!

In the meantime, check out this nostalgic article that is fluffy as hell but made me well up with pride... http://corporate.olympics.com.au/news/sydney-2000-the-time-of-our-lives-15-years-ago

What era do you wish you could go back to? Leave me a comment and let me know! I’d love to hear from you!

Your Olympic nut,

Jorgs

P.S I wrote this entry whilst sitting at a corner desk on the second floor of the City of Sydney Library in Haymarket, and the entire time I typed, I could hear a busker down on the street below playing Waltzing Matilda. Coincidence? I think not.

 

The Boxing Kangaroo is my spirit animal, of course!
 

Which Bunk? Sydney Central YHA, Sydney, Australia

It’s been a while between drinks with my hostel reviews hasn’t it? Well no more. I’m back with another Sydney hostel review for you my travelling friends! Sorry they’ve all been Sydney hostels so far – I promise I am going to do reviews on other hostels in other cities too – it’s just that Sydney is the city I visit the most and there are A LOT of backpackers hostels in the emerald city!

Today I’m reviewing Sydney Central YHA. I stayed at this hostel at least ten times now, and while it’s not as good as Sydney Harbour YHA in The Rocks, it’s still got plenty of good things to list about it!

This little hostel gem baby is located a stone’s throw from Central station in the Sydney CBD. As you may recall from my previous review of Railway Square YHA, which is also located a stone’s throw from Central Station but difficult to find and with many stairs to tramp up when you eventually do find it, Sydney Central is a much easier walk and much easier to find I’m pleased to report!

The walk from train station platform to front desk of the hostel will take no more than 10 minutes, if that, and gratefully, there are no stairs and no hills. Rejoice! The hostel is right next to a convenience store and a café, and the endless eating possibilities of Chinatown are just a few more minutes walk away. The Capitol Theatre, recently showing Les Mis, is also nearby. If you really wanted some exercise you could walk from the hostel all the way down busy George Street to the iconic Sydney Harbour in about 20-30 minutes, depending on your pace. And of course, being the convenient cater for everybody city that Sydney is, you are flush with all things you could possibly need during your stay at the YHA – ATM’s, medical centres, gyms, pubs, clubs, supermarkets, parks, shops, cinemas, buses, trains and language schools just to name a few - as they are all only seconds from your grasp when you’re staying at Sydney Central.

When it comes to laying your head down for the night everything from male or female only dorms are available, in four, six and eight bunk set ups. You can also book private and family rooms (though these are often the same price as a 2 or 3 star hotel nearby, and at least with a hotel you would have your own bathroom and tv…just an FYI). Still, that being said, in a hotel you likely wouldn’t have at your disposal two enormous communal kitchens kitted out with everything you could need to cook a five course meal – you don’t even need to bring your own cutlery. It’s all here. So too are walls upon walls of shelves to store your food (complete with a label with your name and check out date to differentiate your cornflakes from someone else’s cornflakes). There’s even a free food fridge – one of my favourite things a hostel can offer a budget traveller, and a genius idea to boot. The eating area also has plenty of comfy booths as well as long communal tables that would make Jamie Oliver bubble over in glee at the shared experience of it all. Vending machines by the kitchen pump out everything from tea and coffee to icecream and drinks.

 



The dorms on offer at Sydney Central are ample and spacious – unlike some other hostels where 2 bunk beds are often cramped into the tiniest shoebox of a room. Lockers in the room are large enough to fit three decent sized bags, but you need to bring your own lock. Sheets are provided and although the doonas, mattress protectors and pillows have seen better days the only way you’re going to get a bad night’s sleep is if someone in your dorm room snores (always a dreaded possibility!). That being said though, the hostel can be noisy at times – every door in the place closes with a loud bang no matter how delicately you try to close it, the walls are kind of thin and if your room is close to the lifts you’ll hear every ding announcing its arrival on your floor, or to the bathrooms you’ll definitely hear when someone uses the hand dryer at 2am. Still, I’ve stayed at worse, louder hostels.

The bunk situation - some
travellers are not the tidiest!

 

Now, if you’ve stayed at Sydney Harbour YHA over in The Rocks like I have and loved to pieces the way every bed has a power point next to the light, you’ll be disappointed that this is not the case at Sydney Central. Still, there are enough power points in other parts of the room to please everyone. Select dorms have lockers which actually have power points inside them, which means you can handily charge your laptop or mobile and lock it away so there is no threat of it being stolen as it charges.

The shared bathrooms on every floor seem small – some with just three showers and three toilets each, but I have never come across them full, and never had to wait to use a shower. Perhaps during peak times there might be a line, but truly, I don’t think there is a peak time in a backpacker’s hostel – the people staying there are on holidays. They’re not living to normal time frames! The bathrooms will be no more packed at 7am than they would be at 10am.

 

 

LOLZ

 

The all important free wifi is available on the ground and first floor only, but you can purchase a package if you want premium wifi throughout all the floors during your stay. Good deals are advertised on many a wall throughout the hostel and in the lifts - $112 for three night’s accommodation with premium wifi being an example I saw in August 2015 that would be hard to pass up if you’re a person who cannot live without being connected.

 

 

Sydney Central also offers an array of other activities and amenities for travellers – everything from a conference room to a cinema to lockers for hire (with power points inside! Yay!) to walking tours and pizza nights. The staff are friendly and you truly feel like you’re in the thick of the big exciting world of backpacking when you are standing in the lobby of this nine story hostel, your sheets tucked under your arm and your room key in your pocket.

 

 

This hostel also radiates with the distinct feeling of being a melting pot of gap year travellers and groups from schools, universities and organisations. There is a lot of emphasis on and information provided about travelling on to other parts of Australia, getting jobs in Sydney, learning English, setting up bank accounts and help with tax – there is even a large noticeboard covered in ads for cars, campervans and tents for sale from people who have finished their gap years and are heading back home, eager to offload the rusty old kombi they bought at the beginning of their stay and toured Oz in. I was even approached in person during one stay by a guy asking every person in the room individually if they were looking for a job. His in person approach was a step up from the array of job ads posted on the noticeboard next to the one displaying the car ads. Such extensive noticeboards and information aren’t found at, say, Sydney Harbour YHA, which is much more of a tourist frequented hostel, whereas Sydney Central is for the true travellers and gappies – those off on an adventure not just for a week or two, but a few months or a year, who want to be close to transport and all the things they’ll need to make a living in Sydney for such a long length of time.

Sydney Central might not be as close to all the famous Sydney icons as Sydney Harbour YHA is, and it’s also definitely not as new and modern, but the prices reflect this, so it’s still a good deal and a great place to base yourself during your trip to Sydney. Of all of YHA’s Sydney hostels I’m pretty sure this one is the easiest to get to via public transport and on foot, and I know in my book, that makes it a place I’ll be coming back to!

Jorgs rates Sydney Central YHA 4 stars out of 5! Check out their website at www.yha.com.au ! And while you’re there, follow me on twitter @Brindabella24 and on Instagram @brindabella24 J

 

Enjoy the fun and the sun in Sydney -
this city never disappoints!

 

Until next time,

Jorgs

Crazy travel tale #1

Hi friends! I just got home from Dubai yesterday and as you know, going to Dubai isn’t my fave, so I usually spend most of the time I am there in my hotel room, where there is a suitably large bed and a very wide screen tv (I know I know, I shouldn’t be complaining right?) and abusing the free Wi-Fi offered to crew. Anyways, on this occasion, as I spent much of the day in my pjs, I got to thinking of all the memorable and crazy situations I’ve found myself in and crazy experiences I’ve had whilst in foreign countries and I thought they would be great to share on my blog with you all.

Now when I say crazy situations I don’t necessarily mean crazy scary or crazy dangerous. Sometimes an experience has been downright unbelievable or really, really lucky or stupidly, ridiculously funny. The sort of stories I won’t even wait to tell when I get home after my trip…I’ll be telling them in the car on the way home from the airport.

One such story happened in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania a few years back. I was travelling solo in the City of Brotherly Love and had been to all the must do’s already – the Liberty Bell, the US Mint, UPenn, the LOVE sign and even Amish country. But I knew there was one more must do on my list – the Rocky statue and steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Now I have never seen a Rocky movie in my life, I’m not a fan of Sylvester Stallone at all and I had zero interest in boxing OR modern art. But I still felt like I had to see it as part of my time in Philly so I wanted to tick it off my list.

So on my rainy last day in Philly before I headed to NYC, I caught the bus to the museum and proceeded to walk around for at least an hour trying to find this bloody statue with no luck. I was getting frustrated that the grounds were so large and I couldn’t seem to find what should surely be an attraction swarming with tourists just like myself. Eventually I went inside the museum and asked a staff member for directions. She looked me up and down with a disgusted look on her face (obviously thinking I was such a philistine) and gruffly gave me directions before walking off in a huff to the real appreciators of art. Awks. So outside into the gloom and doom of that wet June day I went again. As I was nearing the statue (although I had no idea still that I was close to it) a guy and a girl were approaching me on the same footpath from the other direction. They were laughing their heads off and scoffing at something that seemed like the biggest joke in the world. I went to smile as we passed each other but then they stopped. “Oh my god! When you get to the statue you have to say ‘I want to go to Fairfax, Virginia this summer’ to those people over there!” they exclaimed, pointing at a group of three people standing about 30 metres away from us.

“Why?” I asked, cautiously laughing myself, but not really sure these people were the full quid.

“Trust us, just do it!” and then they ran off.

I really had little intention of doing it, but when I got closer to them I could see they were standing near the Rocky statue, and since I had tried for hours to find this thing, in the rain, and my sneakers were pretty much soaked through and my bag was getting heavy, I was damned if I wasn’t going to get my photo with this landmark before I returned to Australia, so I thought I would ask them if they would take my photo for me.

They happily obliged and afterwards as I said thankyou I remembered what the guy and the girl five minutes earlier had said, and decided what the hell?

“Thanks for taking my photo,” I said with a grin. “By the way, I really want to go to Fairfax, Virginia this summer.”

Well they just Lost. Their. Shit. “YES!” they yelled and pointed over my shoulder at a man standing behind me dressed up as George Washington. “You’re the last one to win!”

And with that George handed me an envelope and a bundle of brochures from the tourist bureau of Fairfax. You can imagine the look on my face, but I played along, thinking, who are these nutjobs and what have I won? They explained that the promotion they were running was going to award $100 to the first three people to go up to them and say ‘I want to go to Fairfax, Virginia this summer’, and apparently I was number three (I guess the guy and girl I’d seen earlier who had given me the hint were numbers one and two)!

The volunteers took my picture with the George Washington impersonator and then cheerily wished me a great day and said they hoped to see me in Fairfax one day soon. All my thoughts of why I had originally wanted to come to the museum that day were completely washed away by then, as you can imagine. I smiled and thanked them and walked back off in the direction I came as they packed up their pamphlets and left, no more prizes to give out.

I waited until I was a safe distance away from them before opening the envelope they’d given me. I didn’t really believe they’d given me $100. For free? Just for saying some cheesy line? No way. But lo and behold, when I ripped open the envelope I looked inside to discover $100 in one dollar bills staring back at me. That’s right – one hundred one dollar bills. Because George Washington is the president who features on the one dollar bill. Duh (and I guess he was also from Fairfax, Virginia?).

I was shocked and then started laughing not dissimilar to how the guy and girl earlier had been laughing. Did I just get a hundred bucks for free? What? This was too good to be true! The rest of the day I spent marvelling at my good luck, and the irony of how I hadn’t even seen the Rocky movies, how I had had so much trouble finding the statue and the iconic steps from the film, how the woman inside the museum had looked at me with such a disgusted look on her face when I had asked for directions, how I hadn’t even been super keen to leave the hostel at all that morning because it had been such miserable weather. And yet I had gone, and this had happened.

Totally worth it.

 

 

That moment and the Amish food I tried whilst in Pennsylvania remain my strongest memories of my time there.

What crazy things have happened to you whilst travelling? Have you ever had a stroke of luck like this? Leave me a comment and tell me all about it. I’d love to hear from you! And while you’re there don’t forget to follow me on Instagram @brindabella24 !

Until next time…

Jorgs and George Dubbya