Sydney accommodation

Sydney offers every category of accommodation – from backpacker hostels to international standard deluxe hotels (A$300-plus per night).

Sydney’s large and diverse accommodation industry caters for all budgets. At the upper end there’s the luxurious Park Hyatt Sydney, set right on the water’s edge, and the Westin Sydney, occupying the classic old post office building in Martin Place. At the lower-priced end, the ever popular Y on the Park, offers budget rooms with a near-city location. There are also many economical, self-catering apartments and reasonably priced guest guesthouses and hostels are plentiful. Bed-and-breakfasts are numerous, especially in outer suburbs and rural areas close to the city.

Sydney’s major hotel areas are around the city centre, Darling Harbour and Pyrmont, Circular Quay, Central Railway, and the inner eastern suburbs. Most hotels have in-room internet connections or wireless areas for laptops, and all backpacker hostels have computers for pay-as-you-go net surfing and email checking.

It’s worth looking on the internet for special deals, both in advance bookings and last-minute rate reductions. By all means use the sites that compare and present hotels together, but if you have a good idea of the place you wish to stay, go directly to their website and look for a ‘specials’ button. You can often get better deals this way. But be aware that there are popular times of the year, such as around new Year and January, when hotels are fully booked, so forward booking at this time of year is essential.

Although Sydney’s CBD is only 7km from the international airport, there are times when a stay at an airport hotel is necessary. Fortunately there are three good options: Hotel Formule 1 Sydney Airport is a good budget option; Ibis Hotel Sydney Airport offers mid-range value, and Airport Sydney International Inn is only a few minutes from the airport, in the quieter suburb of Arncliffe.

Sydney Harbour Bridge

The Sydney Harbour Bridge is the second most visited Sydney attraction - after the Sydney Opera House. This is a bridge located on the Sydney Harbour, connecting the Central Business District (Sydney CBD) on the coast with the residential north sydney suburbs. The bridge offers a beautiful panoramic view of Sydney.

The Bridge was built over a period of eight years, from 1924 to 1932. Since its inception is has been regarded as one of the most beautiful harbours in the world and is the largest in the world. Dr. Bradfield was the one who designed the bridge and the English company Drom Long and Co. were responsible for its construction, which cost a little more than 4 billion pounds. The bridge was designed with 8 dedicated lanes for vehicles, two train lines and a path for cyclists and pedestrians. Do you know how many cars pass by here every day? No less than 161 thousand. Impressive!

The Sydney Harbour Bridge was built with steel arches and is the main highlight with the New Years Eve fireworks display. If you are able to travel to Sydney during this time of the year you will get the opportunity to take many excellent pictures of boats and the sea which are illuminated by fireworks. It’s really beautiful!

You can also enjoy an unforgettable experience doing the Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb. Climb to the summit of the bridge and get to know what it feels like to be 134 meters above the Sydney Harbour. If you are not afraid of heights it will be a fascinating ride. Choose to do the Bridge Climb during the daytime or night. Both climbs last about 3 ½ hours. Do not miss the opportunity to take dramatic panoramic pictures of the city including the Sydney Opera House, sea, mountains and the city port. You will feel like you are on top of the world!

Sydney Opera House

In the late 50’s, Danish architect Joern Utzon won the prestigious Pritzker Prize (the equivalent of the Nobel in the architecture category) by the unique design of this building: the Sydney Opera House. The jury described it as “one of the most symbolic buildings of the twentieth century, a masterpiece, an image of great beauty… a symbol not only of a city, but of an entire country.”

His project had not been chosen among the five finalists (out of 233 that were submitted), but a well-known architect, Eero Saarinen, was on the jury for the Sydney Opera House commission and had seen the conceptual drawings of Utzon’s future Opera House. Curiously, its creator, Utzon left the project in 1966 by serious disagreements with the government of New South Wales and by the fierce complaints it received from the Australian population, who believed the building was too modernist and abstract. The original idea proved too expensive to implement, and had to be three Australian architects who complete the work in 1973, when it was opened with the opera War and Peace. Its original creator never returned to Australia to visit.

Utzon found it curious that Sydney in itself is an acknowledgment of modernist architecture, because this city can be described as the New York in the Southern Hemisphere, displayed by its skyscrapers, its modernity, its environment and its vitality.

Describing how the concept for the construction came about, he said the idea arose with an orange skin which opened its segments. The shell of an orange shaped their domes; in this web of Swedes tiles that form the roof of the building and that give this forceful contrast in the Sydney Harbour. A concrete base covered with granite, covered with white coating with ceramic tiles make up the rest of this unique monument. And that perfectly recognizable silhouette, like a boat with wind to the sails was deployed, which seems to vary depending on the point from where it is observed, and with the lights of the day and night, play with their volumes, with their facades, with its staircases and windows.

The Sydney Opera House is currently one of the most active travel destinations in the world. Inside it is home to several rooms dedicated to music, with a capacity for 2900 people, and a theatre, with 1547 seats.

Seven “New” Wonders of the World Nominee

The Sydney Opera House was nominated as a candidate for New Wonder of the World in 2007, alongside other world famous monuments like the Taj Mahal, the nabatea city of Petra, the Alhambra in Granada, the famous ruins of Stonehenge, the city of Timbouctú in Mali, the moais of Easter Island, the pyramids of Giza in Cairo, the Great Wall of China, Machu Picchu in Peru, the Acropolis of Athens, the Coliseum in Rome, the Statue of Liberty in New York, Eiffel Tower in Paris, St. Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow, Castle Neuchswastein in Germany, and St. Sophia in Istanbul.

Sydney – Australia’s vibrant harbourside destination

Cosmopolitan, diverse, energetic and easygoing, Sydney has colonial heritage, dazzling modern buildings and a free-wheeling lifestyle. Its iconic, glorious sheltered harbour and its sunny, subtropical climate help make it a major tourist destination. It is clean, unpolluted and relatively safe, and its not surprising that it is most often voted as one of the world’s most liveable cities.

But, far from being the clichéd sun, sand, surf and sport scene you might expect, Sydney also has world-class museums and galleries as well as a roster of shops that include branches of world-renowned stores such as Tiffany and Cartier. The cuisine is excellent – Sydney is now one of the modern food capitals of the world. And some of the finest wines on earth come from Australia’s many vineyards. After dark you can take in an opera or ballet at the Sydney Opera House, see a first-class theatrical production, dance the night away in a classy pub, take in the sparkling vistas from a vantage point such as Sydney Tower, or spend the evening sampling local beer in a historic sandstone hotel at Sydney’s birthplace, The Rocks.

A vibrant world business capital, Sydney has a commercial buzz that permeates the CBD. The city embraces people of all races and nationalities and, although this doesn’t make it a multicultural utopia, you certainly get the feeling that you are visiting an international destination. An Asian presence is strong, and you’ll overhear conversations in any number of European languages.

The pace in Sydney is faster than in other parts of Australia, so the nasally Australian English, with its distinctive colloquialisms, is delivered double time. The often-heard expressions ‘No worries, mate’ and ‘She’ll be right’ say much about the attitudes here. Come to Sydney with an open mind, meet them halfway, take Sydney as it comes, and you’re bound to have a relaxing, good time.

Sydney Harbour National Park

There is no better way to get to know the many harbourside bays and inlets and their surrounding suburbs than by exploring the multi-sectioned Sydney Harbour National Park.

Sydney Harbour National Park, which protects several islands and foreshore areas around Sydney Harbour, contains remnants of bushland common before white settlement, and many cultural and heritage attractions. You can visit convict-built buildings, historic maritime and military installations, and recreational islands. The Quarantine Station (>101) at North Head, which isolated new arrivals with infectious diseases from Sydneysiders, has night-time ghost walks. At Middle Head are the remains of a network of forts that were built around the harbour for protection from, among others, the Russians in the nineteenth century, and the Japanese in the 1940s.

Other park highlights include ferry tours to the tiny colonial penal relic, Fort Denison, Australia’s only Martello Tower. Here an audio-visual presentation highlights its history, including its time as a high security prison. Enjoy a relaxing ferry trip to tiny Shark Island, spectacularly set in the middle of Sydney Harbour. This is the perfect destination for a picnic, with its shady trees and picnic shelters – there is even a small beach where you can enjoy a harbour swim. There are many harbour walks, including the Manly Scenic Walkway, with its native coastal heath and subtropical rainforest remnants. On the south side of the harbour, the 1.5 km, easy Hermitage Foreshore Track starts in Nielsen Park at Vaucluse and takes you through a strip of protected bushland, winding along the western edge of Vaucluse and finishing at Bayview Hill Road. A swim at Nielsen Park beach is a welcome treat on a summer’s day. The harbourside suburb of Watsons Bay was a fishing hamlet and naval base. Today this charming suburb retains its village atmosphere and you can swim at Camp Cove or explore South Head National Park.