before and after Taronga Zoo...fireworks!

Obviously I gotta start with the night before or even earlier...just briefly:

the other night (I think it's been a Wednesday) Steffi and I went to the German Xing Sydney Network meeting after work...of course in the "Ueberbar" in the first level of the "Loewenbraeu" or - as Australians pronounce it - the Uberbar & Loenbrau...

A couple of very boring but also a couple of very interesting nice people. One of'em was Christian, a 23 year old German who hasn't been living back home for 7 years now. We decided to go out on Saturday and we did. The girls and me (Heide, Steffi, Elisa and Laura) started in "The Gaff" to get a couple of free drinks from 10-11pm and, got into a gay club called "stonewall" which I'd describe as quite "colourful" (and free entry).

Elisa's first Drag Queen to be seen ;-) and another show dancer @ stonewall ground floor

Christian an Mic rockin' the top floor @ stonewall

We had a few (more) drinks and finally ended up in the "arq" (check out their homepage to get an impression *g). Danced a lot, therefore sweating a bit but didn't take our shirts off. Well, one of us did but not me...and I think it must have been extra funny for the girls because at around 2pm almost all of the guys had taken their shirts off...and nobody harassed them or even looked at them ;-)

Laura, Heide, Elisa and Steffi @ the arq

Got back home at 4.30am to catch some sleep.

Got up at 11.30 to meet the others at Circular Quay again to take the fastest way via public transport (ferry!) to the Taronga Zoo (link). Thereafter we jumped on the cable railway

Heide from Moooooooenscheeeeeengladbaaaaach!

and off we went

view



view



the guy who opens the door ;-)

At the entrance we got shocked: 37 bucks! Fortunately Elisa is doing an internship at "Fairfax". Due to the relocation the wanted to get rid of left overs...6 tickets for the Taronga Zoo for example. So we just had to pay the 10.40$ for the ferry return. Nice that we bumped into 2 backpackers who had 2 tickets left (somebody didn't show up) and gave it to us for 7,50 each...almost saved an extra ice cream ;-)

Due to the Zoo's descend we started our walk at the upper right of the map (to go down in serpentines) with a couple of Roos,...

...Emus,...

and some sleeepy...

...Koalas (link).
It is commonly said that the name 'Koala' is an Aboriginal word meaning "no drink" although there is no evidence to support this. Koalas do drink water, but only rarely, due to their diet consisting of eucalypt leaves, which contain sufficient water to obviate the need for the Koala to descend to ground level to drink.



Other people seem to think that Koalas not only drink but are drunk. Thats why the zoo must have put on this sign saying "not drunk - just digesting" (click to enlarge the picture). I still prefer to think that they are "on drugs". It would at least explain, why a common cause of injury for these cute (but a bit smelly) little animal is actually to "loose touch with reality" and simply fall off the tree ;-O

can't remember the name of this little fella...maybe you know it better...funny nose (just like me *g)

turtle with a looong neck

another relative: a tortoise (Landschildkroete) with a weird shell



the world's biggest lizard...this thing was massive!



Heide and me enjoying the zoo view on Sydney



the world's most famous enclosure (Gehege). You might have seen the Taronga zoo Giraffes in a TV show or on pictures like the one I took. My favorite shot this day...



albeit these guys weren't always cooperating (as you can notice by the tongue)

but sometimes...

they gave the freaky visitors a go...

did you guys hear about the recent scientific research? "Chimps beat humans in memory test"(link). Funny thing if we consider ourselves as top of the Creation (Schoepfung).

the chimps were quite active

whereas the king of the food chain gets lazy when the food is served every day

We had a bit more fun on a beautiful zoo spot.
Steffi and Nozomi...

Check out my/our small project:

www.jump-our-world.blogspot.com

Mic jumping Taronga Zoo"Jumping Jack" style

Kevin jumping Taronga Zoo"Jumping Jack" style

Mic jumping Taronga Zoo"Monk" style

Steffi (nickname: possum) jumping Taronga Zoo"Superman" style

Nozomi jumping Taronga Zoo"U name it" style

Nozomi jumping Taronga Zoo"Trident" (DreiZack) style

how a happy Jump-Our-World (link) founder looks after getting "new fun shots" for the homepage.

I tried to convince the elephants to do some fun stuff as well but the somehow weren't in the mood...

the ostrich (Vogel Strauss) didn't put much more effort into our "thing"

this fella is massive and around 7m long...looks pretty scary but...

it actually isn't...on land they are kind of slow moving...

in contradiction to the suricates/meerkats...

who doesn't like'em?

We finished off with a dwarf hippo

and some funny 2D animals.

After a bit more than 3 hours (shortly after 5pm when the zoo closes) we were exhausted and went out to wait almost 45 minutes for the delayed ferry. We had exactly 1 hour to make it to the "Idols" finale at the Sydney opera. So we took a "shortcut" which wasn't a shortcut but made us see a couple of nice things....such as this fabulous wide grown tree...

...or these hedgerows "sex + death"?!?!?

One of the places where the flying dogs are hanging out during daylight

It's amazing if they start their night and fly in groups of hundreds

Anyway, we (Steffi and me) had to keep going, got back and had 5 minutes to eat and get out again to the Circular Quay where we just came from...too much of a hustle (Hektik) for my taste...so I stopped a cap to just about make it in time...

The gates were locked but we planned to stay in the small park above anyway and had a nice time (Laura, Heide, Steffi, Kevin and Lilli) due to my Goon, crisps (Chips) and the event in the background.

Somebody won the show and the firework started.

quite impressive for a TV show

you might have already seen my video (link)...

After the show we saw a (tipsy) guy fun chasing a little girl and running full speed into an iron fence with his head. He bleeded like a pig and I'm sure he needed a few stitches but still said that he didn't want an ambulance. And his "friends" were even worse cause they had nothing better to do than taking pictures of their "buddy"...well you can't force'em but he probably wondered the next day what had happened...
the 4 of us went back to Hyde Park but Steffi and Heide got distracted by an illuminated building, Laura had to catch the bus and I walked back a bit to pick the girls up. Thereafter we sat down at the Hyde Park fountain and chated until Heide had to leave as well...

Sweeeeeed day! Why would that hardly ever happen back home?
Is it:
the weather?
the people (getting lazy, boring and fat)?
the city?

Maybe all of the above!?! But don't hesitate to proof me wrong...I'd love to be wrong here...