Day -1 Tue 09April2024 Museum Day

 After a nice restful night, we at breakfast in the hotel lobby before heading out to find a yard store we had seen during our city bus tour.  We found it and Angela purchased a pattern to knit a hat like she had done when we visited the Falkland Islands some years ago.  Afterwards we walked down to the waterfront to meet up with our friends, Richard & Jeanette Chin who we met while on a previous cruise to Australia in 2019.  We enjoyed a nice lunch at Sydney's oldest pub and caught up with each other.  All too soon, our visit was over and we said our goodbyes.  They headed off to catch a train back home while we made our way to the Australian Museum near Hyde Park.  



The main purpose of our visit to the museum was to see the Ramses Egyptian special exhibit.  We had tickets for the 3pm entry (timed tickets are necessary and must be purchased in advance.  So we ended up touring part of the museum before touring the Ramses exhibition.  The exhibit was quite well curated and we used an audio guide which added a lot of additional detail.  Ramses is one of the most revered of the Egyptian kings and while his treasures were looted early on, his coffin, located in a different location, went undiscovered for 3,000 years before being discovered by a herdsman.  Afterwards we visited the parts of the museum we hadn't previously seen.  One of the most striking exhibit was a life sized Tyrannosaurus rex replica which was lying on its side which was used for a mock dissection.  The were many cool dinosaur exhibits with lots of skeletal displays.



Tasmanian tiger








As we ended our visit, we noted that it was raining and we waited a bit before walking back to the hotel which was about a mile away.  After a short rest, we boarded a shuttle bus which took us to the Sydney Tower for a very nice buffet dinner at 8pm.  On the ride back to the hotel around 9:30pm, our driver mentioned that his "real" job was with Deloitte.  After we unloaded the bus I chatted with him and told him that years ago I worked for Deloitte.  We had a great chat.  The bus driving gig for him is his fun time.  


We finished up minor repacking and got ready to enjoy our last night in Sydney.  Tomorrow we're expecting to board the Majestic Princess in the morning and begin our trip back to Seattle.


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