Cycling into the New Year.

Seeing as my local gym was mostly closed during Christmas week I had to go for a long cycle ride around town to get rid of some energy. I decided to go and do a seven bridges ride around the NW of Sydney.

It basically covers the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Fig Tree Bridge, Tarban Creek Bridge, Gladesville Bridge (where this photo was taken), Iron Cove Bridge, Anzac Bridge and finally the Pyrmont Bridge. In all its around 35km with lots of cycling up and down various hills as well.

I had to take plenty of stops when going up some of the hills it was quite knackering at times to try to get to the top. In the end I cramped up quite badly on both my thighs when I got to the Anzac Bridge. It must have looked like I was crouching down for the loo to the people driving long the bridge! I had to squat down beside my bike to stretch my upper thigh muscles as it was too painful to even stand up.

Still it was worth it in the end and I was quite pleased that I did manage to make it home, even with very tired legs. The views from some of the bridges were quite fantastic. I was quite jealous of some of the people who must have decent harbour side views and even more so of the people who had a garden that went all the way down to their private boat on the harbour.

For the New Years Eve celebrations we decided to find a spot on the observatory park, which is just across the road from my Apartment. An eight-lane Harbour Bridge road, but still just across the road.

Here is the view that we had of the Harbour Bridge from our picnic spot. We got there around 3pm and it was a little busy but never got that packed even in the evening. There were quite a few people for the midnight fireworks but they were only around for the last thirty minutes or so.

There were two sets of fireworks, 9pm ones titled the children’s fireworks and then midnight ones for the adults. As well as fireworks on the bridge there were also several barges around the harbour, which had more fireworks.

Here's a picture of the kids fireworks they were quite good:

Even more spectacular was the midnight show. What made it really good was that there were also some surprise fireworks on some of the tallest buildings in the CBD. So in effect we were surrounded by the firework displays, as the CBD was behind us, one of the barges directly in front and the Harbour Bridge to one side.

Here you can see the exploding buildings of the CBD:

Fireworks from the barge in front of us:

And finally some of the displays on the Harbour Bridge:

Quite a good display in the end. I'd say that they were only better than the London 2000 fireworks because we were surrounded by them and wherever you looked you could see something. I remember the London display being louder but not as spectacular as the Sydney ones.