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Hi Brent,
Great to hear you had a good time.
It is hard to find a nicer guy than Michael so great to hear you got to meet him.
The road system in Sydney is best described as navigationally unforgiving and
is still signposted in such a way that local knowledge is still often required.
From the moment a visitor to the city leaves the airport they have to be
prepared, for example, to make split second decisions as to what lane to be in
at certain times, often with minimal sign-posted notice and the traffic volumes
then make it impossible to change lanes in time.
The SatNav option in the rental car is highly advisable, but even then the number
of tunnels in the city road network and the GPS canyoning effect within the CBD
itself still results in one having to fly visually by the seat-of-the-pants a lot of the
time when going downtown.
Andrew's anecdote about his daily toll fees are unfortunately commonplace for
Sydney motorists.
Great to hear you came back via my favourite northern route to/from the
Hunter Valley. The Koolang Observatory is open to the public. Our preferred
observing location this close to the city is with friends who only live a couple
of km away from there. The neighboring Yengo National Park, Mangrove Mountain
Dam and other adjoining National Parks is a large area with minimal light pollution
though the Sydney light glow is still visible to the south. But for an hour's drive
from the city, it is hard to beat.
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