Royal Botanic Garden

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Sydney at First Sketch

On my first morning in Sydney I left my digs in Surry Hills and took the L2 tram line towards Circular Quay.

Circular Quay is a very famous spot in Australian history because it was here that the First Fleet landed with its first batch of convict colonizers in 1788.

Two of Australia’s most famous sites bookend Circular Quay: Sidney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House. This is the epicenter of Sydney.

I picked a bench in the shade of the iconic sails of the Opera House and sketched the equally iconic Harbour Bridge.

I then walked around the Opera House wondering how on earth I was going to fit this architectural masterpiece into the pages of my journal. (Maybe I needed a bigger journal!) First I needed to get a further perspective so I headed into the Royal Botanic Gardens, picking up life birds along the way like such iconic Aussie species as sulphur-crested cockatoo and the laughing kookaburra.

It was thrilling to get a first look at a kookaburra!

I found a bench and attempted a first sketch. Capturing the sails was going to be a challenge and I figured I’d needed a few attempts from different perspectives.

In the meantime I continued to bird.

One of those “I’m not in Kansas” moments. These are not escaped cockatoos but wild sulphur-crested cockatoos feeding on seed like pigeons in a park!

I headed out to Mrs. Macquarie’s Point, after picking up more lifers, to get a further perspective of the Opera House and Bridge.

My sketching bench with a view of two of Sydney’s most iconic structures produced the featured sketch.
A self portrait view from the deck of my Surry Hills fifth floor flat looking toward downtown Sydney. A frequent morning visitor to the trees in the foreground and my first Aussie lifer was the beautiful rainbow lorikeet.