Sydney by Night

We landed late, thanks to the couple that apparently stayed in Vegas, though their luggage made it quite handily without them and onto our Sydney plane. It took over an hour for the crew to locate the independent-traveling bags and have it removed. Security, you know.

So it was close to 11 p.m. when I arrived at The Russell, my small 1887 hotel in The Rocks. Make that small, historic and dark; the lobby and entrance were completely unlit. A call on my cell, and I was in.

I'd chosen it for location...near the Harbour Bridge, Opera House and just a half-block from The Four Seasons, my lodging of choice when the budget is plump. This one is not.

The hotel itself is warm, cheery and inviting. It also features a few things that American hotels do not: Single rooms, and rooms with shared baths. (It does also have larger rooms with en-suite bath, but they're $50 more, and for that I can walk across the wall to use the loo.) My room is snug (say 8 x 10 feet) but clean, and features a bathrobe, iron, coffee, non-working fireplace and working phone. The price: just under $100 U.S.

The Four Seasons is pretty well dead at 11 p.m. on a Sunday, and I'm not sure how my hiking boots would go with their marble entrance. I head up the street and stumble quickly on a historic pub, The Orient Hotel, the kind of place where they serve lambs brains and rock oysters for lunch, and plenty of beer later. A live band is blasting out Wild Thing, and a crowd ranging from pert young things with bared decollete to a balding-middle aged geek with a passion for unconventional dancing are ripping up the floor.

I find myself chatting with a young woman from Dallas, on her last night in Australia after a month of software development in the Outback town of Alice Springs. Name's Vonda Robinson. It's her second work trip to Australia. "The people are really friendly,'' she says. "I like it alot.''

Sounds good to me.