Royal Botanic Gardens

We should have allowed a whole day to see Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens. As it was, we saw very little of them.  Maybe next time. 

Doryanthes Excelsa or Gymea Lily is a native of New South Wales.  That's a state in Australia in which this park resides. 

I don't know what kind of trees these are, but they grow in interesting shapes. 

You will need to click on this photo so that it enlarges enough to be readable. 

What an interesting trunk!

 

The Australian magpie is a medium-sized black and white bird native to Australia and southern New Guinea. It has a glossy black colored plumage with white-colored patches on its nape, upper tail, and shoulders. They can live to 25 years and have a wingspan of 25 to 33 inches.  Like other magpies around the world, Australian magpies are very smart diurnal birds that can recognize familiar people based on the sound of their voices. They can also mimic over 35 species of birds, as well as humans, dogs, and horses.

Amazing tree.... read all about it in the next photo.  Click to enlarge for reading. 

The Strelitzia or Bird of Paradise Plant is a native of South Africa. It belongs to the plant family Strelitziaceae.  The genus is named after Queen Charlotte of the United Kingdom, who was born a princess of the house of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.

View of the Opera House and Bridge from near the Fleet Steps 

The Fleet Steps were built in 1908 and named after the American Great White Fleet visit to Sydney in 1908. The Steps have been used for many important events and were ascended by Queen Elizabeth II in 1954 on her first visit to Australian soil.

We were in the Gardens in the spring so we did see some beautiful flowers.  

This is the Levy drinking fountain in the Royal Botanic Gardens.  It has a red granite base with Art Nouveau bronze statue of a young girl standing amid reeds, a heron and frogs. The fountain was a gift to the people of Sydney in 1889 from the Levy family in memory of Lewis Wofle Levy (1815–85), politician and businessman. The statue was made by C B Birch (1832–93).  I didn't realize it was a drinking fountain when we were there. 

From the Botanic Gardens, we walked to the Sydney Tower Eye.  Along the way we saw this memorial to Scottish poet Robert Burns.   The statue is 10 feet high on a a stone pedestal of Melbourne granite. There are 60 known statues of Burns in the world with 8 in Australia.  Why?  Who knows.

St Mary's Cathedral is a Gothic-style Catholic cathedral built of local sandstone from 1868-1928.