Sydney City

Sydney, Australia's gateway city and the capital of New South Wales (and the site for the 2000 Olympics) is built around one of the most beautiful harbours in the world, and along kilometres of golden beaches stretching north and south of the city on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. Sydney is a friendly city offering visitors a variety of attractions and activities. The beaches and harbour play a major role in the lives of Sydney-siders with yachting, surfing, sailboarding, swimming and water-skiing available. Many national parks and protected areas of natural bushland surround the city, and the picturesque Blue Mountains are a 90 minute journey from the city, offering walking, camping and picnicking as popular pastimes for visitors and residents alike.

Perhaps Sydney's most famous landmark is the spectacular Opera House with its graceful 'sails'. The Opera House has become Sydney's cultural centre, offering opera, ballet, concerts, drama and film.
The harbour foreshore is home to the historic Rocks area, the site of Australia's first European settlement in 1788, and now home to a variety of galleries, museums, restaurants and shops. Also overlooking the harbour are the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney Aquarium and Taronga Zoo.

Some interesting statistics...
• There are 37 beaches along Sydney's coastline, from Palm Beach to Cronulla.

• The Sydney metropolitan area covers 4,000 square kilometres. That's the same size as London and double the size of New York City.

• Sydney Harbour has enough water to fill 504,000 Olympic swimming pools.

• The Mint on Macquarie Street is the oldest building in Sydney's CBD. It was built in 1815.

• The average age of CBD workers is 34 years and nine months.

• Sydney generates about $4.8 billion in tourism export earnings each year.

• Centrepoint Tower is 305 metres above sea level.

• There are about 75 kilometres of roadway in the City of Sydney.

• Sydney's population increased by 273,600 people between 1996 and 2001, to 4.2 million.

• The NSW Government didn't pay off the debt for building the Sydney Harbour Bridge until 1988, 56 years after it was opened.