buddy30

Hi, any help appreciated for a new traveller to Australia. We will be arriving in Sydney at 06:45, on the flight from Bangkok. Our flight to Brisbane is at 13:00. It would be good to drop our cases somewhere, and get out of the airport for a while. Even for just a couple of hours. Any suggestions?

lavandula

Dump your bags in luggage storage at the airport and take a taxi to Brighton-le-Sands if the weather is good. There is a beach so you can roll up your pants legs and get sand between your toes, or any number of cafés, restaurants and a fish and chip shop, so you can grab a breakfast or take your fish and chips down to the sand. The area's businesses have, or have had in the past, a slight Greek twist. You want the intersection of Bay St and The Grand Parade. Not a tourist area IMO, but there is a hotel there, and all the shops.

Remember you will probably have to change to the domestic airport from the international, which is some distance away, so leave plenty of time to pick up bags and take the bus to the other set of terminals, and also allow time for the boarding cut-off. You might need as much as 3 hours just to navigate security, collect bags, customs, and then locate buses, travel to domestic, and then check in again and get to the gate. Maybe you could collect a few other opinions on this; the timings might not allow for much time at the beach.

Lavandula

victorbritts

Your can try out many nearby places.
Some of which are:
George Hanna Memorial Museum
Adora Handmade Chocolates
Alexandra Bakery & Café

There are lot more places to go apart from this like you can go to beach.

tt7

What airline(s) are you flying? If you're arriving at 6.45am from BKK, I assume you're on QF 24? If your flight to BNE is at 13.00, I assume that's on VA and not on QF (as the QF flight is at 13.05)?

It's been a while since I've done an international-to-domestic transfer at SYD. However, if it's QF to QF, then after clearing immigration and customs, you can drop the bags at the QF transfer facility and then take the (free) QF bus to the domestic terminal (which is on the other side of the airport). However, if it's QF to VA, then (a) I'm not sure if VA has a bag drop facility at the international terminal or (b) if they have an airside inter-terminal bus. If not (and I suspect they don't), you'll have to schlep your bags and yourselves from one terminal to the other.

Why do you have a 6 hour wait? Was that deliberate and, if so, why? You don't really have long enough to see anything of Sydney; will you be coming back to Sydney later on? If it was me, I would be trying to get on an earlier flight to Brisbane (flights are usually every hour). I would get the bags over to the domestic terminal and see if you can get an earlier flight. If not, you may still be able to check-in (if switching from QF to VA) and drop the bags. If it's QF to QF, it's much easier as you can drop the bags at the international terminal and QF will get them over to domestic for you. One caveat (if you're switching from QF to VA) is whether VA will accept the bags more than 3 hours ahead of flight time. I got stuck landslide once at BNE when I was very early for a domestic QF flight (meeting Mrs. tt7 who was coming to the airport later) and QF refused to take the bag until 3 hours before the flight we were on.

I would deal with the issue of getting the bags over to the domestic terminal and then decide what to do. Although, as suggested you can get a cab and get out of the airport for a couple of hours, personally I wouldn't bother - a lot of mucking about for very little gain. I would just get over to domestic and try and get an earlier flight.

Songdoc

I have the same situation. I'll have 6-1/2 hours in SYD en route from Christchurch to Honolulu. It's crazy, but my partner was able to get a flight with only a 3 hour connection--but for me to get that same flight would have added $400. I'll arrive in Lihue (Kauai -- our final destination) 3 hours after him. It wasn't worth $400 for me to arrive three hours earlier. But I might try the Brighton-le-Sands idea if the weather's nice.

Thanks!

Susan7

Here's some more suggestions from an inquiry about the same topic earlier this year:

http://www.fodors.com/community/aust...what-to-do.cfm