I have been looking forward to this weekend since last year! CHOCOLATE FESTIVAL, what's not to love?? I went in 2015 and as soon as it was announced it was on again in this year we booked our plane and hotel and counted down the weeks! It's a great event to use as 'research' while getting to enjoy the beautiful Sydney Harbour and chocolate in so many forms.
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| Lindt Chocolate |
We arrived in Sydney on Friday morning to gorgeous blue skies, lucky as we had to walk from the station to our hotel. The Chocolate Festival starts on Saturday so we had Friday afternoon to get our bearings, make our plan, go to the TOP of Sydney Tower and get cream puffs!
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| Sydney Tower Skywalk |
In April I was in Sydney with my gorgeous niece and we stumbled across a little hole in the wall in Chinatown selling these amazing cream puffs, needless to say we went back numerous times and planned to go back again next time we were in Sydney! They were as yummy as we remembered.
I surprised the kids, I say kids but they both tower over me, with a Sydney Tower Skywalk. It was amazing!! We all really enjoyed and got some fabulous photos. If you're in Sydney I recommend the Skywalk.
After our Skywalk we headed over to Chinatown with a pit stop at City Markets, a factory outlet place above Paddy's Markets. Chinatown was busy, busy, busy. I think that's while I like it, so full of energy and food! We went to the food court downstairs and it was BUSY. The food was delicious.
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| Chinatown Food Court |
Next morning we woke with a plan
EAT CHOCOLATE. Another gorgeous day greeted us, we were SO lucky with the weather as a few weeks earlier it was rainy and freezing in Sydney town. We caught a train from Museum Station, what a cool little station. Loved all the old posters on the walls.
The Chocolate Festival is held at The Rocks near Circular Quay and it was shaping up to be busy. We got there at about 10am, right when it opened and went in search of something to eat. Our first choice was chocolate dipped fruit, strawberries and watermelon. So good (and healthy!?). We did a walk around the whole festival to see what was on offer and made notes of where we wanted to head back to. The number one stop was the Lindt Tent where you could get your very own personalised chocolate bar, yes please!
I think my business,
Rainbow Designs, sells one of the most POPULAR products ever, CHOCOLATE. Going by the crowds there are a LOT of chocoholics around, makes my heart sing and my mouth water. Where to head to next?? Maybe a donut or an icecream?? Icecream sounds like a plan - Gelato Messina and the 'Robert Browney Junior', chocolate, fudge, more chocolate, mmmmmmmmm. A glazed donut from The Donut Shop and lots of samples. Lindt balls, coconut and dark chocolate and Darrel Lea chocolates. To see how popular both of these areas were made me think I might need to add these brands to my hampers???
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| The very popular Lindt Lounge |
For the rest of the day we did some touristy things and headed over to the Opera House to look for seals, didn't see any. After that we caught a ferry over to Luna Park. I hadn't been to Luna Park in a VERY long time but I don't think it's changed much at all, very 'back in the day' cool. I didn't venture onto any of the rides but the other two went on a 'vomit inducing' ride and the funky roller coaster. They loved it!! (and didn't throw up, bonus).
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| Luna Park |
More chocolate was on our minds so we ferried it back over to Circular Quay and over to the festival to check out the stands again. What to have? So many choices! There was a very groovy container truck turned into pizza shop called 'Happy as Larry' that we just had to try. Margeritta pizza, so good that mr 14 went back and got another one for dinner! Miss 16 and I had some yummy satay chicken skewers. We were going to get another donut but they had sold out, like many of the stands. I think they underestimate how many they'll need. There will be some very late nights tonight making up more for Sunday! Zumbo's stand had sold out of two of their products - we didn't end up trying any but they looked amazing!
We trained it back to Museum Station and back to our hotel, after picking something up for dinner, and relaxed. It was a long but super fun day. Miss 15 was leaving early on Sunday back home while Mr 14 and I weren't leaving until Sunday afternoon so we had another day at the festival plus I had organised a jetboat ride for us!!
After getting up at the crack of dawn to walk miss 16 to the station, mr 14 and I watch a bit of the paralympics and slowly got ready for the day. After checking out of the hotel and leaving our bags for collection later in the day we headed to the train and circular quay. Chocolate Festival here we come. We made a pitstop at Starbucks for a coffee/ice chocolate and a bit of sustainance for the day ahead. While sitting enjoying our breakfast we realise we didn't check the fridge in our room before we left. Shock horror, mr 14 has left his chocolate in it! Luckily, after ringing the hotel, they were able to grab it for us so we could pick it up when we got our bags. Brekky down and first stop was the instagram photo machine to print out some fabulous photos, go and get our personliased Lindt chocolates and then over to the Jetboat wharf.
The Jetboat was FUN! We got drenched, luckily we were wearing a fetching purple poncho. What an amazing way to see Sydney Harbour - highly recommend!
Our weekend in Sydney was coming to a close so we did one last lap of the
Smooth Chocolate Festival before making our way back to the hotel to collect our bags and then onto the station for our flight home. I had such a fun weekend. The weather was near on perfect and the company was pretty great too!
I highly suggest visiting the Choc Fest next year and in the mean time check out our
chocolate filled hampers to help tied you over until then ;-)
nb: Unfortunately my camera card failed so most of my photo's didn't work. :-(
