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The city of Sydney has hosted some big events. The 2000 Olympics come to mind as one. Also APEC was hosted in Sydney last year. The latest event that is big on the world stage is the World Youth Day. This is a gathering of young catholics from around the globe.

About 100 000 pilgrims are said to be in the harbour city for the event. Many of the visitors are staying in schools or are hosted by families. When such events are on it is probably best not to visit Sydney as many streets are closed and it is difficult to get around.

Today in Sydney the largest ever mass in Australia took place. An estimated 150,000 pilgrims made their way to Barangaroo, near Sydney’s Darling Harbour. If you were not aware of this as a tourist you were in for a surprise.

World Youth Day continues for the next few day in Sydney. The highlight for pilgrims will be the service to be held by the Pope who came to Sydney for the event.

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Recently on the airwaves here in Canberra there has been quite a bit of discussion about the Canberra Airport. Due to the large number of public servants now working out there the traffic situation has become a major concern. Also finding a taxi from the airport into the city is said to have a negative impact on business in Canberra.

Something else that was raised by callers was the fact that the Canberra Airport itself is not running smoothly. The terminal is too small and the flights at times were being canceled. The Qantas regional manager was interviewed on air to give a perspective from the airlines. He said according to statistics things are not really that bad.

The Qantas representative also pointed out that the airport will be opening new facilities in around 3 years. Before that time Qantas will spend around $10 million to upgrade facilities at Canberra Airport.

After hearing all this I come back to the headline for this post. If you are coming to Canberra is it worth flying or are you better off driving your car or getting a hire car? I think a Qantas pilot’s wife gave the answer to this. She called in to say her husband finds it better to drive rather than fly from Canberra to Sydney to take the controls of an international flight.

I tend to agree. For the past couple of years whenever I fly out of Sydney International Airport I choose to grab a rental car and drive up the freeway to Sydney. It is about a 3 hour drive and is quite stress free. Compare this to flying and there is little difference. By the time you travel to the airport, wait for check in, board and then fly it all adds up.

I vote for the driving option.

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I have added a video of the tall ship race which was held on Sydney Harbour. The race was part of Australia Day celebrations in 2008. January 26 was the day.

The ships passed Fort Dennison and headed past the Sydney Opera House before going under the Sydney Harbour bridge. There was a huge crowd on hand to watch. As a contrast from the sailing ships the Pacific Dawn supercruiser was also on the harbour.