We are a British family who love to travel, and especially love travel to Australia. In this post, we give our pommie perspective on getting the best out of a trip to beautiful Sydney, New South Wales.

In our opinion, Sydney is one of the greatest cities in the world, and just like London, Tokyo, Paris, and New York, it is a must visit, unmissable destination. Make sure it is on your bucket list! Its clean and beautiful, has lots of green space, and of course a laid back Australian beach vibe combined with a vibrant culture, food and awesome neighbourhoods to explore. 

It the perfect choice for families, with parks and playgrounds aplenty, and with the ocean and wildlife on the doorstep, providing plenty of fun activities to keep the kids happy! Its safe, easy to navigate, and we also felt it was the perfect mix of bustling atmosphere without being overwhelmingly and relentlessly busy (the way it can sometimes feel in London, for example).

This was our third visit to Sydney, with our most recent trip being the first visit here with the kids.

There so much to see and do – it can be hard to decide what to see and what to miss if you don’t have much time here – but we have narrowed it down for you, with our top reccomendations – this is how our family would spend one perfect day in Sydney with our kids if we only had 24 hours in this iconic beauty.

Circle Quay

🌉 Harbour Bridge

🎶 Opera House

🌸 Botanical Gardens

Get the tram to Circle Quay. When you get off you will be in the heart of tourist Sydney, bustling with people from all over the world, who have come for the iconic views of Sydney Harbour, the bridge, and the opera house.

There are boats coming and going, shops selling gifts and trinkets, restaurants, cafes, and bars.

We walked along the waterfront to the opera house from the tram stop, which was a 5 minute walk, stopped for photos and to have a quick walk around.

It was very hot day, so after 5 mins we kept the kids moving towards somewhere more shady – onwards to the large park, which leads on to Harbour View Lawn and the Sydney Botanical Gardens.

The walk is lovely and is a wide paved path right along the harbour front with great views of the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House.

The botanical gardens are beautiful and a great place to walk around explore, with plenty of wide open space for the kids to be kids. We spent time relaxing here, eating ice cream, sitting in. The shade and dri king plenty – basically soaking it all in, enjoying the views and not pushing the kids too far. The boys had a great time looking for giant pine cones – kept the well entertained for at least 30 minutes!

Bondi Beach

If we were here in Sydney for one day only, there’s no way I could leave without visiting the famous Bondi Beach. You can get the bus from Circle Quay straight to Bondi, it takes 40 minutes and drops ypu right in the heart of it all – the street is bustling with cafes, restaurants, fast food joints and surf shops.

Being Bondi, it was, of course, heaving with  backpackers and tourists, but the whole place felt so fun and alive – we loved it.

The beach was super busy, but we found a spot on the sand – the surf was ferocious – the kids loved it, but I wouldn’t let them go in too far as the sea was crowded with people and the waves were really powerful – easily knocking adults off their feet let alone little ones.