During my week in Sydney, I got a little taste for some of its beautiful iconic sights, natural wonders and spend-happy shopping culture. I am a huge fan of markets, among other shopping venues, and Sydney did not disappoint.
Check out some of the best shopping in Sydney, Australia!
Mini Cupcakes! So adorable 🙂Street musicians perform at The Rocks
The Rocks is a cool area of Sydney right by the harbour. It has cool cobblestone and funky restaurants tucked into laneways. On Saturdays, The Rocks hosts an outdoor market that, while mostly outside of my budget, was beautiful and fun to walk through nonetheless.
There are dozens of stalls set up selling cool varieties of homemade jewellery and crafts. Around the next corner, the craft stalls turn to food and luxury street meats are served up to eager pedestrians. Alongside all of this is live music and great views of the harbour.
Queen Victoria Building (QVB)
In Australia, you can pick which sushi rolls you want. Each roll is about $2 and probably equal to 4-6 of the little cut up rolls we order at homeJust a little mall filling a laneway
The QVB is located on George St., one of Sydney’s biggest shopping areas. Some areas are pretty extravagent (hosting labels like Chanel & Louis Vuitton) while others are a bit more budget conscious. One part of this area is completely pedestrian friendly and shoppers take over running from big name brand retailers to tiny boutiques stuffed into laneways. The QVB is at the centre of it all.
Apparently, it’s designed based on shopping hierarchy: the most expensive stores are on the top floor while the more discounted stores are at the bottom. So, I didn’t go beyond the first floor. But I did find a great deal on a new purse, really yummy sushi and a very cute German bakery!
Sydney Fish Market
SEAFOOD
I was eager to check out the fresh seafood action at the Sydney Fish Market. Unfortunately, as I later learned, most of the action happens at the crack of dawn when the fresh fish is brought in and sold to retailers. So when I strolled in around 9:30am, it was pretty quiet.
Nonetheless, it was pretty cool to see tables full of delicious looking seafood. I selected some salmon sashimi and sat outside by the water with the few other brave souls who could stomach seafood (and raw seafood at that!) before 10 in the morning.
St. Paddy’s & Market City
The view from the top floor of Market CityMarket City
Market City is a huge complex in Sydney’s Chinatown. The first floor is home to St. Paddy’s Market: an indoor market with hundreds of stalls selling discounted scarves, jewellery, souvenirs, tech items, clothing. etc. It was a little overwhelming and took me quite some time to get all the way to the back (where the market strangely turns into a produce grocery store).
After walking a handful of aisles and picking up a few little things, I noticed there were a lot of repeats and decided to check out the rest of the building. The other floors house discount clothing shops, restaurants & an Asian food court. I resisted browsing (mostly) and convinced myself I didn’t need anything really. I did head upstairs for some coveted good-bad Chinese food (aka food court Chinese food).
More shopping to see…
Sydney definitely has a lot more shopping to see. There are a bunch of other markets that I missed like Paddington’s Market (only open on Saturday’s which was my designated stalk-Prince-Harry day) and a few I passed on my bus. As I said, huge fan of outdoor markets so will definitely try to check out more the next time I come back to Sydney!
Riana Ang-Canning is a travel writer who has been sharing her global adventures as the founder of Teaspoon of Adventure since 2012. In that time, Riana has travelled to almost 50 countries on 6 continents, including interning in Eswatini, working in Tokyo, road tripping New Zealand and living abroad in Prague. Riana helps everyday travellers discover the world on a mid-budget, proving that you don't have to be athletic, wealthy or nomadic to have an adventure!
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