24 December 2017 and 1 January 2018

Sea Life, Wild Life, and Madame Tussauds are all located adjacent to each other and across Darling Harbour’s Pyrmont Bridge from the Maritime Museum. An obvious tourist trap that is made more enticing by the Sydney Big Ticket which allows you to bundle 2 to 5 attractions, including these three, the Tower Eye and the Manly Sea Life Sanctuary. We wanted to see the Tower Eye observation tower and Sea Life aquarium and decided to add Wild Life zoo for a few dollars more.

Sea Life is Sydney’s aquarium. It is not the largest or nicest we’ve seen but the kids did enjoy it. Considering the bundled savings, the entrance fees were reasonable for what they had. The air-conditioning did not work when we visited so we were overly excited to arrive at the penguin adventure’s arctic chill “boat ride”.

Wild Life is a small zoo. They have small habitats with all the quintessential Australian species, including platypus which we have not yet seen anywhere else.

We are fortunate to spend 12 months in Australia and have a membership to Australia Zoo. If you are a citizen or have the luxury of time to see these animals and sea creatures in other venues or in the wild, Sea Life and Wild Life are not for you. If you are short on time, they check the boxes and allow you to see species you won’t find anywhere else in the world. We did not visit Taronga Zoo in North Sydney; however if you have time to spend this might be a nicer way to see them without leaving Sydney.

Sea Life Aquarium

Wild Life Zoo