Coronavirus: Front-row seats for Sydney’s midnight spectacle are still available

Any other year, New Year’s Eve at Circular Quay’s Cafe Sydney would have been booked up by September. This year is different.

Cafe Sydney patrons, from left, Derek, Jemma, Christina and Jae Glover take in the prized view of Sydney Harbour Bridge on Monday. Picture: Nikki Short

Any other year, New Year’s Eve at Circular Quay institution Cafe Sydney would have been booked up by September.

This year is different.

With Sydney playing whack-a-mole with the coronavirus — and borders remain closed — the interstate and international tourists who would have filled the city’s hotels and restaurants are nowhere to be found.

And this, if anything, could be one silver lining for Sydneysiders who would otherwise find city restaurants and hotel rooms fully booked or difficult to justify.

Jan McKenzie is Cafe Sydney’s operations manager.

She says it’s been a “stop and start” year with bookings and cancellations, new bookings — and, again, cancellations.

“It’s been a moving scenario after everybody listened to Gladys’s briefing this morning,” Ms McKenzie said. “At first the people from the northern beaches cancelled, then Melbourne cancelled and today people from Perth cancelled.”

Now there are 60 seats available at the Customs House restaurant — at $800 per person — with sweeping views of the Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Opera House.

Under new restrictions, only those with bookings, and a special permit, can enter the area.

“It will be slightly different this year, there won’t be thousands roaming around below but it’ll still be a great night.” Ms McKenzie said, adding the restaurant would otherwise be booked “by late September”.

“Being in Circular Quay is the place to be,” she said.

It’s the same story at some of the city’s most exclusive hotels — where reservations on New Year’s Eve in other years have been close to impossible only days ahead of the event.

Tourism Accommodation Australia chief executive Michael Johnson said: “We’ve got a ­situation where there are no international arrivals and due to the recent northern beaches update we have no interstate travellers from Queensland and Victoria.

“So from that perspective we are finding that there are more opportunities for people from the regions and Greater Sydney to be able to stay in the city if they are thinking about it. There is availability in all ­hotels.”

On Monday, even the luxury Shangri-La Hotel abutting Circular Quay had rooms with a view — starting at $2595.

So too did the Inter­Continental, the Four Seasons — including the presidential suite — the Sir Stamford at Circular Quay and the Pullman Quay Grand.

Other businesses are struggling with the uncertainty.

It would be tough to find a restaurant with a better view of the fireworks than the Sydney Cove Oyster Bar — a waterfront diner between the Circular Quay wharves and the Sydney Opera House.

But its general manager, Laura Sanna, said that after so many cancellations she “couldn’t guarantee” service on New Year’s Eve would go ahead.

“We were aiming to sell 180 tickets, but at this stage we’ve only sold 74,” Ms Sanna said. “We won’t get any walk-ins ­either.”

Ms Sanna said she didn’t know why restaurants in Sydney’s CBD had to adhere to strict restrictions when “crowds at shopping malls are pretty much uncontrolled”.

“I understand they are doing their best, but when you compare the sorts of crowds at indoor shopping malls to restaurants with check-in procedures and space rules, you do start to wonder,” she said.

Sydney Cove Oyster Bar manager Laura Sanna at Circular Quay on Monday. Picture: Nikki Short