Amazing view? Check. Great food? Check. Refreshing drinks? Check. Watsons Bay Boutique Hotel certainly has you covered. Score yourself a table in the sun and scoff down some killer soft shell crab sliders or a bowl of the crab spaghettini. On Sundays they hold crab races, so pick your favourite crustacean and cheer them on for the chance to win.

Hands down, Opera Bar is one of the best spots in Sydney to watch the sun set with a drink in hand. Not to be outdone by the drinks and the harbour view, the food menu is also exceptional. With a charcuterie and raw bar as well as a café, the appeal of grazing on artisanal meats and cheeses while taking in the city is popular even with the locals.

If you want to dance, you head to Cliff Dive. If you want a crazy cocktail that’s served in a monkey hat, again, you head to Cliff Dive. Part tiki bar, part nightclub and 100 per cent fun, we love the no-cover-charge good times that Cliff Dive offers. Get in before 10PM to avoid the long queues out the door and to bag yourself a booth.

Offering a modern take on Greek mezze, Beta Bar can be found above its sibling restaurant, Alpha. Expect small dishes such as feta custard with duck-skin crisps matched to cocktails like the “Dirty Greek Martini”, in a raw, stripped-back space saturated with confectionary hues and metallic shimmers.

From the craft-soda company, PS Soda, comes PS40, a cocktail bar that focuses on drinks that use the brand’s core range (wattle cola, bush tonic, smoked lemonade and blackstrap ginger) such as batanga, a concoction of wattle cola, green-coffee-bean-infused tequila, lime and smoked salt. Aside from that, other cocktails are just as inventive – try the “Stockholm Syndrome”, a vodka drink mixed with cumin and dill, aquavit, lemon, pink Himalayan salt and pepper.

The views don’t get more spectacular than from the Blu Bar on the 36th floor of the Shangri-La Hotel. Make sure you nab a window seat to indulge in the lofty vistas of Darling Harbour, the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House, while sipping on the gloriously boozy rosemary old fashioned.

It’s about time a noteworthy bar opened in Sydney’s Financial District, and Kittyhawk has certainly been worth the wait. Channelling and old-world luxury (the Liberation of Paris in 1944 more precisely) with a standout list of cocktails including a full selection of rum and rye old fashioneds, it’s the perfect spot to let your hair down after a day in the office – so much so the place is rammed between 5:30 and 7:30PM.

Up until now, waterfront boozing was always limited to high-end hotels, so the opening of Smoke on the rooftop of the multi-level dining destination, Barangaroo House is a real treat. Against a backdrop of harbour views, sip on cocktails with dreamy names like “Endless Summer” – a fresh concoction that mixes Aperol, lillet blanc, lemon, vanilla and passion fruit – and nibble on luxe bites like wagyu sliders and beluga caviar.