Wednesday, November 19

At sea. A much calmer sea, in fact. After a couple more work sessions today (each necessarily short to let the glue dry in between additions), the dragon is almost done. We’ll have a “private showing” for our table mates tomorrow evening, then she gets turned in for judging on the 21st.

Thursday, November 20

Ae sea and once again out of range of CNN! O Joy! O Rapture!

The second passenger talent show was this afternoon. While some passengers repeated their acts with slightly different material, there were also some new ones including a very nice flute/piano duet, and the HAL Chorus had a new song to add to their others. They did an excellent job again. Probably no wonder as our Cruise Director, Bruce Scudder, was a child prodigy on the organ and holds a master’s in music from U. Michigan plus a double master’s from Julliard in piano performance and conducting. With all that and his sense of humor, he could probably get music from row of deck chairs, much less from a group who are actually interested in singing (regardless of actual talent, although there were a good number of nice voices among the 40-45 members of the chorus.)

This afternoon I was out back on deck (the fantail?) and came up with the following:

Sun road behind us -
glaring white on blue ocean.
The journey’s ending.

I can’t decide whether to being packing some things now or to wait and do a “panic pack” on the last day. Either way is a bummer!

Friday, November 21

Still at sea and getting closer to San Diego!

Well, the dragon’s done as you can see. The sign with her reads: “Delilah Dragon-dam brings us the gift of a wonderful cruise.” And we did manage to use at least one of everything on the

“required” list including one paper hole reinforcement in an inconspicuous but highly appropriate place. There were seven entries in the contest. We didn’t win, but got lots and lots of positive and appreciative comments.

The top two vote-getters (intricate to the point of fussiness) were disqualified because they didn’t use one or another of the required bits. The winner was this very detailed rendition of an oriental temple complete with a lighted buddha inside. It was quite nice as you can see. As with the trivia competition, the best part of not winning is not getting any prizes that have to be packed to carry home or otherwise disposed of.

I’ve been on somewhere between 35 and 40 cruises now. I usually buy a copy of the photograph of everyone at the table in the dining room taken by the ship’s photographer just as a record. This time, however, the photo is actually really good of all seven of us! Nobody squinched their eyes or had an odd look on their face! I was amazed!

Tonight is the last formal night at dinner, so I’ll probably begin packing after that. *sigh* Unless something really interesting happens tomorrow (other than more packing), I’ll end this account here. It’s been a truly fabulous trip, and I’d do it again in a hearbeat!

Monday, November 17

Honolulu, Hawaii. I had planned to sleep in this morning, but at about 9:15 a.m. the ship held a fire drill for its crew members. This involves a series announcements and alarm signals piped into every cubbyhole on the entire ship at full volume. So much for sleep!

I didn’t do a whole lot today...went back to the Aloha Tower Marketplace and wandered around there a bit more through a some of Hawaii’s famous “liquid sunshine.”

I came back to the ship for a bit of lunch and found that Jill had returned from her jaunt to see friends on the Big Island. After that I somehow managed to fritter away the rest of the afternoon doing not much of anything which is ever so easy to do on board a cruise ship.

Before dinner here was a lovely program of young girls demonstrating the hula as you can see here. After dinner just about everybody on board went to the Crew Show. This time they held both the Filipino and Indonesian Crew Shows on the same night. Several of the ones I know wre in it. One is Joseph (in the Filipino show) who is a steward in the Sea View on the aft of Lido deck and a wine steward in the dining room. For some reason, he has decided that I am a good one to tease. He tries to sneak up on me and surprise me as I’m leaving the dining room. Most times I catch him at it, but a couple of times he’s managed to surprise me. If I did have my Fijian water pistol along, I could get him good! Also in the Indonesian part of the show was Rahman, the captain of our section of the dining room.

Tuesday, November 18

Lahaina, Maui. We are here for only part of the day...sailing at 2:00 p.m....and not docked but tendering in. I got up early with the intention of going ashore for at least a little while, but by the end of breakfast, the weather was more liquid than sunshine, so I gave it a miss. Jill went in, however, and said the rain wasn’t bad. She found a Crazy Shirt store (one of which I had been hoping to get to in Honolulu, but they were all too far away from where we were docked). She brought me back a Kliban Sumo Cat shirt!

Of course the weather cleared completely just about the time they were raising the tenders and anchor. Jill and I had been working on the dragon again (yes, I’ll post a photo of her when she’s done), so took an ice cream break to watch us sail around the north end of Maui and out into the Pacific headed at last for San Diego. Thus I was able to get some nice photos of Maui.

The North Pacific is running about 6 foot swells and the ship is doing about 21 knots...enough to remind one of the old sailor’s adage of “one hand for self, one hand for the ship.” It will probably remain like this until we get to San Diego.

Thursday, November 13

At sea with the usual laid back schedule. Noon is the time for team trivia. Here’s one for you from a couple of days ago...what country has an AK-47 on its national flag? I assure you I won’t forget this one again...it’s Mozambique! Or from yesterday, name the seven von Trapp children from “Sound of Music.” That one is a lot harder than the seven dwarfs! Our team lucked into three of the seven. Then today, what was the name of Captain Hook’s ship. And who played Marian the Librarian in “The Music Man” on Broadway before Shirley Jones played her in the movie? Jolly Roger and Barbara Cook.

I skipped the “Neptune’s Revenge” ceremony for crossing the Equator which we did at about 11:00 this morning. Such things are pretty silly with various people (nowadays members of the crew rather than passengers...probably someone sued over it) getting slimed with various gooey substances and tossed into the pool and made to kiss a dead fish etc.

In the afternoon Jill and I worked on our dragon again. Making pretty good progress. We have decided that her name is “Delilah Dragon-dam.”

Beginning in the late afternoon, we got into an area of reasonably significant swells. The sea condition is described as “moderate” meaning swells between 4 and 7.5 feet. It makes for uncertain walking but excellent sleeping.

Friday, November 14

At sea. Seas still moderate. Good sleeping. Didn’t do much all day. This evening was Polynesian formal night. I wore one of my new pareos as a skirt with a fancy jacket.

Coming back to the cabin I discovered our latest “gift” from the ship which is another nice duffle suitcase with wheels in which to carry home all sorts of acquired stuff. I haven’t really bought all that much stuff, so I’m going to try to pack one of my smaller suitcases inside a larger one to be shipped home so I’ll only have two to deal with on the plane. Fortunately we have 4 days after Maui to do trial packings. Only one week left!! I find that I’m still not really ready to get off, even with a 65 day cruise!

Saturday, November 15

Another lazy day at sea. Caught up with a couple of taped lectures on the tv that I had missed. Jill and I worked some more on Delilah Dragon-dam. We have until the 21st to finish her. Discovered, by accident, that we are back in range of the media, i.e. CNN et al.

Sunday, November 16

Honolulu, Hawaii. Up at just past the crack of dawn to go through US Customs and Border Protection (all they did was a “face check” against our passports which we now have back from the ship’s tender care). Grabbed some breakfast and went back to bed! This being my fourth visit to Oahu, I don’t have any tours booked

In the afternoon I made a “pilgrimage” to the local Wal-Mart along with about half of the ship’s passengers. Wal-Mart was even running a shuttle service! I went to pick up a couple of craft items for Delilah, but it was very interesting to see the difference in merchandise here as compared to central Virginia...mostly in clothing, although there was a pretty large “Hawaiian souvenir” department as well. After I returned to the ship’s vicinity, I wandered around the Aloha Tower Marketplace area for a while, in the process meeting three of my table mates plus a bunch of other passengers I know.

I then spent the late afternoon up in the Crow’s Nest watching rainbows come and go over the city.

Multiple rainbows
shimmering over Punchbowl
in liquid sunshine.

Tuesday, November 11 (The second one)

First, thanks for all the birthday messages and e-cards! You sent them on the 10th, and I actually got them the same day, but it was the (first) 11th here! Today is the second 11th as we cross the International Date Line, so now we’re back in sync with the U.S. dates again.

Last night, even after the lovely lunch we enjoyed, we all turned up for dinner! Also at dinner, I was presented with a lovely chocolate mousse birthday “cake” (which, of course got shared) and a serenade from our dining room staff. I’m not sure what language they sing in, but it’s their version of a :good wishes on your happy day” song and has a lot more pep than our usual “Happy Birthday.” Last night was also the big “Chocolate Buffet” upstairs at the Lido, but I figured I’d already ODed on chocolate for the day, and I can always see it in the photos Jill took.

Today we are at Apia, Samoa. It is a small island which was the home of Robert Louis Stevenson and is where he is buried. Weather is very hot and sticky and it’s quite a hike to the town’s center. I went ashore briefly to some temporary kiosk shops set up on the dock, but was soon back on board.

In the afternoon a group of young people, the Island Gospel Culture Group 2008, came aboard to present a folkloric show of a local legend about a young girl and an eel. They were very energetic, both with dancing and singing and even saying their lines. The show was lots of fun. Also during the day, there were one or two tours of the ship by groups of school children. I think it was great of the ship to do this for them as they obviously had a great time!

After we got back out into the open ocean, all of a sudden the Captain came on the PA saying that we had passed a small fishing boat that was waving a red flag, so we were going to turn around and go back to help them. So around we go, and about the time we get back and slowed down almost to a stop, and they are ready to lower a tender to go over to see what’s the matter, the little boat fires up its engine, runs a circle around us and heads off. The Captain comes back on the PA saying that the “red flag” turned out to be a guy waving a greeting to us with his red t-shirt! He then commented that he was going to see that the young man got another color t-shirt! Some of us think he also ought to get his bridge crew a better set of binoculars! But seriously, because they couldn’t raise the boat by radio, the Captain was obliged to do what he did in case there had been a problem.

Wednesday, November 12

At sea for the first of four days before reaching Hawaii! Jill I started work on our dragon this afternoon and made pretty good progress. In the past, on some trips, there have been contests for teams of people to build a ship from odd parts supplied by the cruise staff. This time the contest is not a ship, but “an icon of the trip.” So we (actually, Jill) decided on a dragon. There were three distributions of “parts,” and you must use at least one/some of each part in the first distribution. This includes things like corks, tiny papier-mache flowerpots, markers, a roll of red ribbon, a short piece of white ribbon, a foam paintbrush, etc. The second and third distributions have included a bag of mixed buttons, scissors, assorted pipe cleaners, medicine dose cups, rulers, dowels, glue sticks, aluminum foil, bits of glittery stuff, etc. At one of our ports, Jill found and bought a packet of fancy origami paper and a big hunk of florist’s foam (which carves like a dream), and we’ve been saving things like the gold foil wrappers from the pillow chocolates, etc. So now we have a head (which at the moment looks rather like a green duck while the glue dries, and a pair of front legs, and about a thousand ideas of what to do with the rest of it. The judging isn’t until after we leave Hawaii, so we’re making a list of stuff we might need at Wal-Mart, and I’ll make an expedition there on one of our two days in Honolulu. (Jill is flying off to the big island to visit some friends for a day or so.)

The other day that we will be in Honolulu, I plan to make an expedition to Hilo Hattie’s...just on general principles. If there is something specific you need from there and you can let me know all the details in time (via e-mail to my regular address, please), I’ll look for it for you. (Note: that last sentence applies only to people that I may be seeing in person in the foreseeable future. I don’t plan to take on shopping duties for any- and everyone who might be following this blog.)

I want to mention television on board. There are about 17 or 18 channels available on the tv sets on the ship including those in our staterooms. Several are dedicated to things like the view ahead of the ship from the camera on the bridge 24/7 (somewhat interesting except at night), some music-only stations, a couple of stations that show and reshow videos of things like shore excursion information, some of the lectures, and other programs aboard, etc. Several of the others show videos of old cartoons or programs from channels like Discovery, A&E, etc. These get repeated over and over throughout the cruise until you are thoroughly sick of them. Four channels show movies from the ship’s relatively extensive DVD collection; they repeat all day, but are changed every day. And finally, there are three channels that we get from satellite feed: CNN, ESPN and TNT (or maybe it’s TBS, I can’t remember which). Anyway, for the past ffive or six days we have not been receiving these satellite channels because we are too far out in the Pacific. The satellites are, not surprisingly, aimed at the continents and certainly not at these small islands or at a ship in the middle of the ocean so our dish can’t pick them up. This will most likely continue at least until we reach the vicinity of Hawaii. I’ve found it refreshing that we are actually out of the reach of the instant media!

Sunday, November 9

Gorgeous quiet sea day. The photo shop on board is going to have a photo contest. I decided to enter one I took in Saigon of a local lunch cart and its proprietor and customer. Sometime after the 15th they will post the entries and passengers can vote. I decided against entering one of Uluru as I’m sure others from the tour will probably do so.

This evening’s bed animal made from towels is a scorpion...very apropos for November and an incipient birthday!

Monday, Noember 10

Suva, Fiji. I was last here on the Fair Princess 20 years ago, almost but not quite to the day! I slathered myself with bug repellent before going off on tour this morning because Fiji is currently having an outbreak of Dengue Fever...not something I wish to experience! Also, I have faithfully carried my (new, never unfurled from its little pouch) travel rain cape in my shore excursion bag since the trip began. Today I actually unfurled it, but didn’t put it on because the “no more than six drops of rain” magic still seemed to be working. At the end of the tour, it did rain on us as we walked along the dock to the gangway...more than 6 drops, but not enough to stop and put on the rain cape which was wadded into the shore bag. Now to get it folded up and pouched again...

Jill’s and my tour went to a place called the Pacific Harbor Arts Village. I had been there 20 years ago, and I must say that it has changed a good deal and gotten much more sophisticated. It now has shops and restaurants, and a covered section of bleacher seats for watching the performances, and no more snake photo ops. We saw a ritual of fire walking (actually, the Fijians step and stand still on white hot stones rather than walking across fire ashes and embers), and several traditional dances by groups of men and women. All quite colorful as you can see. This woman is wearing a skirt of tapa cloth which is made from the pounded bark of a tree (I think I remember that they usually use mulberry bark).

The bus ride to and from Pacific Harbor Arts Village was an adventure also. The bus itself wasn’t too bad. It wasn’t air conditioned, but the weather was cloudy and with open windows, it was cool enough. I am a bit dubious about whether it had any springs and/or suspension system, but the thorough jouncing we got could have been due to the road rather than the vehicle. The scenery is extremely lush and green, but impossible to photograph from the bus in motion. Every few minutes we would come to a little village which would have at least two and usually three speed humps to be bounced over slowly. Jill and I (and pretty much everyone else) were glad to get back to the ship that is firmly moored to the dock! I am now so used to places that drive on the left that I’m going to have to be careful when I get home!

I didn’t bring my Fijian water pistol from the last trip when ten or twelve us of acquired them to play a joke on our assistant waiter, but I didn’t feel the need to go hunt up another one. Our assistant waiter this time, Nusirwan, is very efficient and not a congenital joker as that one was.

Tuesday, November 11 (The first one)

At sea. Our trivia team actually tied for first place today, but lost on the tie-breaker. A nice change from being 2 points down from the winner.

All seven of us from our dining room table went to lunch at the Pinnacle Grill this afternoon as a “generic birthday” celebration. It was a lovely lunch, worth far more than the $10/person that they charge for lunch. Stan was all dolled up in his jacket and medals along with a poppy in his lapel for Armistice/Veterans’/Rememberance Day. He’d been to the service this morning (with champagne) and to the veterans’ gathering afterward (with more champagne). He presented a fine old Scottish blessing for us at the end of the meal in his best Scottish accent.

The weather today is quite warm and pretty uniformly overcast with occasional showers, so sunbathing is not on the agenda. (I did manage to get my rain cape folded and rolled small enough to fit back into its pouch...and I’m good at folding maps also!)

Thursday, November 6 (Day 48)

At sea. Very smooth seas...just a teeny bit of roll. It’s still a bit coolish outside, but getting warmer as we head north. (Feels funny to type that!) Didn’t do much...just puttered around the ship.

By the way, I won’t be getting two birthdays this year as I thought I would. It turns out that someone somewhere decided on a schedule change, and they moved a sea day from later on into the space between Suva, Fiji and Apia, Samoa. Thus my birthday will not be doubled by crossing the International Date Line, but Armistice Day will. That’s okay also...any excuse for a celebration! Too bad I’ve finally “run out of” fudge that I bought at the winery outside of Melbourne! We’ll all go have lunch in the Pinnacle Grill instead.

At dinner this evening we got a full report on Mary’s ascension of the Sydney Harbor Bridge, complete with photos taken at the top! She said it wasn’t nearly as difficult as she imagined it would be, and the hardest part was the four steep ladderways at the beginning of the climb. They don’t allow you to take up anything but yourself and your sunglasses. They put you in a protective suit with a built-in safety line and hard hat. But they do take photos of both the group and individuals at the top. They usually take the individual photos with the Opera House in the background, but Mary asked that hers be shifted a bit so her background is the ship and Circular Quay. She said she’s do it again in a heartbeat! She’s one happy camper now!

Friday, November 7

At sea. The water here in the Coral Sea is even smoother than yesterday...at times almost glassy. The temperature is definitely going up as we crossed the Tropic of Capricorn today. I even sat out in the sun for a while after lunch.

For the past two days, I’ve joined Jill’s trivia team since they lost a member who got off in Sydney. Both days we’ve come within 2 points of winning, so I guess I’m helping some. Actually none of us feel a burning need to win any of the geegaws they offer as prizes since most of us have most of that stuff already...umbrellas, luggage tags, photoframe/mousepads, etc, but we do have fun. Today’s kicker question (for which I can only remember the answer, not the question) was to tell what three impossible names had in common. It turned out that they are states in the United Arab Emirate. Sheesh! I can’t even keep the countries of Africa straight anymore, much less know something like that!

Last night’s “bedtime present” was a stuffed koala, cute and squishy. It gets added to the tote bag, travel journal, sweatshirt, umbrella, two delft-ware dishes, a really ugly coffee mug, etc etc that we’ve already received. We are still guessing that we’ll get some sort of piece of luggage toward the end of the trip to tote it all home in like we did on the South American trip.

Otherwise, it’s been a lovely peaceful day.

Saturday, November 8

Noumea, New Caledonia, a large, cigar-shaped island surrounded by the largest lagoon in the world made up of the second largest coral reef in the world at 930 miles long. In fact, it has recently been named a World Heritage Site. The island is also unique because it is actually a piece of Gondwana which separated from that supercontinent along with Australia and New Zealand 85 million years ago, and separated from them 55 million years ago. As a result, it is a treasure trove of the prehistoric Gondwanan forest ecology with tons of diverse and primitive plants and animals.

The island was named by Captain Cook because the scenery reminded him of the Scottish highlands. It is, however, a French territory like Martinique in the Caribbean. It is the world’s third largest producer of nickel behind Russia and Cuba.

I won’t send any postcards here because they would have to go to Paris before heading to the U.S., again like Martinique. I tried to brush up my minimal, marginal French because the people here have the same basic opinion of non-French-speaking tourists, yet again like Martinique. Bon jour! Fortunately, our guide on tour was a bi-lingual Brit, and the stall keepers that I bought a few souvenirs from were tolerant of my spotty French. The one I had some conversation with spoke to me mostly in French, and I mostly understood her enough to reply.

Our morning’s tour consisted mostly of a drive around the Noumea area and a visit to their aquarium which is only about a year old. The aquarium was fabulous! I could have easily spent the whole morning in there! And if I ever get back here, I will certainly go there again! Our guide told us that one of her tours recently was with a couple from California who are with the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and that they had high praise for this one in Noumea. I can believe it!

Tuesday, November 4

When I woke up and looked out my cabin window, I had a full view of the Sydney Opera House just on the other side of Circular Quay! The other side of the ship looks out on the Sydney Harbor Bridge. This means we are docked spang in the middle of the downtown area and right next to the oldest area of the city called “The Rocks.” Absolutely could nnot be more convenient!

I had a nice half-day driving tour of Sydney today. This photo is from the area called “Mrs. Macquarie’s Chair and shows the Opera House, part of the Bridge, and just left of the Opera House you can see the stern of our ship...just above that little white dome thing. We also went to Bondi Beach, and assorted other picturesque points. One of the best parts of this tour was our guide, Peter. When asked if the shape of the Opera House was meant to represent something, he listed off several things including, of course, sails, but also “a scrum of nuns.” I thought I’d fall out of my seat laughing at that one!

Back at the ship I had lunch on Lido aft deck while watching a number of groups of people actually climb up to the top of the Bridge! Yes, that line of little bumps is a group of climbers. They started offering this as a tour about 5 years ago and have evidently made a mint on it. Some people are foolish, some are foolhardy, and then therre are tourists! One of our table mates, Mary, is scheduled to make the clomb tomorrow. Not even in my misspent youth would I have tried this!

After lunch I took a long leisurely walk around to the far side of Circular Quay. This is where most of the ferry boats come in, and there are lots of shops, restaurants and ice cream parlors. I patronized one souvenir shop, one Baskin Robins and one ATM. The people-watching was prime this afternoon as it is the day of the Melbourne Cup (richest horse race in the world), and practically the whole of Australia turns out for parties to watch it. Lots of people dressed to the nines, most ladies with hats or feathers or bows or some other sort of headgear, and lots of them in really high spike heels with no stockings (makes my feet hurt to think of it).

Wednesday, November 5

Jill and I had a tour together this morning. The main point was a visit to a Koala Zoo where you can actually pet and/or feed some of the Australian animals. We then drove through Olympic Park and took a ferry back to town. Jill and I the stopped for an excellent lunch in one of the many restaurants at Circular Quay before strolling back to the ship. I came back with “wombat cooties” on one hand, “kangaroo and koala cooties” on the other, and probably “sea gull cooties” on the seat of my pants where I’d sat on the wall around Circular Quay to rest at bit on the way back after lunch.

Someone please tell Connie that I spotted James’ apartment building on the way back down the river by ferry. It is now almost totally surrounded by high rise condos, and there is a garish amusement park on the next spit of land between hisplace and the Bridge. I did not try to find out if James is still here since I can’t remember his last name.

We don’t sail until 11:00 p.m. tonight, so I am hoping to get some photos of everything lit up before we go.

I happened to turn on CNN just one minute before Obama came out to give his speech in Chicago’s Grant Park. I am also glad that Warner won in Virginia.

WOW! AMAZING! FANTASTIC!

Wednesday, October 29

After lunch our little band of 15 passengers plus ship’s escort Judy met our tour guide Sandy and boarded the bus for our afternoon tour of Perth and Freemantle. Perth is a lovely city on the Swan River, and one of its famous features is the black swans that live there. Our bus driver/local guide located a family of these birds for us to admire.

We had some free time in downtown Perth during which we were urged to purchase an item called a “fly net.” I thought, “Yeah, sure,” but bought one anyway. Little did I know then that this would be the most useful item I’ve ever purchased on any trip I’ve ever taken anywhere! Next we visited the Kings Park and Botanical Garden with great views of the city.

Back to Freemantle for a tour of this very Victorian harbor town where the America’s Cup was held a few years ago. While touring the marina area, we saw just about the biggest and most gorgeous yacht any of us had ever seen. She was called “La Masquerade” out of London. One of our band, Alan, walked down there later and chatted with a couple of the crew, but didn’t find out who the owner is.

We spent the night in an historic hotel called The Esplanade and after a nice buffet dinner I turned in early as we had an early gathering time in the morning for our flight to Ayers Rock.

Thursday, October 30

Our Quantas flight went smoothly, and we were picked up at the airport by Mick and his huge orange bus complete with kangaroo screen. Off to our hotel, Sails in the Desert, which was very very nice. After checking in, we rejoined Mick for a tour of Kata Tjuta (also known as The Olgas).

This red sandstone formation is located in the same national park as Uluru (aka Ayers Rock). It is made of larger pieces of sand and rock than the very fine-grained sand that composes Uluru, but is essentially the same stuff. However, it’s different composition has caused it to erode into about 36 separate domes. Most everybody went off for a walk into one of the crevices or small canyons, while I pretty much hung around near the trail head.

This is where I and the rest of the tour group learned the high value of our fly nets! You wouldn’t think that there would be so many flies out in the dry desert, but oh boy, there are! And the little buggers sense that humans are walking water supplies and come straight at your mouth, nose, eyes, ears and any exposed part that is sweating (which is just about all of you). If you are mostly covered up, you sweat more, but you don’t feel as many of them walking around on your skin. At least they were flies and not mosquitoes, so you don’t get bitten...just walked on.

After a pit (literally) stop at what Mick described as “long drop toilets,” we went to see the sunset at Uluru. As huge as Uluru is, it is very like an iceberg since it extends six kilometers underground. It was formed in a shallow depression in an ancient sea bed and has since been tipped up at a steep angle as can be seen in the fine sediment layers.

We were served champagne and hors d’oeuvres while we waited. It was somewhat uncertain whether there would be a decent sunset because the sky had been mostly cloudy all afternoon, and there had been rain showers in the area along with beautiful sunbeams through the clouds off and on. However, Mother Nature and Uluru did provide an absolutely spectacular show, with the rock standing out against the clouds probably even better than if the sky were clear. Just toward the end of sunset, a faint rainbow appeared on top of Uluru which doesn’t happen often! It was totally awesome!

Sunbeam through the clouds
Red sand, gold spinifex,
Uluru gleaming.

Rain in the desert.
Wispy droplets are falling,
Not all reach the ground.

Stark and grayish red,
an ominous Uluru
broods beneath the clouds.

Uluru sunset –
Monolithic, crowned by clouds
with a rainbow jewel.

Friday, October 31

Up and out and on the bus by 5:00 a.m. to go see sunrise on the other side of Uluru. No champagne this time, and the viewing area is closer, so you can’t really get the whole thing into one photo, but spectacular nonetheless. This photo shows part of Uluru with Kata Tjuta in the distance. Onward to the Aboriginal Cultural Center for a presentation on the various kinds of tools they have used for thousands and thousands of years to survive in this difficult land.

Back to the hotel for breakfast. Then off again in the big orange bus headed for Alice Spring. Our first brief stop was at a cattle station where one family runs about 5,000 head of cattle on about 850,000 acres of land. They would probably have more, but Australia is in about the eighth year of drought.

For lunch we stopped at Mt. Ebenezer Roadhouse. It was near the junction of the road to the Kata Tjuta and Uluru National Park and the main (only) road from Adelaide to Darwin. Part restaurant, part tourist stop, part aboriginal art gallery, part local convenience store, and all Aussie. You’d almost expect Crocodile Dundee to come strolling around the corner of the building!

Yes, we did stop at the camel farm. No, I did not ride a camel, although some of the group did. There were somewhat fewer flies here bothering humans, but only because they had the camels to bother instead!

Finally we got to Alice Spring. This town (current population around 27,000) was originally situated as a telegraph repeater station between Adelaide and Darwin because there is water here. It seems a thriving place, at least from the brief driving tour we had of it before getting to our hotel (an International Crowne Plaza Hotel which was very nice). The Todd River runs through town...once a year it even has water in it! That doesn’t stop the inhabitants from holding an annual regatta. The boats just don’t have any bottoms and the crews standing inside the boats just pick them up and run like hell through the sand!

We were treated to drinks before dinner, then another buffet, after which most of us collapsed quietly from such a long day. Thankfully, we didn’t have to be ready to load the bus until 9:30 the next morning.

Saturday, November 1

Off on another Quantas flight to Melbourne. With an hour and a half time change (from Freemantle to Ayers Rock there was only a 30 minute time change), we arrived in mid-afternoon. We checked into another International Crowne Plaza Hotel that turned out to be one of the most frustrating places I’ve stayed in a long, long while. The rooms were about the size of my cabin on the ship, with less closet space and cheap veneered furniture, and the layout of the hotel was the most inconvenient thing any architect could possibly dream up. In fact, I was quite literally trapped in the hotel building until we left the next morning. The only way down to street level was a long, very steep ramp that I knew I wouldn’t be able to negotiate with my walker at my current level of tiredness. Supposedly there was an elevator and an escalator from the 2nd floor reception lobby down to the street, but neither was operational. The way up to the guest rooms was via an escalator up to another lobby where one took another elevator to one’s floor, or, for me, via a tiny elevator located down a blind hallway half-way around the building from the upper elevator lobby. There were other seriously irksome things about that hotel and its staff, but I will save them for my letter to the CEO of International Crowne Plaza Hotels. Needless to say, I was in a totally rotten mood all evening.

Sunday, November 2

Things perked up as soon as I got out of that stupid hotel, and this last day of the tour was an excellent one! Our first activity was a lovely, leisurely, scenic boat ride up and down the Yarra River through Melbourne. Although rain had been forecast, we had nary a drop. (I attribute this to the fact that I have carried my new rain poncho with me on every tour on this whole trip and it has never rained more than six drops on us anywhere.)

Next we headed up to Yarra Valley toward wine country and the Blue Dandenong Mountains. For a while I was busy checking my eyelids for leaks, and when I opened them again, I thought I was back in Albemarle County! As you can see, the Yarra Valley is a very close match to our little section of the world! We stopped at a local winery for a tasting and a delicious lunch. I had a lamb stew because one just cannot travel in Australia without eating lamb at some point! Several of our band purchased wines there, but several others made a beeline for another counter where they had just about every variety of fudge imaginable. Guess which group I was in!

Our last stop was the Healesville Wildlife Sanctuary which combines the aspects of a zoo for indigenous species along with research and breeding programs and the veterinary, rescue and rehab aspects of our own Virginia Wildlife Center over near Waynesboro. Sandy had laid on a special tour for me with my own guide and “people mover” (i.e. golf cart). In addition to a tour of the Health Center (wonderfully set up for educational programs), I got to see kangaroos (this male red kangaroo was definitely king of his own hill!), koalas, dingos, an echidna, several platypuses, and a river rat (usually in hiding...none of the rest of our group had seen it) plus a bunch of birds including several handsome ibises.

We finished up with a driving tour of some lovely areas of Melbourne en route back to the ship. All in all, with the one exception of that stupid hotel, it was a fantastic trip! Sandy and Judy went out of their way to make sure that I was able to do as much of everything as I could and that I would be comfortable waiting for the others when I couldn’t.

Monday, November 3

I actually made it to dinner on the ship last night...had even unpacked, sorted and bagged the laundry, and gotten the dusty remains of the red center of Australia out of my hair before the dinner chimes rang. Afterward I spent a few minutes out in the fresh air up on Lido aft with Jill before coming back and crashing until about noon today! They had relatively good weather and calm seas on board crossing the Australia Bight, but of course a lot cooler than we had been having through the tropics and a lot ooler than we had on our tour through thr desert. Today is still cool, but the Tasman Sea is quite calm. Tomorrow will be the first of our two days in Sydney.

Sunday, November 2

I'm back from the outback. The trip was totally fantastic! I am totally tired! Details and photos when I recover a bit.