Australia (travelogue)
Last Day in New Zealand: Fjords and the Mitford Sound
In the evening we received an invitation to dine with one of the ships singers. They called them "hosted tables." Because we were eating with others I dressed up a little more than usual. We were at a table with 4 others; the singer, another couple and a single woman. It was fun. We hadn't met many people since we got off to a late start meeting people. There were two reasons for this: 1) about half the people on the cruise had been cruising for just under a month when we got on (they got on the ship in Los Angeles), and 2) I was sick for the first 2 days of the cruise so we felt we should sit alone at meals.
Melbourne
We took a bus tour/harbor tour/bus tour of the city. It was a large, pretty city.
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| Harbor tour |
A Conservatory in the city;
A WWI and WWII war memorial. Roy is standing by the Eternal Flame (WWII)
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| This building was built to commemorate WWI. When it was opened, 300,000 people came to see it. It was paid for with money donated from the people. |
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| This was a memorial to a man who took his donkey in and out of the war zone in Gallipolli, helping as many as he could. He was finally killed by a piece of shrapnel. |
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| A trough memorial built for the horses that died in the war. |
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| After finishing our excursion, we walked on the beach. I only wished I was dressed for swimming. Melbourne was hot. 80 degrees plus 90 % humidity. It was wonderful. |
Eden
Our excursion in Eden took us on a walking tour up above the harbor.
Some views from the morning tour.
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| This is in the museum that was made to remember one particular killer whale. He was called Old Tom. Old Tom helped the whalers herd the baleen whales towards the cove where they could hunt them with less danger. The Orca's could keep the tongue and lips of the whale, and the whalers could have the rest. In all the years of hunting with Old Tom, only one man was killed (not by the Orcas). |
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| This sailboat was full of youth learning the art of sailing. I asked if they were "troubled youth." The guide said that troubled youth were the targeted passengers, but anyone who wanted to be involved could apply. |
On the Ship
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| We enjoyed visiting with this couple. Zach is 48 and his wife, Annie is 38. They've been together since 2012. Zach spent 15 years working with his brother on a video game, "Dwarf Fortress." They've been supported with donations from their fans (not making a lot) until they recently published the game and got a payout for that. Zack got skin cancer that cost them a lot of money, even with Annie's insurance. This prompted the brother, Tarn, to move forward with publishing the game because he realized that a medical problem could wipe out all of his savings. Very nice couple, but very different from us. Annie said they have no desire to have a family. Her brother, who was supposed to be the one to have kids, passed away last year from a heart infection. Zack is continuing work on his game (if you don't constantly update, you have a "dead game") and on new ideas. He said they have had some ideas stolen, so they have learned to be very careful. Apparently, they came up with the digging process that is used in Minecraft. The Minecraft people offered to hire them, since they'd used their idea, but they were hoping to have success on their own. |
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| We met a few people on the ship. This was the most colorful couple (literally). Mark and Beba. Beba was originally from Serbia. She was a trauma surgeon. After observing her throughout the trip, Roy and I both agreed we'd never want her as our surgeon. Mark didn't drink much, but I'm pretty sure Beba was an alcoholic. Her outfits were very interesting. One evening outfit was see through black lace. Mark told us that Beba had gotten very familiar with Valium after plastic surgery. She'd also taken Osempic to lose 30 lbs. (she was skin and bones). Even with all that, we enjoyed their company. |
Melbourne
We thought this oil tanker was going to hit us. We didn't realize it was there on purpose to refuel the ship. We are docked here, not moving.
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| Another picture of me with food! |
It was quite cool most of the time on board. I got into the pool here, but the water was anything was calm. I was in for 5 minutes.
Sydney
We arrived in Sydney on Monday morning, had a leisurely breakfast, then disembarked from the cruise ship. Our hotel room wasn't ready, so we checked in our luggage and went across the street to the Botanical Gardens. They were beautiful (and extensive). They had native plants, but they also had trees and plants from other areas.
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| An example of the large gum trees in the area. |
Above: Botanical gardens in Sydney
New Zealand had been fairly cool, but Austrailia was hot and humid. We spent a few hours at the gardens until our hotel room was ready. We were so tired that we spent the rest of the afternoon resting, then took a half-hour walk to the restaurant (Love.Fish) on the water front. We took the Ferry back to the hotel just in time for the sunset. The skyline was amazing. The architecture in Sydney is interesting.
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| A quintessential boat repair place |
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| Sydney Opera House (the place where we saw the Dungeons and Dragons play/experience |
Note the people on top of the bridge. You can see from the picture below just how high up these people are. They paid for an excursion to hike to the top of the bridge with safety harnesses
Our 2nd day in Sydney we had a scheduled tour. It was awesome. It included a tour of the Blue Mountains, a trip to the zoo, and ended with a ferry ride around the harbor.
The blue mountains are blue because of all the eucalyptus trees. The leaves have an oil on their leaves which mixes with the air particles, causing a blue haze. The area reminded me of Flaming Gorge with trees covering the bottom of the gorge instead of water. It was beautiful. We rode a cable car (straight down into an old mining area), walked through some rain forest, rode another cable up, then a sky ride overlooking the area.
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| The cable car. We thought the whole ride down would be at this angle. We were wrong, as soon as we passed the platform, it took a more direct (steep) route to the bottom. On the right: looking down into the canyon. The ferns in Australia are beautiful and large. |
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| The Three Sisters |
Following our time in the Blue Mountains we stopped for lunch, then headed to the zoo. I didn't feel like an hour at the zoo was nearly enough. We only did the Australian section, and were rushed at that; but we loved seeing the kangaroos, wallabies and koalas. We even saw a tasmanian devil.
The zoo had a nocturnal area that we had to rush through to get back to our bus in time. There were many snakes and some other animals native to the area.
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| Dingos |
We were given some pellets to feed the kangaroos and the emu. On the right is a "forest dragon."
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| Tasmanian Devil: It looks like it might be mean. |
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| You can see the baby in this kanga's pouch. |
On the left you can see the baby. It's outgrown the mamma's pouch.
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| We waited in line to get a picture with the koala. When it was our turn, we went to stand by the koala. He looked at me and started climbing down. We had to wait for a different, more cooperative animal. I had to move the leaves out of my face for the picture. We also took many pictures of the snakes of Australia. We sent them to Nick. If you're interested I can show them to you. |
We got back to our hotel just in time to change and head to a play. The only thing playing was "Dungeons and Dragons," so Roy purchased tickets (in advance), just to have the experience of going to the famous Sydney Opera House. It was an interactive play where we sort of played the game with everyone by making choices on our phone. Since we've never played before, it was a little weird, but it was fun to see people dressed up as various characters (the audience, not the actors; the actors costumes were very simple). We grabbed dinner at the opera house, too. It was a happening place.
It was fun to experience Sydney. It was a huge city with many people out and about. The public transportation system consisted of taxis, Ubers, ferries, trains, and buses. Some people drove cars. It's the most expensive city in Australia to live in. Our guide told us that most people had to make the choice to either live in a crappy place, or move out of the city and have long commutes to get better living conditions.
All too soon it was time to go home. We called an Uber and checked out of the hotel. Most of our Uber drivers had been from India (Australia is a country of immigrants). This time our driver was from Afghanistan. He was 38 yrs. old and had been in Australia for 12 years. He told us that he had made the choice to leave Afghanistan, not knowing if he would live or die. He had to leave his family behind (he wasn't married). He spent many days on the ocean and ran out of all rations. He said he ate his toothbrush when there was nothing else to eat. We are so blessed to live in the USA and to have the freedoms we have. This young man said that he didn't like politics because he felt like all politicians are dirty. In his country, leaders wouldn't hesitate to kill their own sons if they threatened their position in government. We asked about marriage. He said that to do it in the traditional Muslim way, it would cost too much for him. He also said that he had to find a woman who was happy just to have someone to spend her life with; someone who didn't expect much monetarily. He told us that it cost him more than $500 per week to rent the car to be able to be an Uber driver. We had a great conversation and he told us that he gave us 5 stars as his passengers. We told him we gave him 5 stars, too. We came away realizing how life isn't very fair.
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| On the way home. |
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