Rhapsody of the Seas

So on the day we were to board the ship, we had some spare time in the morning so we decided to head back to Bondi Beach since it was a really gorgeous day. This photo gives you a flavour of what was going on between the sunbathers, surfers, boogie boarders, swimmers or people watchers.

Even though it was the middle of a week day, there were lots of people to see and most of them were worth watching!We boarded the ship without any problems although Jude was really getting worried when it took me over an hour to drop the rental car off and run back to the port (in 37 deg C weather).

With the sun just starting to set, we headed out to sea on a calm but breezy day.

The Sydney harbour has to be one of the most scenic places in the world to start a cruise.

The first port of call was Brisbane, which is the third largest city in Australia and has some quite modern looking buildings.
It is located on the long and winding Brisbane river so we felt the best way to see the city and learn about it’s history was to take a river cruise on the ferry boat Mirimar. As we were finishing breakfast, we happened to bump into Lou and George’s best friends who just happened to be on the Rhapsody of the Seas, and even more surprising, were planning to take the same ferry boat to the same park we were! What a small world!
The river trip was relaxing and we learned much of the history of the area including the story about the family that donated the university grounds, the floods of 1974 that wiped out many of the houses along the river and why there are so many bats on the island next to the golf course.


We toured the Lone Pine Koala Park and got up close to a number of different Australian animals including a few different types of Kangaroos like the white bush kangaroos shown here:

We saw dingos, kassawary’s, fox bats, Tasmanian devils, kookoobura’s, sheep dogs and wombats. This cute little lizard fellow seemed to want to follow us around looking for a handout or maybe he was after the mosquitoes that like to follow Jude around.

The main attraction here of course is the really cute Koala’s (note they are marsupials not bears so you can’t call them Koala Bears!) like this one who woke up long enough for me to get her picture.

They eat 4 hours a day and sleep 20 hours a day (as Jude said, just like the average Canadian male in winter except it’s beer not eucalyptus leaves!). Jude went into the special exhibit and even got to hold one for a few minutes.

I will try and keep the blog up to date but the Internet access on the ship is too slow for uploading pictures so I had to wait till we had a few minutes in port at an Internet cafe so the next update may take a few days so please be patient! We are having the time of our lives, meeting many interesting people from many different far away places and some from even just down on Binns Street around the corner from us! Bye for now.

Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rainforest

We started off our adventures in Port Douglas with a trip out to the Great Barrier reef on the Calypso Snorkel and Dive Tour. Judy went snorkeling and I went diving and we all went to three different sites on the Opal Reef. Before this trip I patiently explained to Jude how divers are very rarely bitten because sharks don't consider them food. Of course just as we arrived in Sydney, a Navy diver was attacked by a Bull Shark in Sydney harbour and a surfer was attacked on Bondi beach. Despite all of that, she did get her nerve up and had a great time snorkeling (I only saw one small white tipped reef shark). I spent some time looking for Nemo and I found him, or at least one of his cousins.

Even friendlier than Nemo was Marvin the Marvelous Purple Wrasse who would let you pet his nose and followed us around looking for handouts. This gentle fish was about five feet long and had lots of personality. Jude was petting Marvin until she saw a four foot long barracuda with huge teeth and then decided she would keep a bit of distance between herself and extremely large fish.

We also toured around the area visiting the Barron falls shown below and also stopping at a local pub, filled with people and kids of all ages, that had a fundraiser BBQ for the Bushfire Victims. It was great sampling some of the local cuisine (BBQ bangers and fries), chatting with some of the locals and supporting a great cause.

For our last day in Port Douglas we went on a Rainforest Safaris that visited Cape Tribulation, Mossman Gorge, Cooper Creek and the Daintree river. One of the highlights was taking a small boat down the river in search of salt water crocodiles, the most dangerous and largest crocs around. Here you can see Jude has her eyes peeled looking for anything staring back at her from the mangrove trees lining the river.
Although they are hard to find during the summer, we luckily came across a 3 meter female sunning herself on a log. Both our guide and I tried to get Jude to stick her arms in the water to see if we could get a better shot of the croc's teeth with it's mouth open but she wouldn't go for it.

Travelling down another tributary we came across the dominant male for that whole territory and he was about 4.5 meters long! It's really hard to get the scale of this thing from the picture but that is all one crocodile! Those scales sticking out of the water on the right are his tail and most of his bulky body is under the water so you can't see it. This thing was longer than a compact car!

We've noticed that a lot of things are different in Australia than Canada, even though there are lots of similarities as well. You don't see "Caution - Watch for Deer" signs in Australia you see watch for Kangaroo or Emu Signs.

The highways, roads and bridges get flooded so often that the trucks come equipped with snorkels so they can travel through even deep water to get across.

In Canada we might see ant hills, gopher mounds or mole hills but in Australia you get huge termite mounds.

There are lots of big bugs like this Golden Orb Spider that was about 8 inches high. They are harmless but Jude wouldn't even let me put it on her so I could get a better picture, imagine that!

All the critters seem a bit bigger and we have bats at the cottage that are about the size of a sparrow, well we came across these fruit bats flying around that have a 1 meter wingspan and look like Canada Geese flying around.

So now it's back to Sydney for the start of our Circumnavigation of Australia Cruise which should gives us lot's more adventures to write about.

Welcome to Sydney

G'Day mates! Crikey, me an the Sheila happy as Larry on an Aussie walkabout! No worries, I'll just crack a tinnie, throw some yabbies in a pot and have a bonzer time!

Yes, we have now arrived in Australia. Everyone we talked to was really friendly (and no they really don't talk like that, at least not all the time) and we got lots of good advice on how to have a great time in Sydney.

The first area we checked out was the Darling Harbour and we went to the Fish Market for lunch. Speaking of Yabbies, look at the size of this one!
We also took a harbour cruise which gave us great views of the Bridge, the Opera House and a number of very expensive houses and apartment buildings. Here is a picture of the Sydney Bridge which we must have crossed 10 times in the three days we were there.

So I dropped Jude off at the the harbour to buy the tickets for the cruise while I went to find a place to park. The roads are confusing, there are tunnels everywhere, they drive on the wrong side of the road and the car controls are all backwards! As soon as I dropped her off, with only about 20 minutes until the cruise left, I managed to get caught on the expressway, headed back across the bridge, to the other side of Sydney, through the toll tunnel, with no way to turn around! Putting my rather short list of Aussie swear words to good use, I only cut off about a dozen or so drivers, got blasted by horns but I managed somehow to get back, park the car and run onto the gangway before they pulled it up. And yes Rick, I kept within the speed limit-well kindof!

In Australia they put a big "L" on the back of cars that Learners are driving. I think some of those drivers thought I should have a big "L" on the back of my car for "Looser"!

Here is a picture of Darling Harbour at night, it is beautiful and it was worth it.

One day we checked out the Sydney aquarium which had interesting displays with penguins (I had no idea there are small penguins that live around the Sydney harbour), sharks, a great barrier reef display, otters and these things called Dugongs which are like Manatees but different. For the record, these are not fish pictures, Dugongs are mammals.

The last night in Sydney, we knew that Simply Red was playing at the Opera House but tickets had been sold out for months so we trucked down to the harbour to see if we could get in.

We went to the box office and were told that nothing was available but there was a lineup of people in case tickets came up. Scalping tickets is illegal in Australia and they seem much more serious about it so there is no one out front going "Who needs tickets?" like in North America. We were about 6 or 7 people back and some of them had been there for hours already so it looked pretty doubtful but about 20 minutes before the show they asked if we wanted to buy standing room tickets so we said sure why not! It was an awesome show and what better venue to see a performance in.

It was a great show and I manged to video some of the show (by the way Amanda, Jess and Ashley, " Simply Red" is an 80's band, not a fundraiser to stop Aids in Africa).

I tried to download a video clip but it kept crashing the internet at this resort so here is a pic instead.

We have now left Sydney and headed up to the Great Barrier Reef. Australia is truly a gem of a country and we are lovin' every minute here. Until next time, 'hooroo' or otherwise-see you later!

Run for the Whales and the Road to Hana

On Saturday the Pacific Whale Foundation held the "Run for the Whales" which is a fund raising event to help support research and provide opposition to the Japanese who are still trying to get approval to commercially hunt the Humpback Whales. Jude and I both signed up for the 5k event with her planning to walk and me planning to run. I think she surprised herself by running most of the event. I surprised myself too as I managed to finish 3rd in my age group and was presented with a medal. What a team!



On the next day we took the long "Road to Hana" which is a really popular day trip in Maui. The slow, winding road through a lush paradise driving for miles along the cliffs. As we found out, it's not the destination but the journey that really made the trip. Can make out the two little white cars on the road along the cliff in the picture below?

We passed over about 50 one lane bridges and stopped at more waterfalls than I can remember. This one is huge at about 150 feet high, although in the blog picture below it's really hard to tell that there is a person standing in front of the falls.

We also hiked about 3 kilometers up a steep trail, through eucalyptus and bamboo forests and past massive banyan trees.

The next day, I somehow managed to convince Jude to try an introductory SCUBA dive, although for some unknown reason she seemed to warm up to the idea much more after she met the Dive Instructor, Patrick.

She did great and overcame her fear of sharks (due to watching the movie "Jaws" too many times) and became comfortable under the water and was able stay under for quite awhile, following Patrick around like a little puppy.

I am including this short video of a Spotted Moray Eel just for Li as I know how much she loves eels! If you listen closely you can hear the whales calling to one another!

That night we stopped to watch the sunset and saw a father and daughter fishing while standing on the edge of some shoreline fish pools that were built about a hundred years ago.

That's about it for Hawaii. On Saturday we fly to the land down under to begin the second phase of our adventure. We leave Maui with mixed emotions as we have had such a fabulous time here. But we know it's only a farewell not a goodbye as we will return one day!

Diving on Lana'i and the Luau

I have to write about our diving trip to the Island of Lana'i to a site called Cathedral I. It was Amanda and Nick's first 2 dives after being certified, their first in the ocean and their first in warm water.


We went with a company called Extended Horizons and our guide, whose name was Maren, did a really great job of showing us many different types of Marine life including the Ghost Shrimps below. These are nocturnal and we found them inside a cave which was another first for Amanda and Nick.

We also found a Tiger Moray eel with strange markings, large spots over most of it's body and smaller spots on it's head.

Later on another Moray Eel popped it's head out to have a look at us and I managed to get the camera in for a close up without loosing any fingers.

Here is a video of our group swimming along enjoying all the marine life. Maren carried an underwater whiteboard which she used to point out things like a sea turtle eating a jellyfish, weird little sea slugs which are only found around Hawaii, raccoon butterfly fish and an octopus.

I also got a video inside the Cathedral so you could see why it's called that. The light streaming through the holes in the lava rocks make it look like stained glass and there were other unusual fish inside of the lava tube cave.

After Jess headed back to Victoria, we went to a traditional luau with the roasted pig, hula dancers and all that. We were given fragrant leis when we walked in and the show started right around sunset with a beautiful pink sky as a background.

Most of the cast and servers are native Hawaiians and Judy seemed to have no trouble making friends with the guys. She seemed to really like their authentic costumes, tats and the dancers muscles!

Of course I didn't mind posing with the Hula dancers as well in their grass skirts and coconut bras. I couldn't help but notice that some coconuts were bigger than others for some reason.

Here is a video of one of the traditional native dances. The announcer told us the whole story behind it all but I can't seem to remember much of the details. That may have been due to the Mai Tai drinks (but they still weren't as good as Nick's, right Roy!)

I thought Charles would appreciate a closer video of the Hula girls shakn' their booty

As we headed back to the condo this afternoon we were treated to a rainbow in the hills right behind us and reminded again what a magical place Hawaii is.

Fun in Maui

I got some feedback from my Mom that she wants to see more people pictures and less fish pictures so I thought I would start off with something she also hates : the Superbowl, especially when it's in Tampa (which is close to where they spend the winter). We spent the day at the beach on Superbowl Sunday so we held our own game while we could hear the crowds cheering in the bars just off the beach.


Here is a shot of Nick going for a pass and Amanda trying to defend. Nick seems to be having problems keeping his eyes on the ball in this picture for some reason.

Here is Nick going for the over the shoulder pass, just like in the touchdown Pittsburgh scored to win the Superbowl. Tim A., was there more winners or losers at your party with that spectacular play with 35 seconds remaining?

Just like Santonio Homes on the play previous to the game winning catch, Nick drops the ball!

Here I'm showing Nick how it's done, stretching out to make the play. See Nick how easy it is if you only focus on the ball and not let your eyes wander (but thats just a Dad talking)!

That same night we got changed and went out to take some sunset portrait shots. Almost every sunset on West Maui is gorgeous and dozens of people stop along the road to watch the sun go down every night.

Here is a great shot of the kids when they were behaving and not trying to throw each other into the ocean.

One night, we toured around the town of Lahaina and the girls got a great portrait done by an artist who works right off the sidewalk downtown. Every girl walking by stopped to watch and say how nice the portrait was and every guy walking by said I was a lucky man.

No matter where you look in Hawaii there are flowers blooming everywhere. On the side of the road, in gardens and next to the rivers.

Even exotic flowers like the bird of paradise are found everywhere.

Once we stopped for lunch at the Kanaha Beach park, because it's only 3 blocks from downtown Kahului (the main town that has the airport, shopping malls etc.) and watched the Kite Surfers out on the bay.

I'm not sure who has more guts, the surfers when the big waves are out at "Jaws" or the Kite Surfers when the wind is blowing and they fly 40 feet off the water, but both are fun to watch.

At the end of the day we usually head back to the condo to catch the sunset. Here is a view from our balcony towards the island of Lana'i as the sun drops behind the clouds.

Finally we ended another great day in the sun with yet another incredible sunset as we sipped our wine and toasted to a vacation we will remember for a long time.