For most of our three weeks in Eastern Australia, we were joined by our dear friends from Oregon, Doug and Colleen. Touring, fine dining, and late nights kept me from my blog. But now home in CT, I can catch up before taking a break for the summer.
We left New Zealand and spent three full days sailing across to Australia. The first day was real rough. Debra and I never get sea sick, so we actually enjoyed it – except for getting up 5 times in the night to secure cabinet doors, pick up olive oil bottles rolling across the kitchen floor, and otherwise trying to find what went “bump in the night” – or bang!
Because we have a nice deck on the bow of the ship, we held a “sail-in” party for some new friends from the ship when we arrived in the port of Sydney. The weather was perfect and the rising sun hit the city just as we passed it – a great start to a great country.
Doug and Colleen joined us the next day, so we took them on a seaplane tour of the City and landed on a pretty little lake in the hills. The scenery along the coast was beautiful. While on the lake, we had the most amazing lunch at the Sea Cottage Inn. It was so good we tried to pry the recipe’s from the young chef, but to no avail. Actually, eating at great local restaurants is a big part of Debra’s retirement plan and dining was a highlight of our time in Sydney and later, Brisbane. Our favorite was a small Italian place called Buon Ricordo. The food was beyond description, a must-do if you ever get to Sydney.
Having spent little time in this part of the world, we decided to go on a number of outings to experience the region. We toured a rain forest, saw beautiful flowers, kangaroos, koalas, kookaburras, and huge bats. Of course, when Doug saw a huge snake, he had to go play with it – I did NOT take that photo Colleen rode horses, and even a camel as it was on her bucket list and a trip to Egypt isn’t looking promising.
The sail out of Sydney Harbor was also spectacular.
After a stop in Brisbane, we sailed to Hamilton Island at the start of the Great Barrier Reef. We thought the place over-rated as a resort island, but did have a great day of golf on nearby Dent Island. The hills were so steep on the course they had seat belts in the golf carts!
The ship then island and city-hopped north along the reef to places like Airlie Beach, Nelly Bay, Port Douglas and Cairns (a local told us it’s pronounced “cayns – like beeya cayns”). The Great Barrier Reef covers an area that would stretch from California to Alaska. It can be seen from outer space. Doug and I went scuba diving at four different sites. I’ve been diving maybe 15 times in my life. Each time I enjoyed it for about 20 minutes, then got bored as the coral and fish all started to look the same. The dives off of Port Douglas were very different. The diversity of hard and soft coral, and the fish were stunning. After 45-minute dives in three different areas, I still didn’t want to come up. I’m sure you’ve all seen your fill of great underwater video – and I just had a cheap little underwater video camera, but I add some clips here just for our memories:
Those of you who know Doug, and what happens when we get together, probably wonder if we got kicked off the ship. Well, almost. Once a month or so, there’s a fancy dinner that requires a tux or dark suit. We decided to go – even though we thought retirement should excuse us from such attire.
It was a long, long multi-course meal with wine pairings and two vineyard heads competing for the longest introductions to each wine. By the time desert came, Doug thought the chocolate needed a “food face” pairing competition. We had to participate to keep him from making a scene.
We all really enjoyed Australia, what little we saw of it. It was a great time, especially to be shared with Doug and Colleen. Thanks for coming all the way from Oregon guys!
D & D Adventures 