I’ve decided that blogging using satellite WiFi is not good. My posts for the rest of my cruise will follow after leaving the ship. Items to follow include:
A Koala stole the heart of Mrs Me
Memories of a Memorable Day (Our Wedding)
The Final Frontier
King Neptune – Will He or Won’t He?
Singapore, Land of Wonder
Plus pictures
Clearly, [slightly] misleading; or is it?
The one thing that Debbie really hates is the cold. Even walking round the cold isles in a supermarket will turn her fingers white where the circulation has stopped resulting in agony when the blood does finally return. I have no idea what the cause is or if anything can be done to address it other than to wear gloves, which she clearly does when outside, though even then gloves are not enough.
Stick with me, this will all come together….
Around the beginning of 2013, I asked Debbie, “If I asked you to marry me, would you say yes”. Much to my delight, her response was ‘Yes, of course I would’. Brilliant I thought, when the times right, I’ll propose, safe in the knowledge that I won’t be rejected. 🙂 I know, I’m an old romantic.
Anyway, not long after that we were looking through our favourite magazine, the P&O Cruise Brochure when I pointed out a cruise that went from New Zealand to Singapore that actually included Adelaide (where her Son Matt went to Uni’ for a while and won a big cycle race). I also pointed out that it was likely to be warm (hot) for most, if not all, of the cruise. Better still, it had many, many sea days, which would allow us to rest & relax. It was however quite a long trip extending to close on 23-days. We just knew however that this was the cruise for us. So, we booked it.
Shortly after that when out for a meal in our local, I decided that the time was right and asked her, properly, if she would marry me. To my great relief, she stuck by what she said and agreed. A few drinks later we started to discuss possible dates when almost simultaneously we suggested getting married at sea and where better than when on the cruise round Australia. That was it: a done deal. A wedding at sea it would be, with a party afterwards when we returned back home.
And today, is the day before that long awaited day. I was excited when she accepted my proposal of a proposal. I was excited when she accepted my proposal. I was excited when we both agreed to a wedding at sea. I’m still excited now.
But:
Ever since boarding the ship, Mrs Me has been constantly seeking the sun’s rays soaking, nay, drinking in the sun’s warmth and sitting there with a glazed looked about her and a smile of contentment. For sure, I just knew that Mrs Me would be happy here. And yet, this constant desire to seek out warmth, which brought about an apparent inner peace and self contentment made me wander whether or not everything was as it should be. I began to fear that maybe she was in fact a ‘Visitor’ from ‘V’. This would also explain why she was happy for me to be getting a little plump: A nice plump meal.
My fears were further reinforced when she started to shed her skin all over the balcony floor. How reptilian I thought. Maybe the marriage has an outcome I was not prepared for. Or:
Maybe I’ve been taking too many tablets with too much whiskey 🙂
Back to the land of reality, I continue to sit on the balcony quietly content in knowing that tomorrow, the title ‘Mrs Me’ will become official. I look forward to seeing that magical dress that was created and fitted within 7-days and 3-fittings. No doubt I’ll never know the true cost but I don’t really care. I look forward to having Jack as my Best Man and witness and Jill from our table to be our second witness. Most of all, I look forward to spending the rest of my life with Mrs Me (her real name’s Debbie by the way).
For those that are interested, the music I wanted for the ceremony was:
Happiness – Ken Dodd; Bring Me Sunshine – Morcambe & Wise; Unchained Melody.In the end however, we elected for:
Cantata from Fifty Shades of Grey; Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini; Unchained Melody.Until then however, I’m going to enjoy my last day of freedom and drink whiskey without being nagged.
Obviously, the title isn’t true. One of the attractions of cruising, apart of course from the variety of places one can visit in just one trip, is meting up with friends you haven’t yet met, and let’s be honest the worlds is full of such people but cruising seems to be able to bring such friendships to the fore. But, every once in a while something happens to make you think:
If it weren’t for passengers, Cruising would be brilliant
This morning in Melbourne was just one of those occasions, though the feeling passed by as soon as it came. But what caused such a feeling?
The cause was MyKi, Melbourne’s equivalent to Oyster!
To get into town from the where the boat was parked, we really did need to get a bus and/or tram. To do this we would have to obtain a MyKi card. This would cost $6 for the card(!) and $8 for a days worth of travel. The only place we could get a MyKi card was in the cruise terminal (unless you were prepared to walk all the way into town) and apparently, they only took cash. At this point, it’s worth pointing out that immediately after we had parked our boat, a Holland America boat came in and parked next to us. Each of the two ships held around 2500 passengers. Both ships were scheduled to be in Melbourne from 08:00 to 17:00 (ish). So everybody naturally wanted to get off early to get the most of their time in port. Can you imagine what it’s like when two ships disgorge their passengers together? That’s when I decided:
If it weren’t for passengers, Cruising would be brilliant
Obviously, not all 5000 passengers turned up at once, many went on excursions, many stayed on board and the rest staggered their departure time but nevertheless, queues were an inevitable outcome. After what seemed to me to an outrageously long time, we finally reached the pay desk; were asked if we wanted to pay by cash or card(!); elected for cash and obtained our cards, which, we were told, were valid for 4-years. So, if anybody wants a MyKi for getting round Melbourne any time in the between now and 2018, we have two J
Looking back, it wasn’t really that bad, if it took 20 minutes, it wasn’t really that big a deal.
Partly because of the passengers, Cruising is brilliant.
In due course, our ‘packed to the gunnels’ bus delivered us into town close to the river and train station. As we alighted we were met by a number of red topped tourist advisers who took time to explain on a map where we were and asked if the was anything we anted to see in particular. I think to myself, ‘I’ll get him here’ and asked where the nearest camera shop was. Straight away, he marked it on the map, explained how the Mall was close by and also where we would be able to get the tram back to the ship. He also mentioned that if we got lost or needed more information to look out for other groups of advisers in red tops and hats that are stationed around the town at major intersections. Now that, London, is how to look after your tourists/visitors.
As instructed, we made away along Collins Street and then up Elizabeth Street and sure enough we came across the camera shops and $300 later, I left with a shiny new wide-angle lens. Naturally, having spent so much money on myself, this was a green light to the future Mrs Me to spend at least twice that on shiny sparkly things, but first, she wanted a pair of Ugg Gloves – why not, it was after all [well] below 80°
For the records, the Ugg Gloves were followed by one Australian Opal ring, one Clogau Necklace and one pair of Clogau earrings. No doubt the remaining bracelet will join the collection in due course. She did however treat me to a pair of Calvin Klein socks!
Anyway, back to my lens buying experience. Having sourced the lens and left the shop we continued back towards the river, or that’s what we would have been doing had we left by the same door as the one we entered, which we now know we didn’t. Doh. Eventually, we realized something was amiss; the sun being in the wrong place was the clue. We looked at our map and worked out that we were at the intersection of Collins Street and Queens Street: we therefore continued down Collins Street to the next junction, which was also an intersection with Collins Street and Queens Street. This confirmed it; we were lost, disorientated and confused. Now, I don’t mind admitting that sometimes, I can be a little bit clever. I worked out that the river to be down rather than up the hill so we continued down Collins Street J, until we saw going back up. I gave in. I did what us blokes hate to do. I asked for help. I asked for help from what turned out to be a very helpful traffic warden who said we should cross over, continue down the next left, cut through an arcade, turn right and we would be there.
While in the arcade of course, Mrs Me naturally smelled out a shop with things we needed, like a sterling silver coaster with a koala on it, a glass koala, a postcard with a koala and a pewter koala. Finally, we got out of the arcade and reached the riverside where we now needed a drink in what looked like quite a nice little Italian bar (those that know Mrs Me won’t be too surprised at that). Where we finally persuaded a little Italian Waiter to make a table for two on the Veranda. Our quiet little drink turned into wine, water, pizza and fries. And, very nice it all was. As with all good things, we finished our repast and made our way to the tram stop, stopping the check with people in the red tops and hats that we were going the right. At the tram stop, was a tram travel assistant who kept us up to date with the progress of the tram. As the arrival time drew near, it was clear that passengers from both ships were heading back at the same time. Boarding the tram was a bit like boarding the Northern or Circle Line in the rush hour and we were all on it to the end of the line. This did of course mean that we all arrived at security at the same time. This was however where Mrs Me’s cunning plan fired into action and stopped at the Australian Opal store to purchase said Australian Opal Ring. By which time the crowd was but a few stragglers. And so, on to the ship, up to the cabin, pour a drink and relax before dinner where we announced to our table friends that we were to be married by the Captain and asked if they would be happy to be our witness. Their excitement for us was apparent and jumped at the chance. So much so that they started to work out what they would have wear (more on that after the big day). Dinner itself was itself its normal satisfactory affair before Mrs Me and I retired for a quiet drink in the Crows Nest before retiring.
It was in the Crows Nest that we Met Jack (our future best man and nearly 80 years young) and his sister, Joy (86 years young). They both asked us to join them for a drink to celebrate our forthcoming marriage, as Joy was to be leaving the ship two days before hand. Well, one drink led to another and before we knew it, it was 1 o’clock in the morning and both Jack & Joy were just a little bit tipsy. So we found ourselves escorting two wobbly octogenarians back to their cabin so as to make sure they were both ok.
Then, it was time for bed for ourselves. Next Stop, Adelaide…..
And we were only there for two days and a night.
This is an epic: I make no apologies: Sydney is, after all an epic city.
After three days and nights at sea, it was good to make land, in fact we were ecstatic – God alone knows (and the world cruisers) how we would have been after 8 days and nights at sea – Better still, the land we made was Sydney: we’d waited so long for this day, although the preceding day of blue, blue skies and an unbelievably flat Tasman Sea made the wait so much more tolerable: yet we were here. We had actually arrived at Sydney, Australia; the other side of the world.
We awoke, yes unbelievably the ‘we’ stands for both Mrs Me as well as me, at 05:00 to watch us sail into Sydney Harbour and: seeing for our first time, Sydney Harbour Bridge & Sydney Opera House ‘in the flesh’ an emotional moment it surely was.
When we booked this trip so many moons ago, we immediately booked an excursion through P&O to see an Opera in the Opera House, even though we didn’t know which one it was going to be. As it turned out, the Opera was to be Carmen, an Opera we had seen & loved twice before; once in the Verona Arena (in Italian) and again in the the Royal Albert Hall in London (in English) so it was going to be interesting to see it again – in yet another iconic venue – and hear it in French.
Prior to our arrival in Sydney, the Captain explained that we could only park where we were going to park (opposite the Opera House) if we arrived very early or late so as to avoid the rush hour. The reason became apparent almost as soon as we’d parked and tied the boat to the side with all it’s strings. Immediately in front of us were the ferry piers with boats of all sizes coming to drop off its cargo of commuters and tourists and to collect the next batch. This went on all day with the mix of commuters and tourists adjusting according to the time of day. Some boats were small little water taxis carrying no more than a dozen passengers while others were huge great big buggers that looked like small ships. At any one time, there was on average 4 coming in and 4 going out, constantly, all day long. No wonder we had to come in early.
Once we satisfied ourselves that we had parked correctly and was tied up nice and secure, Mrs Me and I went for breakfast where we (sorry, She) planned what we were going to do for the day. After much discussion, which consisted of Mrs Me discussing and me nodding my head, we agreed to just wander around the immediate vicinity, explore the area called the Rocks, find somewhere to drink, look for Australian Opals, find somewhere to eat, walk around Circular Quays, checkout the Opera House, find somewhere to drink, check ferry options for the next day, find somewhere to drink, watch the world go by then go back to the boat to get ready for the Opera. And, that’s exactly what we did. And having done it, we were hot and weary. So hot and weary in fact that we felt it necessary to return to our cabin early enough to allow us it sit and relax on our balcony, just watching Sydney’s hustle and bustle: we also felt it necessary to drink the bottle of champagne that had replaced the last one we drunk.
Point of information for P&O; if you keep putting champagne in our fridge, we’ll keep drinking it. 🙂
Our next decision point was what do we wear for the Opera. A quick scan of the various paperwork suggested that open neck shirt, jacket & smart trousers would be just fine. For Mrs Me something nice (anything she wears make it something nice though).
The next challenge was going from the ship to the Opera House, about 500 metres, or a 10 minute gentle stroll. But no, we were to be transported there by coach. With boarding time – an age in itself – and the drive, seemingly, round Sydney, the whole thing took around 30 minutes. Naturally, we elected to walk back after the Opera.
At last, we were in the Sydney Opera House. We made our way up 120 steps, only to espy an escalator as we reached the top, before making our way to the pre-show bar looking out across the harbour. We genuinely felt so lucky/privileged just being there, let alone being lucky enough to have tickets to see the [sell out] show. In fact, we felt it necessary to drink 2 or 3 more glasses of fizzy pop before going into the theatre. Once inside, we found our seats and waited while the theatre filled, with people wearing the full range of outfits, from full dinner suites and evening dresses to sandals, jeans & T-shirts. And all sorts in between, some of which, and I’m talking about the female variety here, were more than a little pleasing on the eye. ouch, leave my ear alone: it hurts. Anyway, they were, very pleasing on the eye indeed.
The lights went down, the orchestra sounded off and the Opera was on. And as it started, the story once again came flooding back, with Carmen as ever looking voluptuous ( ouch, my ear hurts again). In a way, the fact that the story was so familiar was good as the effects of close to a bottle of champagne and the heat of the day started to take its toll. But, with all credit to the cast and orchestra, and of course all those that made it happen, I did manage to stay awake for the whole show and yes, I enjoyed every bit of it. I think I may have a bit of a crush on Carmen but given what happens, it probably wouldn’t be a long lasting crush. Now, as I mentioned, I had seen Carmen in Verona, and there, they brought horses onto the stage. They didn’t in London nor did I expect them in Sydney, but they did. Even for part of the curtain call where the horse bowed in appreciation of the thunderous applause. Applause that was well deserved for all involved. And so the show ended, the Opera House emptied and we made our way, on foot, back to the ship, back to our cabin, back to our balcony, back to just one more drink before bed time.
I recommend all to see Carmen at least once.
The next morning we had a slightly later breakfast before returning shoreside to catch a ferry from Circular Quay, going under the Sydney Harbour Bridge, to Darling Harbour. From here we planned to walk around, via Paddy’s Market & China Town into Hyde Park and the Royal Batonical Gardens back to Circular Quay where would have a late meal so that we could enjoy the 9pm sail away (normally, we would be at dinner between 8:30 & 10:00).
We made Paddy’s Market in good time and immediately decided that Paddy’s Market was not a place that we would spend too much time. It certainly wasn’t our cup of tea. There then followed 10 minutes map reading for my part and questioning on the part of Mrs Me who was convinced I had the map the wrong way round (proof that women can’t read maps) – leave my ear alone woman – before admitting I was right and continuing into China Town, where we stopped to get a coke and jelly beans for Mrs Me who was starting to feel shaky and in need of sugar – nothing of course to do with the excess of champagne the night before! for gods sake, will you stop flicking my ear. Fully rested and watered we continued on to Hyde Park to visit the Anzac Memorial and then onto the fountain of remembrance.
From Hyde Park, we crossed over to the Royal Botanical Gardens. By now, we were starting to flag as the day got hotter (even the tar underfoot felt a little soft) and the exertions and excess of the previous day took its toll. Luckily, we found a small cafe where we could take on proper food and rehydrate ourselves properly. Had we been sitting in London, we would by now be pestered by pigeons but here in Sydney we saw but one solitary pigeon but there were loads of large (duck size) birds with long beaks like curlews. I don’t know what they were, perhaps they were curlews, but they were friendly and cute despite having the back of their heads looking a bit like a vulture. While the temptation was there, we resisted and kept all the food to ourselves.
By the way, as I’m writing this bit, we’re sitting in the Crows Nest enjoying a Singapore Sling , listening to a gaggle of women nattering and the clicking of their ‘knitting needles’ as we sail the Bass Straight between Australia and Tasmania on our way to ‘The Bite’ (which is supposed to be a bit like the Bay of Biscay) and subsequently, Melbourne.
Once again rested, we headed into the gardens proper which were stunning. Pictures I’m afraid will have to wait until we get WiFi that’s a bit quicker and more reliable that satellite. Without a doubt, there was a tropical feel about the place. It was very hot and extremely humid. In fact, it was so bad that when we ‘chanced’ on another cafe, we again felt compelled to site down a replace lost fluids. This time though, with beer :-).
While enjoying our beer’s I took the opportunity to photograph some of the wildlife. As before we were joined by what I now know to be Ibis’s, crows, moorhens and other things that I’ll never know the names of. Then, there was an almighty roar from above. No, it wasn’t a lion! It was an aerobatic team doing their stuff over the harbour. Wow, what a treat that was. I managed to get quite a few pictures, most of which were rubbish so you’ll have to take it from me, they were really good. After that, it was the last push to get back to the ship. On the way however, we strayed upon a tree filled with parrot type birds. Their flash’s of colours darting around over our heads. Brilliant reds, blues and yellows. Only seeing them for real can they truly be appreciated.
At last, we made the ship tired, achy and very, very hot. So hot in fact that we decided to forego the planned meal at Circular Quay and settle for Fish & Chips 🙂 by the pool before retiring to our cabin for the sail away, scheduled for 9 o’clock or 21:00 as us sea farers know it.
Just as we finished our fish & chips however, the sky became very angry, preceded by sudden strong winds and then, the sky opened and down came the rain. Did we care. Not one bit, we were in a sheltered part, by the bar, and anyway, the rain was warm. The rain triggered the need to close the roof over the pool, which turned the area into a something akin to a Sauna. That was our cue to retire.
Back in our cabin, we sat down on sheltered balcony to watch the rain and was now developing into an electrical storm. The lightening arced across the whole sky and moving forever closer. We saw the night bridge walkers quickly retreating from the top before the lightening got too close. The gulls, our forever friends in port went for cover. Then the thunder arrived, which given the immensity of the lightening was rather pathetic, and then, spookily, the allotted time arrived for us to depart. But, nothing happened. In fact nothing happened for at least half an hour. Then it was time; time to let go the strings. All the strings were eventually released and still the ship didn’t move – do we really need all those strings? After what seemed half an hour but probably only a couple of minutes, we were away. We slipped quietly away from the harbour (making lots of noise with the ships horn probably wouldn’t be appreciated by the locals) turned back into the main waterway and sailed out past the Opera House, setting course for Melbourne. I watched, Mrs Me now electing for bed, as we sailed out to sea until we dropped off the pilot at 22:19. Then, it was time for my bed as well.
ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzz
Was my mantra on my last cruise. On this cruise, I will be seeing far more sea though this time a little more exotic. Instead of seeing the Atlantic Sea, I’ll be see’ing the Tasman Sea and the Indian Sea.
So far, the Tasman Sea has come up trumps. The 1st two days were a bit bumpy but nothing to write home about (we even had some rain on day 2) but day 3 was flat, flat and flat again with the temperatures rising enough to burn both Mrs Me and Me :-). I’m sure however that the application of natural yoghurt to the affected areas will sooty us both. The use of yoghurt was recommended by a fellow passenger but I couldn’t be sure if he was having a bit of a giggle. So, alternatively, maybe we’ll just use after sun.
As for Sea; Sea; Sea! Nothing but Sea: had we joined the ship in Los Angeles, Sea would be all we would see for 8 whole days (not sure how I’d cope with that long without seeing land. Anyway, for us, Day 4 will bring Sydney and we will have to be up at 5 to enjoy the sail into harbour and park opposite Sydney Opera House. So, it’s an early night.
The Adventures of Podge & Tubbs 