Sydney Australia

The Cafe served a Greek dinner the night before arriving in Sydney. I loved it!

I had some lamb (dah!), moussaka, pita bread, halloumi cheese (on the tomato) and olives. Later I had a spanakopia (spinach in a filo dough).

There was also a special person who joined us at the naughty table in the cafe. Ilhan is a lady with a PhD. in linguistics. I can’t say I really understand the definition of linguistics versus being a linguist of languages. I told her I studied French, Latin and Arabic. We had an interesting conversation. I was fascinated.

Now on to today.

We set the alarm so we could watch us sail into Sydney Harbor.

Spectacular!

Later we took an excursion to the world-famous Bondi Beach. Crowded!

Eden, Australia

Our excursion took us to 3 places just as unknown as Eden. The first stop was Merimbula Lake. This is an oyster farming area.

Then another town. I forget the name. This time we went to the whale museum.

This is what’s left of Old Tom.

Later in the day we had a special Greek Dinner in the Cafe. Another blog will explain.

Happy Valentines Day – at sea

The sunset was special. Then at 9PM Viking put on a musical performance for Valentines Day

The rest of the day was lazy. Some reading, listening to a few lectures and dinner. Their was a large cake decorated for the day.

Ballarat Wildlife Park

Basically this was a zoo with local Australian animals. The kangaroos roamed wild and were very numerous.

Of course, there were koalas. A professional photo cost AU$50. About $36. We didn’t do it. I took this photo.

Probably the best story was the tiger. They feed the tiger at one specific time each afternoon so that the crowd can gather and watch the event. Just prior to the time staff set some raw meet at certain places in the second part of the cage. Then the door opens and the tiger knows what to do.

There were more animals like Tasmanian Devils, Cassowaries and Emus.

Don’t worry. I did eat dinner after we returned to the ship.

Philips Island

We are not lost at sea. The internet hasn’t been very good while at sea and not much happened.

Today we took an excursion to what is called a Penguin Parade. These Little Penguins (their name somehow) have a home burrow on land and then go to the ocean to feed. They have a dark blue head and back with a white belly and are about 12 inches tall. According to the web there are about 32,000 of this type. After some extended time at sea eating small fish, they return home. But they are too scared to waddle across the open beach by themselves. So they gather into a group called a “raft” and get home together. It is called a Parade. They do this at dusk. No cameras are allowed because the flash scares them. I took a photo of a raft from the web. This was very similar to one of the rafts we saw.

The site is all set up with bleachers, a shop and restaurants. The bleachers can hold 4,000 people. It wasn’t quite full. But our ship had over 700 viewing this and there were far more people.

We returned to the ship at 11PM and fell asleep.

Hobart, Australia

We sailed across the ditch as the New Zealanders and Australians like to say. That meant we had some rainy and rocky days at sea. The internet wasn’t very strong.

Today we were in Hobart along with many others. This day was Australian Wooden Ship Day and the Hobart Royal Regatta Day. It was crowded everywhere.

As we sailed away we saw the cliffs and a lighthouse.

For dinner I had a scallop pot pie and a Cornish chicken leg with some veggies.

We did take an excursion to Runnymeade House. Lots of history and period furniture from around 1840.

We were scheduled to sail into Milford Sound and then later into Doubtful Sound. Well, the weather didn’t agree with that. The Captain decided to try Doubtful first and see if the weather improves.

I turned around just after we entered the Sound and saw an almost blue sky. As we sailed we saw waterfalls.

But the weather kept getting worse. The clouds gathered!

And soon we had rain.

Eventually we went to Milford Sound.

Day at Sea. Heading towards Milford Sound

The cafe had a special decoration at the bread counter.

Then at dinner the cafe had whole roasted sheep. Lamb for dinner another time.

Dessert was a pavlova with a small chocolate pudding. Kathy and I shared this plate.

Now we have the challenge ahead with some rocky seas and rainy weather.

February 6, 2023

Last night after dinner we had a spectacular view of the moon out the aft of the ship.

Then today we took and excursion around Wellington. Our driver/guide pointed out a special tree still in bloom that they refer to as a Christmas tree. Generally they are in bloom at Christmas, not now. This one goofed.

Our excursion took us to the Botanical Gardens.

I will only add the one photo out of many. It is called Old Port. I love Old Port Wine!

We saw the wind turbine on the hill. Last time we went to it.

February 5, 2023

Napier had a huge earthquake in 1931 that destroyed much of the city. When they rebuilt much of it was done in an Art Deco style since that was popular at that time. And they have preserved many cars of the time. They are proud of that era.

Our excursion was to 2 of the many wineries of the area. The issue we had was it was a local holiday with fantastic weather. So, the wineries were crowded with people from the ship and many many locals.

Dinner in the cafe was amazing. There was a huge pan of paella, lamb gyros, and a modified version of our chicken and cashew salad. Ours includes diced mango. They modified it to use bell peppers instead of the mango. Probably they had no mangoes on board.