mr walker

11 hours ago, NSWP said:

The Chocolate Soldiers done good. Too strong in first half. Our Mr Walker will be happy. A good game of rugby league to watch.

 

No doubt about it Penrith Panthers are a star side.

🏉

Yes Les, I’m very happy. The boys & I enjoyed our day/night at game & came home and enjoyed a quiet celebratory drink. Quiet day today including lunch with friends, including my mate who is a Parra supporter 😁

Penrith Panthers B2B!!!

4 hours ago, NSWP said:

Go the chocolate soldiers for Sunday.

Cheers mate - hoping for the boys to win.

our sons & I are going to the game to cheer them on!

On 9/24/2022 at 7:37 PM, NSWP said:

The gf bread on Coral last week was Horrible. So I bought a Helgas gf loaf in Coles in Melbourne and kept it in cabin fridge, took it to buffet and mdr. 

Always a thinker eh Les 🙂 

We received some excellent advice on a land tour, including particularly from Julie @OzKiwiJJ , ahead of our cruise (AKL to SYD) in Jan '19. We planned around visiting places we wouldn't visit on the cruise.

Based on the advice we flew into Christchurch & picked up rental. We stayed in ChCh , Mt Cook, Queenstown (3N), Franz Josef, Westport, Picton, crossed Cook Straight to Nth Island on the ferry, & stayed at Tongariro (2N), Waitomo & then Auckland ahead of the cruise. All accommodation & car rental was arranged thru a NZ tour company, which worked well for us.

So 12N for maybe 2/3 of Sth Island & 1/4 of Nth Island. We made the most of the time, but another week at least would have been better.

Good luck - it is a wonderful place to visit.

Another recommendation for Zealandia from Tauranga.

On 9/20/2022 at 10:12 AM, MicCanberra said:

Sydney on Thursday 

They’ve put on a public holiday for your return

😳

13 hours ago, queenslander said:

I also met ex neighbours and people I have previously cruised with. I enjoyed meeting Julie and Rolf who invited me to join them for drinks tonight in Crooners bar. I met Les at lunch and also Mic and Rosie on a tour.

 

Looks as if you met the important people then! 🙂 

We have also met the same people before - well perhaps not your ex neighbours. 🙂 

2 hours ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

We went to Sabatinis for dinner and had a lovely evening. I was celebrating a milestone birthday and was delighted when the Club Class Head Waiter came up to Sabatinis to to wish me happy birthday. After our main course our waiter placed dessert spoons and forks on the table. I didn't quite click until he also put empty plates in front of us and I saw all the waiters converging on our table. It was really lovely and the yummy chocolate mousse cake they presented me with was a delicious ending to our meal. It was much nicer that the mud cakes they used to have.

Happy birthday Julie. Cheers Neil & Tracey🥂

16 minutes ago, NSWP said:

Just checked into Marriott, nice vew of Opt forthe morning.

Enjoy your cruise mate - Tracey & I are sure you will have a great time. We expect to see photos of your ‘proper’ breakfasts 😁 Cheers

For those of you embarking over the next month or so - enjoy!!!! For those boarding today it’ll be good to escape this miserable weather.

I am thinking to maybe surprise Tracey with Majestic Princess 11N QLD coastal Oct 20. As most know, we normally are ‘Royal’ but we did enjoy Sun Princess in 2017. 
 

Thoughts? It just seems a long wait until Ovation to NZ in March!

53 minutes ago, Mareblu said:

Maybe he’s on that trip to Eden he had to postpone after his accident.  Les?

I was thinking that also. I saw that a ship was to be in Eden on Wed. Unfortunately the only way for me to contact him is on here.

He’ll be happy we are thinking of him

37 minutes ago, Blackduck59 said:

So it's my birthday on Tuesday but Spitfire only makes this on Sunday 

 

Happy Birthday for Tuesday - still hoping to catch up with you downunder one day 🙂 

On 8/19/2022 at 12:32 PM, springaussie said:

A peak Tasmanian tourism body is calling for a five-year ban on large ships docking in the Apple Isle.

“We don’t believe Tasmania is suitable for these new generation mega-ships” Daniel Leesong, the chairperson of the

Tourism Industry Council Tasmania (TICT), said.

The organisation wants to restrict the number of tourists arriving on cruise ships every day.

With close to 5,000 passengers aboard, these ships are too big for the ports they are docking at, he said at the 2022 Tasmanian Tourism Conference.

13 hours ago, arxcards said:

I think they need to be careful what they wish for. Lots of small ports struggle with 5000 passengers. Hobart isn't one of them.

Not sure if I was a Tourism operator in Hobart I'd be too happy with that

On 8/17/2022 at 1:53 PM, Chiliburn said:

Your my only mate on this forum and sometimes I’m not to sure on that.

On 8/17/2022 at 2:58 PM, gbenjo said:

And with good reason. 😂

I thought we were all mates on here 🙂 

11 hours ago, arxcards said:

....... people using the shazam app on their phones to tell them what songs and artists are being played for music trivia questions. All for a ship on a stick or a luggage tag, trivia is getting lame.

3 hours ago, MicCanberra said:

Agreed, it is not using your personal knowledge if using the internet 

Yes, cheaper(??) & reliable wi-fi on the ships has sure led to cheats at trivia. For music ones, the cheats give themselves away when they request repeatedly to "play #3 again" at the end as they struggle to get the device to recognise the song/artist.

Some 'quizmasters' have used a less well-known artist's version of a song at times, and this often will catch out the app 🙂 

Anyway, we play for our own entertainment & interest - scores by others are irrelevant in that instance.

20 minutes ago, GUT2407 said:

Since having to retire (again) my everything fund is empty. I keep saying to herself “We really must remember to win lotto this week.

 

18 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

We tried that last night. It didn't work! 😪

We gambled $10 on last nights jackpot. Woke up this morning to email saying "Congratulations, you're ticket won a prize". Scrolled down "You're ticket winnings - $8.15"!!!!!!!! Nett loss $1.85, so no $54K cruise 🙂  Baked beans on toast for lunch today 😉

3 hours ago, lyndarra said:

They've moved on - to the good ship Barilledover.

and the rainbow jerseys

On 7/26/2022 at 3:03 PM, MicCanberra said:

Love Garlic, really good for keeping away coughs and colds, vampires and people from getting too close.

Never had any trouble with vampires, so it must work 😳

20 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

Hmmm, definitely need to win Lotto for that one! But it sounds like a really interesting itinerary. It even stops at Bateman's Bay so everyone can visit Les.

Group booking at Raymonds 🙂 Or ship's excursion of a round of golf & lunch with Les at Catalinas. Non-golfers can visit Mogo zoo 🙂 

Yes, would be a lottery win required for us, or a year or two living on baked beans on toast

On 7/20/2022 at 12:58 PM, NSWP said:

For you mob doing some far south coast travel in NSW the Bega cheese visitor Centre has reopened after a two year closure. Good opportunity to visit also for cruise ship pax at Eden.

Hi Les, we may get to visit Bega cheese in a few weeks. Our good friends from here are housesitting for their daughter in Merimbula & they’re invited us to join them. It will be around mid-August & we’ll try & visit Bateman’s Bay on that trip 

Thanks to all for your kind thoughts. I have spoken with my sister this morning & they have accepted an offer from the company and the trip is re-scheduled to Oct 2023. Hopefully that will all work out for them. With that trip added in to their '23 schedule, the will be away for most of 2023 🙂 

If it's not one thing it's another.

My sister & BIL retired a little while back and had a whole series of travels arranged (land & sea) in Nth America & Europe which were all impacted by COVID. They got some money refunded, some as credits and some they will likely never see.

Move on and arrange a month in Europe from next week, the main feature being river cruise. Part of their trip was already changed due to situation in Ukraine. My sister has already started packing, and they get a call from TA - due to the low river levels the river cruise cannot go ahead, so they can still do the trip by bus! Not what they were wanting, so trip is off again!!!

22 minutes ago, NSWP said:

Nothing like a bit of rock and roll on the high seas.

A little motion on the ocean as they say 🙂 

3 minutes ago, Chiliburn said:

......don’t forget some seafood or a scallop pie.

on our visit to Hobart in 2017, we had some very nice fish & chips for lunch just near to the dock. Yes I know we could have had free lunch on the ship just be walking a few hundred metres, but we just wanted some fresh fish & chips. I think it was called Flippers take away (they had tables and chairs to eat at), & I don' t think it was dolphin 🙂 

23 minutes ago, Docker123 said:

Don’t forget Mawson’s Hut museum, just on the wharf.

 

from memory. Uncle Les' son is involved in that