Dave’s Trip To, Around and Into Australia, Sept. 26 – Nov. 23, 2016

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 14, Dravuni Island (Cont.)

 

 

Tonight’s dinner featured a favorite again – prime rib. Here are the dinner and dessert menus:

 

 

 

 

 

 

DW and I had the same things For starter, we had the mushroom and wild rice soup, which was excellent, and reminded us of the four mushroom soup from past cruises. For main, we had the prime rib, rare. For dessert, we both decided to have the rocky road ice cream.

 

 

More later,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 15, at sea

 

 

Today we have a sea day before visiting Mystery Island tomorrow. We set our clocks back again last night, and now are only one hour ahead of Sydney time. Here are the first four pages of the On Location:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More in the next post,

Dave

Edited October 14, 2016 by RetiredMustang

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 15, at sea (Cont.)

 

 

Here are the other two pages of the On Location:

 

 

 

 

More later,

Dave

[Mtn2Sea]

Photos weren't coming in for me this morning, but now they are. Great pics!

[kazu]

Oct. 14, Dravuni Island (Cont.)

 

 

We were among the first to reach the top (a family with a boy of about 10 beat us). At the viewpoint, there were some rocks (some with graffiti on them), and some poles that had been erected, but I couldn’t discern why.

 

The views from the top were indeed excellent. Here are some of the many photos I took, and one that DW took of me to prove that I really did make it. O.K., I admit that I am sitting on a rock, and gasping for air, but I made it:

 

 

 

 

More in the next post,

Dave

 

Congrats on making it :)

 

Nice to see a picture of the author of this fabulous thread :)

[themerle]

Congrats on making it :)

 

Nice to see a picture of the author of this fabulous thread :)

 

 

I totally agree!

[sunnydaze]

I'm sitting here on this rainy windy night, really loving your beautiful pictures. Thank you!!

[RetiredMustang]

Congrats on making it :)

 

Nice to see a picture of the author of this fabulous thread :)

 

 

Thank you (and themerle) very much. I been told by several people that they take one look at me and the names Orlando Bloom and George Clooney completely fail to come to mind. :D

 

Dave

[GUT2407]

Really enjoying this thread.

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 15, at sea (Cont.)

 

 

Reading some of your comments about not seeing the images on my blog reminded me that I had seen some little “x” boxes occasionally as well earlier in the day yesterday. But I don’t see how it could be connected with the internet signal on the ship, since both Photobucket and Cruise Critic are on servers located Not-On-Maasdam. Maybe the Photobucket servers took a hit or something. That might explain why I found Photobucket so balky this morning; perhaps they were just bringing the site back on-line. Whatever it was, I hope it doesn’t happen again.

 

Today was a lazy day for us, reading books, and relaxing. From about noon to two p.m. ship time, we were able to watch the first game of the Toronto Blue Jays vs. Cleveland Indians baseball game, which was enjoyable. We are hoping the ESPN International signal continues so we can watch some more baseball, and perhaps some U.S. football on at-sea days or other downtime.

 

The weather has been dreary and gray most of the day, but the sea is very calm. We hope the weather improves for Mystery Island tomorrow, but it may be that we won’t have very good weather, and probably we will not have the beautiful conditions we had yesterday at Dravuni Island.

 

Tonight was the third gala evening of this cruise; there is another scheduled before we reach Sydney. If our documents were correct when it said seven total for the 52-day collector’s cruise, there will only be three gala nights on the Australia circumnavigation. Here is tonight’s combined dinner and dessert menu:

 

 

 

 

DW started with the tomato soup, while I had the shrimp cocktail. She had the filet mignon for main, and I had the crab legs. For dessert, she had the chocolate cheesecake and I had the lemon mousse torte. All were great.

 

 

More later,

Dave

Edited October 15, 2016 by RetiredMustang

[Karennella]

Is it Thursday that you arrive in Sydney? The weather today has been stunning. I hope it is the same for you next week. It should be a good time to arrive, the kids went back to school this week, ha ha, but it seems very busy everywhere andI am not sure why! Must be spring fever.

[obriendan]

The pictures did not show up when first posted but later they did come through.

 

Enjoying your posts tremendously! All of us "left behind folks" will be joining you soon in Sydney:)!!

 

Dan

Edited October 15, 2016 by obriendan

[RetiredMustang]

Is it Thursday that you arrive in Sydney? The weather today has been stunning. I hope it is the same for you next week. It should be a good time to arrive, the kids went back to school this week, ha ha, but it seems very busy everywhere andI am not sure why! Must be spring fever.

 

 

Yes, we are due at White Bay on Thursday, 20 October.

 

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

The pictures did not show up when first posted but later they did come through.

 

Enjoying your posts tremendously! All of us "left behind folks" will be joining you soon in Sydney:)!!

 

Dan

 

Thanks! See you in a few days.

 

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 16, Mystery Island

 

 

Today, we are scheduled to visit Mystery Island (Anelgowhat, Vanuatu). I hope the winds and weather allow us to do so.

 

 

Here are the first four pages of today’s On Location:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More in the next post,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 16, Mystery Island (Cont.)

 

 

Here are the other two pages of the On Location:

 

 

 

 

And, here are the Explorer pages about Mystery Island:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More later,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 16, at sea

 

 

Well, Mystery Island will remain a mystery to us, as the Captain has cancelled the visit. He brought the ship close to check conditions, but at about 7:30 a.m., the ship headed back to sea. The captain came on the announcing system and told us he was cancelling for safety reasons – there was too much swell at the island’s pier, winds and seas would have required him to let out too much anchor chain to prevent dragging, and the seas were already two meters and forecast to be higher later today. In short, not safe for tendering.

 

The ship scrambled to come up with alternate activities for the day, and at about 9 a.m., new revised On Locations were distributed to our mail boxes. Here is the new On Location, which was printed on one large sheet, but which I have split into four segments for readability:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More later,

Dave

[erewhon]

Sorry you missed Mystery Island.

 

I noticed that early dining was changed to 5.15 on the second "On Location", was that correct?

[easyboy]

Really enjoying your live report. Still following.

[RetiredMustang]

Sorry you missed Mystery Island.

 

I noticed that early dining was changed to 5.15 on the second "On Location", was that correct?

 

Actually, no. We went a bit early in case, but the doors did not open until a couple of minutes before 5:30, as usual. We suspect that, in their haste to get a revised On Location out, they copied and pasted something from an earlier cruise, like the Alaska runs they did just before this sailing. In short, something probably got upgesrewt.

 

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 16, at sea (Cont.)

 

 

The weather was pretty dreadful all day, with heavy sea swells and winds blowing the tops off the waves. But it slowly got a bit better, and near sunset we could even see some breaks in the clouds. The forecast is for improving conditions tomorrow, and quite nice actually for the rest of the voyage to Sydney. We actually spent a good part of the morning and early afternoon watching the U.S. baseball playoff games and oh=therwise generally being slugs.

 

We found that tonight was another of those hokey theme dinners, this time pirates. The MDR staff was dressed in pirate hats and those horizontal striped shirts they used to wear in Canaletto. Here is a photo of Ronny, our assistant steward, in the typical garb:

 

 

 

 

I may be a bit weird (DW’s response: “No doubt!”), but I had visions of Venetian gondoliers rampaging and pillaging each others’ boats on the Grand Canal, and shouting things like “Eh! Que Fa ye mateys! Arrr-issimo.”

 

Here are the MDR dinner and dessert menus:

 

 

 

 

 

 

DW had the andouille and Swiss chard soup, which she reported as being excellent, as have been all soups we have encountered on HAL. I had the mixed greens. For main dish, we both had the roasted chicken, which was moist and delicious. For dessert, she had basic vanilla ice cream, while I opted for the strawberry sorbet. We both agreed that we may be in the minority, but we find the crème brulee to be pretty bland/tasteless. It is basically a flan, of which we are not fans. Maybe if they floated it in a plate of Grand Marnier instead of just adding a dash, we might find it tastier .

 

 

More later,

Dave

[Krazy Kruizers]

Sorry that you had bad weather and missed Mystery Island. But it is better to be safe and than sorry.

[Krazy Kruizers]

Sorry that you had bad weather and missed Mystery Island. But it is better to be safe and than sorry.

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 17, Noumea

 

 

Today we are supposed to dock at Noumea, New Caledonia. We had booked an early afternoon tour of the city, including the aquarium. We are glad we booked instead of making our own way to the aquarium, as we have been told it is normally closed on Mondays and will only let in the organized tour group.

 

Here are the first four pages of the On Location:

 

 

 

 

 

 

More in the next post,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Oct. 17, Noumea (Cont.)

 

 

Here are the other two pages of the On Location:

 

 

 

 

And, here are the Explorer pages about Noumea:

 

 

 

 

 

 

More later,

Dave