Sydney, Jan., 2019

We arrived  in Sydney Harbor around 7Am on our ship.  It was a very pretty entrance. We passed the Opera house and went under the historic bridge and left the ship for good and went to our hotel. We went to a big name hotel expecting great things there, but we a little disappointed.  The public areas were a little odd but in very good condition, but the rooms seemed like they were from the 1970's. However, it was ok.  We learned that they plan to renovate the rooms later in the year by shutting down for a few months, which is probably what it would take to avoid irritating a lot of customers.

 After checking in we walked to the Opera House and took a tour that was very good. It was the last one for the day or close to that as we thought it would be interesting to see the place in the dark if we could find dinner.  They allow photography in areas where they are not set up for a performance and there were lots of interesting spots.

We had dinner at a superb restaurant that is right at the opera house. We learned that there is a video show on surfaces of the opera house at night- two performances and we were told where to stand to get a good view.  It was worth the wait for the show. It was a spectacular series of moving and evolving images of aboriginal art and stories.

The next day we visited the main art museum. It was a bit crowded, but not bad and a great view of lots of art of various origins, but we mostly wanted to see aboriginal art. There were lots of examples. The Brisbane Museum was very good and this one was as well.

It rained a bit in the afternoon as we walked back to the hotel.  We took a taxi to a restaurant area in the early evening and then walked back to the hotel in the evening.
The next day we took a ferry to the Zoo. There was a huge line of people waiting to ride the skyway to the top and we were unhappy about that and concluded there must be another way up. We met an old woman who was there to aid visitors and she said we could take a bus. Apparently, one is supposed to pay for all this a head of time, but the bus driver let us go for free.  We found people were very understanding of tourists who are not familiar with the systems.  The zoo was very nice, but we were both a bit tired of crowds - it was a holiday season- and Summer too! We got to see more of the unusual ( to us) animals of Australia.

Janet went further on the ferry to a beach area while Jim went back to the city to walk around more. He discovered some intersting shops and Victoria  Mall or market. It was built long ago in Victoria's period, and has a very pleasant old time feel.  There is one shop for someone who makes shirt collars. Most other shops are more modern styles.  Its a beautiful old building that has been well maintained and carefully updated to keep the old charm.
It was around this time that we changed our flights home. Knowing that Ziggy was not doing well and being tired of traveling, we changed flights. Our original plan was to go to Hawaii for 2 nights and see a little and break up the flights, but we chaged it to go to Honolulu and then catch a flight after a few hour layover to New York.
Our last day is spent mostly walking in an area where galleries are located. Some were open, some

not. Those that were open were interesting.  We walked and it was a bit hot. We took a break for light food and drink, but Janet took a mis- step on a hard- to- see step and fell, but, fortunately wasn't seriously hurt- just shaken up.  We found a book store and had coffee and then took a taxi back to town and then walked to the hotel.
The next day was a bit rainy, but we went to see a few places near the hotel and in the afternoon we flew to Honolulu and then New York where we rented a car and drove to the veterinarian's office to see Zoe and Ziggy and see that Ziggy was suffering and we had to let him depart.  
We got home and found it in good condition.  We replaced the 35 year old furnace last fall and it seemed to have kept the place warm! We came from middle of Summer to middle of Winter and that transition is a bit hard to deal with.

Cairns, Magnetic Island and Brisbane

We arrived in Cairns from Alice Springs on Dec. 29. It was rainy season and it was overcast most of the time in Cairns and we also had some very heavy rain. We got a little lucky in that it did not rain all the time so we could do some things. We walked about town a bit and found it a pleasant city. At night we went to a center set up for people to see and hear some aboriginal people talk abouttraditions and play some music. We had dinner after and tasted crocodile and kangaroo meat.

We walked across a wood bridge across a river to get to part of the show.  The next day we road near the place and saw how swollen the river was from all the rain. On that trip we were on a bus to Kuranda- a rather nice village that is mainly for tourists- lots of shops and eateries and galleries.  From Kuranda we boarded the sky ride that went over forests and ended near the place we were the previous night. The sky ride was pleasant but it was overcast and in the clouds much off the time.  We got off at one point to see a big water fall, but there was so much mist due to the huge volume of water (due to the rain) that we could not actually see the falls!    Our guide said they have seen higher water levels in the past, but it was awhile ago.   

The next day we were supposed to ride an old train on a scenic route, but were told it was closed due to land slides about 10 days earlier. We went to the aquarium in the city instead.  It was quite nice but crowded since it was a Sunday, but also a Holiday period.  
On New Years Eve Janet was to go snorkeling on part of the Great Barrier Reef, but the stormy weather made the sea to rough, so that was canceled.  We had a nice dinner on the ship that night.

New years Day was probably our most pleasing day in Australia. We signed up for a trip to Magnetic Island.  Apparently, James Cook noted that his compasses behaved strangely when his ships passed there in the late 1700's  and named the island accordingly.  We got a little tour of the island and then our guide took us through a residential area to a small grove of trees where we found 5 Koala's in the trees.  They were mostly sleeping, but they moved a bit. It looked like two were adults and 3wereyounger, but they each had their own tree. They were very cyte and it was good the see them free to go wherever they wanted.  We were told their biggest enemies are dogs and cars when they are not up in the trees. After this we went to a sanctuary which is really a small zoo. Here we got hold a koala female who was very cute and did not seem to mind too much.  We also got to pet a wombat! We could not remember ever seeing a wombat before.  He was quite big- we were told about 60 lbs!He was quite curious and wa slooking all around and seeing who was scratching his hip.  There is a cute video on the web titled "george the baby wombat"  it is quite cute.  Our wombat was full grown though, but still rather cute.
The next day was on a sail boat out to an island where Janet could snorkel while Jim just watched.
The next day was a day at sea on the way to Brisbane.
At Brisbane we visited a zoo where we saw more koalas, wallabies, birds, kangaroos and had a short stop at a park that overlooks the city.We got off the group bus in the city in order to visit the art museum and any shops that looked interesting.  The museum was very nice and free to visit. We saw lots of aboriginal art works that we liked and had a good lunch at the museum cafe.Afterthe museum we walked a mile or so to get on a shuttle bus that was making trips back and forth from our ship to the center of the city.
Our next day was at sea and then we arrived in Sydney.