Catching Up After Being Down-Under

OK, we know everyone has been waiting to see where we are next. It turned out to be very hard to keep our blog kept up while in Australia. Since we did not take a computer with us, just our phones and tablets, making updates became a challenge. I was able to make the previous post this way but, when I started on the next one, I decided this would have to wait.

So, the last post ended with us getting ready to meet up with our Australia tour in Melbourne. We arrived in Melbourne a day early so we got to learn our way around the city a little before our tour guide got there. A nice thing that they did not have in Sydney was a tram system. Sydney is building one and it caused a lot of the city to be dug up with construction sites but, the trams in Melbourne were nice to have. We had never really figured out the bus and train system in Sydney and we had to walk a lot to get to the trains, most of which was up hill. In Melbourne, not only did we have access to the trams right outside our hotel. but they are free within the central business district. Where we had to purchase a card to use the transportation in Sydney, we could get anywhere with in the main business district, which included the Queen Victoria Market. The market has a large retail vendor area, produce, meat, and many food vendors. We went there and bought Geoff a $5 Melbourne shirt, his first of many souvenir shirts for this trip.

Ellyn went to the Royal Exhibition Building for an AQS quilt show. There she met up with a couple of the women who were also scheduled to be on our cruise, which Ellyn found out has a who bunch of sewers on it. She had fun and Geoff headed back to the hotel early.

Finally, we met up with our tour and began guided site seeing in Australia. Our first stop was the site of the first jail in Melbourne, the Melbourne Gaol (a funny spelling but still pronounced “jail”). A grim and dark place, as I imagine most jails were. This is the ONLY way we want to experience one.

Then we took our second trip to the Queen Victoria Market in as many days and this time we ate lunch there and had our first “L&D” session. Our guide, Maree, challenged us nearly every day to do “learning and discovery” in our off time. We sat near some people with two little boys that were very close in age to our Oregon Grandsons, Oliver and Martin. It was fun interacting with their kids and seeing Australia from their point of view.

Our next day in Melbourne was a free day with no specific tours scheduled. We did a little self-guided touring around the downtown area and met up with our friends, Ken and Martha, to take a boat tour of the Yarra River. From here you could take in much of the architecture of Melbourne.

In the evening, we went to St. Kilda on the coast at sunset for dinner and then walked out on the pier to where the Fairy Penguins nest. There we could observe them under very subdued lighting, being careful not to disturb them or use any flash lighting. Pictures were very hard to get.

Next, our first group flight from Melbourne to Adelaide.Although we still have to be conscience of our baggage weight, we don’t have to bother with booking transportation to the airport or booking the flight, we just show up and the guide handles everything. Also, Australian commercial aviation security is a bit less stringent than in the states. We do not have to remove our shoes and we can take liquids through security. The flight from Melbourne to Adelaide is one of the shortest of our trip, only a little over an hour, hardly enough to enjoy a movie. But the weather is good and the flight is on time.

On arrival, our luggage is put into a small trailer attached to a tour bus and we head out on a tour of Adelaide and the surrounding towns. Our bus driver is very good at describing the area and we head up into the hill country to the Cleland Wildlife Park. There we enjoy another perk of guided touring, lunch is included and served as a buffet. Then we have a few hours to go out and tour the park. They have large open areas with kangaroos and wallabies and enclosed aviaries of the native birds. There are koalas too but they are mostly napping in the middle of the day.

When we left the animal park, the driver told us to watch the trees on the way back down to Adelaide for wild koalas sleeping. We did see a few of them. It is quite something for an American to see them in the wild, much as I suppose it might be a surprise for an Australian to see a squirrel.

This adventure continues in the next post.

Making Tracks

A lot has happened in the past two weeks. We have driven our RV over 3800 miles to the left coast and parked it in Gig Harbor, WA. Two American Airlines flights, 20 hours, and over 8000 miles later, we are in Sydney, AU, a land down under, and exhausted.

After checking in at the hotel, we have a mission. Although we got spotty sleep on the flight, we cannot allow ourselves to crash. The jet lag has to be defeated so we started exploring the Woolloomooloo district where we are staying.

We got maps from the bell desk and went looking for the water. It looked only about a ten minute walk away. Fifteen minutes later, we realize we went the wrong way. Oh well, we got to see the ANZAC Memorial, a revered

ANZAC Memorial

place here, and found a grocery store very close to our hotel where we got some needed supplies.

Finally, about 10pm Sydney time, about 44 hours since we woke up in our RV to start this adventure, it is time to crash. After a good eight hour sleep, we are refreshed and the jet lag seems to have dissipated. We have gotten Ellyn's cell phone onto the local phone system, with internet data to last us for the next three weeks, and we have gotten a pair of Opal cards to let us use the public transportation system.

Good to go, we plan a walking and train ride to the water front. Sydney Harbor is amazing! There is the bridge, the opera house, and lots of boats! There is a cruise ship tied up where ours will probably be in three weeks. Next, we got on a ferry and headed out to the zoo. The Taronga Zoo has many of the Australian animals we hope to eventually see in the wild on our tour. They also have many of the African

A Zoo with a View

animals you expect to see in a large zoo. We did a lot of walking and it is very hilly there but it was good to get back in shape a bit after all the sitting we did in the RV for those two weeks crossing the US.

Now we have one day to get our luggage sorted out before we fly to Melbourne to start the tour. It is still about 17 days until our cruise sets out, and we've got a lot more to see here in a land down under.

On the Road Yet Again

Ok, an early launch out onto the road for us this year. The short story is, we are off on a 40th Anniversary adventure so we left Sun-N-Fun before the end of the season (something we have never done before). We are driving the RV to Washington state, where we will put it into storage and then fly to Australia for a 3 week tour of the country. Then we will get on a cruise ship for a three week cruise back to Seattle Washington. When we return to the USA in the middle of May, we will get back into our RV, spend a month with our Grandkids in Oregon and then take a few weeks crossing the USA (again!) and visit the rest of our Grandkids in Boston. Our plan is to be back in Florida by Labor Day. Our third circumnavigation of the USA in the last three years. Woo! 2019 might be a less ambitious year but who knows.

Update - 3/23/2018: In Anaheim, CA now and after 8 days of traveling, we have covered 2674 miles by RV. From here, we head north.