South Pacific Islands November 18–24, 2014

Update:  We’re sending this blog from Hilo, Hawaii, November 29th   All is well.

We began our swing through the Pacific Islands after leaving Australia with Noumea and Ile des Pines.  We’ve been to both before and choose to stay on the ship and spend the day relaxing.  So we begin the blog with our visit to Lautoka, Fiji.  The view from our veranda.

We wandered around one of the largest markets I’ve ever seen; indoor and street side.

Of course we have to look closer at the local wares.

We stopped by Jack’s store.  You may remember this photo from our Grand World visit to Lautoka.  Same store and pose, different guy.  The weapon is called a “Neck Breaker” which they use prior to the cannibal forks.

I offered to take Noreen on an open air tour of the island.  For some reason she declined??

Our next stop was Suva, Fiji.  Noreen immediately made friends with the local police sergeant in their interesting uniforms.  She is holding her hat due to the winds.

 

We had extensive plans to wander around the town and area until we passed the market.  At that Noreen decided she had seen enough of Suva and went back to the ship.  You miss the full impact of the market without smell-o-vision.

But in spite of what seemed unusual for a market to us it was really a very interesting place.  The people were very friendly and the area clean and very organized.  I took some time and wandered around a bit more.  A lot of the people that looked like they were living at a barely subsistence level had cell phones.

 

They also sold live fish.

It started raining and the plastic overhead keep most of the rain out of the market area.

By now you may be asking yourself, “Where are the lush jungles and beautiful waterfalls of the Pacific Islands?”  They are on each island.  But to get to them it is usually a four or five hour round trip in a rickety old bus with open windows on dusty, bumpy roads; in very hot and humid temperatures.  We did some of those trips on our first visits to the Pacific islands.  This is our third swing through the Pacific and we’ll be back in a few months so we tend to stick close to town unless there is a very special attraction we want to see.

Our next stop was Apia, Soma on November 24th.  It was a raining overcast day.  But that didn’t dampen the enthusiasm of our welcoming committee. Apia is only 100 miles or so from American Soma where we were a few months ago.

We shared the port with the National Geographic expedition ship “Orion.”   They usually sail in Antarctica but are conducting some special research in this area.

 

We hope you you enjoyed this brief trip to some of the Pacific Islands.  As I write this we are one day out of Hawaii.  We’ll be spending four days in the area with three ports of call.  Then we have five sea days back to San Diego so I’ll have plenty of time to finish our last entry for this trip.

Thanks for allowing us to share our travel's with you.  Drop us an e-mail, we love to hear from you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Port Douglas, North Queensland, Australia November 10, 2014

We arrived in Port Douglas on a very sunny and hot day.  Port Douglas is located about 30 KM from Cairns, the main port for visiting the Great Barrier reef.  On our two previous visits to Australia we docked in Cairns.  So this port was new to us.  Today Port Douglas exists on a combination of Tourism, local industry and some agriculture.  It is also the Australian home of many of the rich & famous with stars from entertainment and business having multimillion dollar homes on the high ground overlooking the ocean and GBR.  But Port Douglas (PD) has a much more interesting past.  It was a sleepy outpost of civilization until gold was found in 1873.  Growth and immigration followed the gold rush.  Then in 1882 an unusually rainy wet season made the roads to PD impassable and thousands of people came close to starvation.  A more reliable supply route was needed and in 1887 construction was started on the Cairns-Kuranda Railway which opened in 1891.  The railway basically followed the Barron Gorge with high ground on one side and a precipitous drop-off on the other.  Over the last century+ the railway has been a lifeline between PD, Cairns and the towns in-between.  During WWII it is critical to the movement of troops and supplies to fend off an expected Japanese invasion.  It also carried thousands of GIs to rest camps in the area during the war.  Today it is known as the Kuranda Scenic Railway and carries tourists between Kuranda and Cairns on a two hour scenic journey.  The reason I told you all that was because that is what Noreen and I did, we rode the rails.

Our adventure began with a bus ride from PD to Kuranda during which our bus broke down and we transferred to bus #2.

 

Due to the bus problem we arrived in Kuranda with only a few minutes to spare before the train left.  I got a wurst at a local stand while Noreen…..

For those of you following along on my toilets of the world, I haven’t seen urinal trenches in a long time.

Finally we arrive.

The train is pulled by Common Wealth diesel engines built in the late 1960s.  The snake drawn on the side of the engine is Buda-Dji, the carpet snake who in the Aboriginal people’s Dreamtime legend carved out the Barron River gorge.

The carriages are refurbished originals built from 1903 to 1913.  The train was so long the engine was always well past the station and I could never get a good picture of it.

There are standard class cabins for most of the train.

And then there is Noreen class.

There was one stop during the trip at the best place for viewing Barron Falls and Gorge.  The falls drops 875 feet.  Not much water flow this time of year.

Gotta do a selfie!!

On one side we are this close to the raising terrain, riding a cut through the mountain.

On the other side is a drop into the gorge and the valley below.

Stoney Creek Falls Bridge is the most scenic of the bridges along the route.  As hairpin turn you can see the train around the bend.  The bridge has a tight 4 chain radius (train talk).    We’re moving at a fast walk.

The falls the bridge is named after.  Not much water fall this time of year.

 

We went through eight tunnels.  These tunnels were dug with dynamite and picks and shovels.

Coming into the outskirts of the town of Freshwater.  Some housing shots.

Arrival in Freshwater Station, the end of our 1.5 hour journey.

We set off for the ship and again our bus died.  Here we are waiting for the replacement.  We finally made it back to the ship hot, tired and glad to be “home.”

All in all we had a great time.  We aren’t much for watching an 1.5 hours of scenery passing by but it was a nice break from the ship and a different adventure than when we usually visit the Great Barrier Reef area of Queensland.  Hope you enjoyed the ride.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cambodian Buddhist Monk Blessing, Komodo Island, Darwin Jumping Crocodiles

This blog entry covers three different areas.  I thought the Angkor Wat entry was getting to long so I put the monk blessing together with a couple of short ones that occurred later.

So here we are in Siem Reap on October 28th having just returned from a early morning visit to the Angkor Wat temple complex.  We headed over to the Buddhist monastery at Wat Atvea for a blessing by the monks for a safe journey and happy life.

Entry area to the monastery.

The courtyard to the temple contains numerous statues.

Noreen standing there can give you an idea of the size.

Entrance to the temple.  The boxes are for specific donations, i.e., electricity, yard maintenance, the temple, etc.

Inside the temple.  Photos allowed, no shoes or hats.

The Monk Blessing ceremony starts with the Monk’s arrival.

He then began a chant while sprinkling us with water from a silver bowl using a small branch with leaves.  Jack and Ginny were our traveling companions on this trip. 

Then he tied a piece of red yarn on our wrist.  We were to leave it on for continued good luck until it fell off naturally.

The ceremony takes about 10 minutes for the four of us.  Here we are with the Monk.  He didn’t say anything other than the ceremony ritual.

The temple is in a walled courtyard that has relief drawing all around the inside of the wall.

Another portion of the external courtyard.  The building in the background is the monastery living area.

Noreen with the bulls.

The living quarters building.  You can see the similarity between this building and the monastery building you saw in the floating village.

We now move ahead a few days to our visit to Komodo Island on XXXXXXXXXXXX.  Komodo was a tender port and these kids came up to us as soon as the boats were lowered.  They were asking for food or money.

Sometimes they turned over.  But they got right back in.

Komodo is a national Park.  You can’t go ashore unless you are on a scheduled tour either with the ship or local rangers.  There is no just wandering around.  The Dragons rule the island.  Noreen still has her Buddhist Blessing wrist yarn on.  I’m just out of luck.

Visitors go out in groups along established trails each accompanied by a guide and two rangers.  The guide does the dialog while the rangers watch for dragons and ensure no one strays from the group.

A ranger with their stick. All they carry is this forked stick.

The arsenal of anti-dragon weapons.

It was a long, hot walk (which we’ll skip) to get to the dragons.  The Rangers had constructed a waterhole that attracted the dragons.  They don’t feed them or in anyway interrupt their natural habits.  It was the middle of the day so the dragons were napping and avoiding becoming over heated.

I tried for a picture of this guy with Noreen but she got all huffy and wouldn’t sit down next to him; go figure.

Dragons are known to eat their young so young dragons spend a lot of their youth in tress which older dragons can no longer climb.

Here you can see his claws.

There were five males in a group.  Off to the side was a lone female resting in the shade.  Females are much smaller and again due to danger from larger males they tend to stay away from them unless mating.

I think she is much prettier than the males.

The island has a large population of deer, hogs, and other wildlife that feed the dragon population.  If the dragons get to numerous to be supported by the island’s natural resources then the rangers cull the numbers down.  There is a deer in this picture.

After surviving the dragons we have to run the gauntlet of vendors to get back to the ship.  It starts with a row of kids.

Of course, Noreen was up to the task and fearlessly met the vendors.

Some younger kids not ready for the sales force yet.

No one lives on the island.  The only inhabitants are the rangers guarding the national park.  The vendors come over on a fleet of boats parked in the bay and then leave when we do.

As we get ready to sail the Kids come out again and try to get us to throw food or money.

From our balcony looking down at the kids in the water.

And off we go for Darwin, Australia.  Darwin was bombed several times by the Japanese during WWII resulting in a large military build up in preparation for an assumed invasion.  The invasion never happened but many of the effects of the bombings and military defense preparations are still visible.  Rather than tour the town we decided to take an excursion to see some jumping crocodiles. 

Our arrival in Darwin.

It was a long bus ride to the jumping crocodiles river.  Everyone always rushes to have seats in the front of the bus.  We always go to the rear where we usually have room to stretch out.  Notice that Noreen is still wearing her Buddhist Blessing wrist yarn.

It is assumed that all waters in the North Territory have crocodiles.  This year four lives had been lost to crocodiles in the Darwin area.  The bottom line is don’t go in water and be very careful if you go near it.

Our journey begins to see jumping crocodiles.

The process is travel along the river until you see a crocodile.  Then dip some meat on a long pole in the water to get their attention.  Eventually they will jump for the meat.  They make them jump at least four times before they get the meat.  This means they will use more energy to get the meal then they get from it.  Thus they will still be hungry and not rely only on people for food.  These are various crocodiles.

This was the biggest one we saw at about 12 feet and he wasn’t jumping very high.

They also tossed some food into the air right by you.  You had to be quick with a camera to catch the hawks as they dove seemingly right at you.  They caught the food in midair, whizzed by and flew off.

Back on shore this is an accurate size recreation of the largest crocodile taken in the river.

On the way back we had to stop for a quick beer at the famous Humpty Doo Hotel in Humpty Doo, a small enclave outside Darwin.  I got the t-shirt.

N.T. stands for Northern Territory

Had to do a selfie!!

I thought we had the only Sunshine State in Florida.

Where you air intake goes when you live in the outback subject to flooding.

Then it was back to to the ship and off for three sea days enroute to Port Douglas.