Random thoughts from the sea
Day 35, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Sunday, Nov. 6, 2022; Moreton Island, Queensland, Australia. Yesterday the captain warned us that tendering at Moreton Island might be tricky. I wonder if he knew then it would be impossible and was just preparing us for the news. The seas
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Day 33, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Friday, Nov. 4, 2022; Airlie Beach, Queensland, Australia. Today brought another new and fun port on the Australian east coast between Cairns and Sydney. On previous cruises I’ve visited the city of Brisbane, the beach resort town of Mooloolaba and the
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Day 32, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Thursday, Nov. 3, 2022; Cairns, Queensland, Australia. It is almost as if God gave Queensland, Australia, a beautiful coast where the rain forest meets the pristine sandy beach and decided it was too much of a good thing. So, God put
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Day 30, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2022; Conflict Islands, Papua New Guinea, Coral Sea. If your idea of paradise is almost endless light sand beaches shaded by tall palms and other tropical trees, surrounded by coral reefs, then the Conflict Islands should be on
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Day 28, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Sunday, Oct. 30, 2022; Alotau, Papua New Guinea, Coral Sea. There I was, dreamily sitting under the bright blue canopy of a boat, enjoying the stiff breeze as we swept along through the whitecaps past sandy beaches under swaying palms. Children
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Day 25, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Thursday, Oct. 27, 2022; Noumea, New Caledonia, South Pacific Ocean It is Day 5 for me in covid isolation on the MS Westerdam. I will be tested tomorrow morning. I used one of my self-tests yesterday morning, and it showed I
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Day 20, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Saturday, Oct. 22, 2022; Dravuni Island, Fiji, North Pacific Ocean. I have Covid. In my mind I wrote all sorts of clever ways to lead up to this news, but decided to follow my reporter training and just put it out
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Day 19, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Friday, Oct. 21, 2022; Suva, Fiji, North Pacific Ocean. A challenge of being one of the first cruise ships in the South Pacific after almost three years of pandemic shutdown is that things don’t always go as planned. Originally, the MS
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Day 16, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2022; Apia, Samoa. I feel like I have flirted with Samoa but never visited. Today I finally made it. We docked here in 2018 on the Grand Asia cruise, but shortly after arriving the ocean swells increased to
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Day 15, South Pacific, Australia and New Zealand Cruise Monday, Oct. 17, 2022; At Sea, Pacific Ocean. For the first time in nine years, this time I embarked on a cruise not knowing a single passenger. The last time I cruised – the 2020 Grand World Voyage – I traveled
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