45th anniversary...crocs and all

FISH!!!!

So we have been somewhat out of touch for the past week. Started out in the Coral Princess with a lovely cabin and only 17 of us passengers.  Almost as many crew as tourists.  A morning visit to Cooktown and then off to Lizard Island to visit the giant clam beds.  Wow!!!  Giant is right.  I think the largest was 5 feet across.  Mark and I both got to do a preliminary scuba dive.  Once I admitted to asthma, though, not to mention the heart issues, they never let me get deeper than a meter.
Over the next three days, we snorkeled and dove at 4 more fantastic spots.  Ribbon reef no. 3, Ribbon reef no. 9, Escape reef, and more on Lizard Island.  It was a difficult trip...get up early, eat, snorkel, eat, snorkel, drink, eat, sleep.  Oh my.  So much for losing weight while I travel!  There were so many fish, we didn't have to swim far or fast.
Finally, though, the fish were awesome.  Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the coral.  It is terribly stressed,  every bed we were at showed major signs of bleaching.  Though beautiful, all those shiny whites piles of delicate calcium are not the thing we want to see.  In addition, many of the beautiful blues and Reds were sadly showing a sickly mushy brown and yellow color.  On the way to bleaching.  They had little rain in the "wet" so the sea temperature was too high for the past six months.  They are hoping that the winter "dry" will be cool enough to let the coral recover.
After the boat trip, we stayed in Palm Cove for a few nights.  We swam within the jelly nets and took long walks through the mangroves, but only in daytime as we were warned to avoid them at night...dangerous people or crocs....Took a trip through the Daintree and visited Cape Tribulation where Capt. Cook visited in the 1700s.  Black tip sharks swam in the shallows of the ocean and crocodiles lazed in the shallows of the streams. Everyone told us to stay clear of the streams and do not swim in the ocean there.  In addition to the crocs, there were swarms of little deadly jellyfish so everyone only swims within the netted areas at this time of year.  We swam in a safe stream in the Daintree - clear and too fast moving for the crocs - and enjoyed Billy Tea and tucker before heading back to the hotel.  This morning, we hear that a 40 year old woman got et by the crocs in front of our hotel....OMG!  EVERYTHING inAustralia seems dangerous.  Oh well.  Having a good time.  Off to camp and hike in the Outback at 5a.m. tomorrow morning.  More when we get back

Flying foxes... Aargh, No!!!

So we got to the WhitsSundays on a lovely drizzly afternoon and proceeded to walk all around the marina and the resort complex.   We signed up for a variety of kayak or snorkel trips. Unfortunately, all these trips except one were foiled by the wind. We didn't get to go out on kayaks but did make it to Whitehaven beach and chalkies beach for snorkeling and swimming. Whitehaven beach has this perfect all silica sand, white as can be, and the texture of cornstarch. After walking for maybe 15 minutes, all of the calluses are sanded off my feet.    Because the weather was poor, the coral reef wasn't brightly colored. There were fish, but not many. The variety of coral was better than we have seen in the past years. Sadly much of it has been broken by people walking on it and there are some  signs of bleaching and coral death. They surprised me in that there seems to be little protection built in for the coral reef. They do not sell reef safe sunscreens,  they do not require floating vests while snorkeling above the reef, and they do not seem to regulate what people do the reef. You could break off pieces and take it with you or walk on it, damaging it. The ocean  is about 82° quite warm. I have no trouble swimming for a long periods of time; Mark however still gets a bit cold after a while.   Fortunately, the dangerous jellyfish are not in the water at this time of year.  We are now in Cairns and will be heading out on a boat for four days .   While in the Whitsundays and here we have been surprised by the large birds flying each sunset. Last night we got a much closer look: flying foxes,? Heck no, they are giant flying BATS!!!! Upon closer examination it was clear their wings worked differently than any bird we've ever seen. They are not vampires, but fruit eating thank goodness.

Off to rent bikes for the morning and tour the Esplanade of Cairns. More later.

Language barriers

All we wanted was a cocktail while we watched the glorious sunset.  We don't know what went wrong but this guy showed up and wouldn't leave.  Wild yellow hair, rude obnoxious behavior, wouldn't shut up and was really loud.  Thought we left this behind!? Never did get that cocktail.  Guess we haven't yet figured out the language down here.

Melbourne afternoon and evening the 18th

We may never again be able to play "go fish" again with a straight face.  After a lovely day walking through the Botanical Gardens, and then resting in the room to recover from the five or six mile walk, we headed out to dinner on an antique tram through the neighborhoods of  Melbourne. We were joined on the tram by two young (brainless) Canadian women and twenty Chinese men with little English.  Hence, we got extra service from Rowan and Tim, the two marvelous waiters.  A wonderful dinner with bubbly, wines, and more bubbly ensued.  Followed by port and Baileys Creme over ice. Tim was a great guy and we spoke of Seattle, his upcoming trips to SF and Vancouver. He seemed quite taken with us, more so with Mark.  After a thoroughly enjoyable evening - the Canadians flirting with the Chinese and Tim with Mark, we had way too much to drink.  As our children know all too well, Mark can get carried away with his comments in this situation.  At the end of the  evening, the waiters passed out postcards of Melbourne.  Mark fanned out the postcards as if in serious contemplation and asked Tim :  "Do you have any Queens."  Tim answered readily, "I am one.  What would you do with me if you got me."  The Canadians screamed "Go fish!" And Mark melted into the corner of his seat.  Tim loved it all and we could all hardly get off the tram we were laughing so hard.  The Chinese laughed along, but had no clue what was going on.  They obviously thought the Canadians were entranced  by them.  They kept flashing "V" for victory signs and trading pictures.  Now it is time for us to "go fish" for real.  We are up at 4 tomorrow morning to catch the plane to the Whitsunday Islands.

Melbourne morning...

Having woken up way too early, we descended to the lovely breakfast bar.  Our table overlooks the Yarra River in downtown Melbourne.  As the sun comes up, about 6:45, the town slowly comes alive. Blue lights shine off the footbridge as the commuter trains arrive and we relax into our lovely tea and coffee.  Melbourne claims to be the coffee capital of the world.  Vienna and Seattle, take notice!!  This is a lovely town.  I have already developed shin splints from walking many miles,  aargh.  Sustained by a variety of fresh fruits, omelet and pastries, we are off to swim and then walk some more!

Well damn! We got here early this morning after traveling for more than 30 hours. And look what we found! We found the 17th !  It wasn't lost afterall! Sadly, though, this means we actually lost the 16th instead ... so sad. We have spent today recovering from the long flight by eating our way through speciality doughnuts  (creme brulee stuffing with caramel topping, chocolate cake with candied hazlenuts), wonderful mussels (in a cream, coconut, tomato and chili broth), and the speciality coffees of Melbourne.  Mark is now swimming at the pool before working out and I will be getting a massage in a short time to loosen up my stiff muscles - perhaps I will find the 16th after that massage. I now at least we will find ascrumptious dinner.  Melbourne is very similar to SF, PDX and Seattle with numerous restaurants, cosmopolitan speakers and bicyclists and activities everywhere.  Spent some time at the huge city market.  We do always love those....We will be spending the day at the botanical gardens tomorrow and then will be flying on to the Whitsunday Islands.  I expect we will find a fish or two there, perhaps the 16th also.

Ozzie Fish !!!

Still in search of fish, fish, and more fish, we are about to head off to the lower ... what?!  Australia is lower, or something!  We leave May 15, fly about 20 hours and arrive May 18.  Wait a minute!  What happened?  We lost a day!  Where did 17 go???  Damn!  I had plans for that day!  Can we handle a trip this long?  Kayaking on the reef for 4-6 days, camping in the whoop-whoop?  Sydney Harbor, Melbourne?  Whitsunday Islands?  No worries, she'll be apples!  Watch this space if you're bored and in need of something to put you to sleep!