a sort-of post...

i'm killing some time in sydney before our 9pm flight but i don't have any pics with me to post, so i'll do a quick run-down of the past few days from off the top of my head...

we arrived on saturday and didn't have to get off the ship til sunday so we spent the day meandering around The Rocks which is an awesome area right next to sydney harbor where they set up a marketplace on the weekend...

sunday after we got off the ship and checked into our nice little hotel, we met up with my friend jeremy (from PCC) and his wife and they treated us to an awesome and generous day! They took us out for lunch at the top of the sydney tower (amazing view!) and then took us all around the Darling Harbor area and thru the Queen Victoria building... it was fantastic and so fun to catch up!

After they left chris & i finished up our evening by going to the Sydney Aquarium, which had a very cool shark exhibit... we had pounded the pavement all day so we were happy to be off our feet the next day when we did our Blue Mountain and cave tour.

We got a lovely tour of some countryside ourside of sydney and i even saw 2 (live!) kangaroos by the side of the road... the big dark colored one seemed like he was trying to race our bus :)

i'll blog more and add pictures when we get home... see you all soon!

Fizzeled in Fiji but nearly vivacious in Vanuatu...

Days 19-24

So this year, we missed out on Sunday, October 18th. That’s right, no typo… we skipped that day entirely because we crossed the International Date Line! Woohoo! A monumental occasion! Ok, maybe not really, but it was kinda weird and cool to have crossed the IDL and the Equator on this trip, neither of which we had ever done before. We finally played some paddle tennis yesterday (super fun) and even got our ping pong on as well. I did my 5 miles around the deck like I usually do on our sea days (while Chris reads and counts laps for me) and we had a nice relaxing day for Chris’s birthday.
We arrived in Fiji on Tuesday and frankly, we were both a bit fizzled out. We docked in Suva (the capital) which unfortunately required a bit of an expenditure of funds to get anywhere to see most of the points of interest. The excursions from the ship were quite pricey for this port, so we decided to save our funds for OZ and found some bliss in a super cheap internet café ($1 per hr!!)
At the Sail Away Party, we ran into Anthony & Phillipa, an Aussie couple who are actually the only couple younger than us on the ship. They have been on vacation for 9 MONTHS! We are meeting up with them today to slaughter them in paddle tennis and then hang out tomorrow night when we get to Cairns. They know of a great Irish pub and we dock at 5pm so it should be a fun way to spend the evening.
They totally spanked us in paddle tennis yesterday but we beat them at Pictionary and had lots of fun doing Scattergories too! You would think I’d be particularly good at word games, but it was quite a bit harder than it sounded!
On Thursday, we hit the island of Vanuatu and did an excursion (pretty cheap) to the Mele’ Waterfall and Gardens. It was very pretty and well worth it with nice little walk up to the falls where our guide pointed out mango, avocado, banana and coconut trees. The falls were gorgeous and Chris especially had a blast jumping around in the water.
UPDATE:
After a DELISHious! aussie BBQ in the ship we've hopped off and found the internet café in Cairns with Anthony & Phillipa so here I am and here we go! So excited to hit the Great Barrier Reef tomorrow!

ready for Rarotonga... and Am. Samoa

Days 16-19

On Thursday, we were ready and rearing to go for Rarotonga. We bought a round-trip ($7 each) on the bus and took it about ½ way around the island to a little roadside stand called “Fruits of Rarotonga” that was right across from the best snorkeling beach on the island. We could see lots of fishys in the shallows before we even got our gear on. (I was a bit more hesitant because the water was slightly frigid!) But snorkel we did to our hearts content and then just relaxed in the sun, soaking up the sounds of the surf and the tropical air.

When we had enough of that, we decided to walk the beach awhile back towards town and just pick up the bus wherever we got tired. We walked quite a ways (still carrying our gear) till we ran out of beach, then some more up on the roadside… we got out our map thinking maybe we were close enough to just walk the rest of the way back into town, but were dismayed to see how little progress we’d actually made despite going several miles… definitely time to catch a bus! Finally a bus came by and we got a nice tour of the rest of the beautiful island on our way back (funny to see everything in English again… I’ve gotten so used to not having it everywhere else) and after picking up some postcards and such, went back to the ship and collapsed.

I’ve been hitting my “I’m done” point the past few days, since it feels like we’ve been gone so long and some of our prettiest places are behind us, but I’m sure I’ll catch my 2nd wind as we get to Australia. Chris could pretty much do this forever, but I’m more tied to home I think… and the kittys! (yes, I miss my babies very much). I think smaller doses of vacation are good for me… or maybe I could handle more if we were at least bringing everyone with us!

Anyways, we docked in Pago Pago, American Samoa yesterday. Chris got super excited when he spotted a McDonalds AND Mt. Dew. (I think that instantly made it his favorite place so far :)) We decided to hop on a funky jacked up bus (by which I mean that it was the highest off the ground of any ones we saw) for a tour of the island since there wasn’t much in the way of beaches and we didn’t have time to get into the interior. We saw the areas hit by the tsunami… sad to see the destruction, but glad to see that it was far from destroying everything. Mostly parts of a few villages that were closest to the ocean. Everyone was quite friendly and always waved to us as we went by and it looked like relief efforts were well underway.
That’s all for now…. Hugs and love to all….

Bora Bora, not the least bit boring

Days 12-15

Well, I started feeling a bit under the weather on Saturday night and ended up fighting a cold (what the heck?!!) the past 3 days, but that wasn’t gonna stop us from enjoying beautiful Bora Bora! The remedy? Dope up on Dayquil and ride cruiser bicycles (single speed) all 19 miles around the island! :)

The road was relatively flat aside from one giant hill that we pushed our way up, and no one ran us over so it was quite a delightful ride! We spent just under 5 hours with many photo stops along the way of course, and when we were done so was my energy… we headed back to the boat where I completely crashed out for the rest of the night… didn’t even wake up for dinner! So worth it though, plus I needed to save my energy for the next day because….

We went ashore again and decided to hit the high seas (ooh, something new! Ha ha :) and rented ourselves a little motorboat! Shortly after receiving some basic instructions and a map, Captain Chris (yep, my husband) had us gliding across the crystal clear water to drop anchor at our first snorkeling spot, called the Coral Garden. It was awesome… I was doped up on Dayquil again and had no problems since I was breathing thru my snorkel (and not my nose)! Lots of colorful fish and I saw the biggest eel I have ever seen in my entire life… Chris was in another area so he missed it but it scared the crap outta me! It went into some coral before I could get a shot, but it had to be 3 or 4 feet long and really big around…:0

We clambered back into our little boat and beached ourselves up on a motu for a little break, then went back out for more snorkeling… it was so serene both under and above the water… when we finished our little expedition for the day and had the boat safely returned without overturning or shipwreck, we discovered we had both fallen prey to that scourge of the seas, what I like to call “Crispy Crack”. :) Despite numerous slatherings of sunscreen, we both got a bit broiled right above our bum line (you know, above the shorts but below the shirt). Thank goodness for aloe! :)

I wiped out again for the night and chris went up on deck to check out the poolside Polynesian BBQ, complete with roasted pig… sweetie that he is, he took pictures of the food :)
Yesterday was Raiatae… honestly, we didn’t do much here aside from blow the rest of our Polynesian francs on soda for chris, postcards and such… we didn’t have time to explore the interior which was the more scenic part of the island and there weren’t really any beaches that we could get to. We needed the rest anyways, so we just relaxed and played cards the rest of the day. I know, vacationing is so tough! Tomorrow is Rarotonga in the Cook Islands so I’m excited to explore a place visited by some friends (Yep, that’s a shout out to the Scofields).

Looks like we’ll still be hitting Pago Pago (American Samoa), but they say we are a little ways from where the tsunami hit so we wont see the devastated part unless by our intention. I’m really looking forward to getting to Australia, so it will be nice to have a calmer pace before we go full steam when we hit the Continent.
Miss you all muchly!

Tahiti and Moorea

Days 9-11

After another relaxing day at sea, (literally, I just read a book by the pool all day), we arrived in Papeete (pah-pay-yet-tay), Tahiti yesterday… it is very much a city (kinda reminded me of Nogales in its layout, but much prettier, cleaner, and less scary) and we spent about an hour and ½ waiting for the right bus to take us out of town…. Finally our lucky #14 came and we were on our way to Point Venus, the northern most part of the island.
The ride was pretty and worth the wait, especially since it was only about $2 pp and a taxi costs anywhere from $40-120!
We spent some time enjoying the black sand beach and warm water before we headed back to town, via another lovely drive… when we got back to town we hit up the Marche’ for some fun goodies and postcards and made our way back to the ship in time to enjoy the “Sundown Social” on the pool deck… you know you’re really livin’ it up when they bust out “Billie Jean” on the steel drums... the drummer was hilarious… you could tell he was just itchin’ to rock out!
The Show that night was put on by traditional Tahitian dancers, mesmerizing us with their hypnotic swaying hips… they definitely put the shake in booty-shakin!
Today was my favorite so far… we arrived in Moorea, a gorgeous island just about 20 miles off of Tahiti where The Bounty, with Mel Gibson and Anthony Hopkins was filmed. Much more rustic and pretty much the epitome of what I imagine a South Pacific island to be… we didn’t book an excursion with the cruise (too pricey), but instead hopped off the tender armed with our snorkel gear and ran into a snorkel tour (by boat)that was leaving just at that moment and they gave us the deal of $40pp (most of the rest of the folks from the ship paid twice that!)…
we headed across the gorgeous turquoise waters and got treated to an amazing sight… not 20 feet away a mama whale and her baby decided to make themselves known! Mama breached beautifully a few times for us (wasn’t quick enough with the camera though) and both surfaced several times before bidding adieu with a tail fin… that was the closest I’ve ever seen whales… a lady that had been on several Alaska cruises and whale watching excursions said it doesn’t get any better than that! That was worth my $40 right there! But then we stopped in a shallow area and got VERY up close and personal with some big stingrays and black-tipped reef sharks!
At first I was a bit nervous to touch the rays (so big!) but when I did it was marvelous to feel how velvety they were! While most everyone played with the rays, I noticed how close the sharks were, and after an initial jolt of terror, decided it must be captured on film… They were about 3 to 4 feet long or so (no Great Whites, mind you) and way cool to see… I tried the best I could to get some pics but it’s a little hard to tell what you get with the underwater camera as you are taking the pic and sometimes they’d come a little close for my comfort (just out of touching distance, probably about 4 feet away)… it was awesome though, and I never thought I’d be gutsy enough to be swimming in the same waters as sharks! (I blame Jack for making me watch Shark Week on Discovery in Hawaii :))
Next stop was our own little motu (private island), where we snorkeled some more among the coral and saw lots of fun little fishys… it was lovely and relaxing (my heart needed a break from the adrenaline).
Then back to the ship for food and blog time! Tomorrow we anchor in Bora Bora for 2 days!

Land- Ho!!

Days 4-6

The last few days have been lovely and relaxing, as we alternately fill our hours with nothing and lots of things… I have found 2 of my loves onboard – pellet ice and pnutbutter! I’m pretty sure I go thru my lovely ice by the gallons each day and I believe pnutbutter on my pancakes shall become a breakfast staple for this voyage! On that note, I’m still exercising, and mandatory use of the stairs (we made a pact- no elevators!) is getting my butt into shape, but dieting is a lost cause for their pnutbutter cookies are my weakness, hence, my butt will be in shape, but a large, hard shape i fear….… :)
Chris has been surviving shockingly well in the absence of any Mt. Dew and has limited his soda intake to only going thru 40 on this entire cruise… one or 2 per day is quite an accomplishment for him! (but, if he LOSES weight on this cruise, I WILL throw him overboard!!!!) He has also been without ESPN since we left LAX since we are out of satellite range for pretty much all channels, but as we get back into the islands I think we will be getting some signal, so he won’t have to suffer too much longer ….
We’ve attended the Culinary Demonstrations every day and I think George has taken quite a shine to us… whenever we run into him he likes to talk and hang out with us… he knows the scoop on lots of people, crew and passengers… one of my favs is this adorable tiny lady who is 90 yrs old, makes all her own clothes, and can usually be seen dancing in one of the lounges or pushing her 100 yr old husband around in his walker… I saw her on formal night and she looked like she belonged on the Titanic… she was wearing an ivory lace dress and always has on a jaunty little hat… hopefully in the next 20some days I’ll get a chance to chat w/ her….
Yesterday, we signed up for the private 12 person class with George (Chef Geary) and had such a blast! We were in charge of Creamy Chicken Sauce al a Penne…it was a near disaster when I dumped over ½ the bowl of nutmeg in it thinking it had been pre-measured, but it actually tasted really good! (not like nutmeg with a hint of pasta, of which I was afraid) :)
We finally made it to our first port today, the lovely Nuku Hiva in the Marquesas where Herman Melville (Moby Dick) spent 4 months and wrote a book (Typeee,) about the people here. We saw a waterfall in the distance and determined to make it there as our goal for the day, and by golly we did! We were alone in our venture but far from the village port so it was perfect for the time we had… saw many “free range” chickens on the way and a cow that made Chris a bit nervous as to its intentions, :) went through a traditional island downpour, but we escaped unscathed (although a bit wet) and loved every minute of it.
Oh! I learned a party trick from Davey!! Can’t wait to show you all… :)
Much Love!!!

Sorry this first post will be a bit long, I promise to do better… :)

So the first day of our Grand Voyage went smoothly… we had no problems with our flight or shuttle (aside from the old man smuggling beer in his luggage which started leaking) … we even shared our TUS-LAX with Brian G. and saw the Quantas double decker Airbus A380. Pretty cool… We got on the ship as soon as they allowed and of course, went straight to lunch. The Amsterdam is quite a bit smaller than the ships I’m used too, but surprisingly enough, it doesn’t feel crowded, although I definitely feel the rockin’ & rollin’ more…. Thank goodness for dad’s magic little pink pills, I haven’t felt any motion sickness!

We watched “The Hangover” at the ship’s movie theatre and I must say, I was mostly amused :) At dinner we met our table mates, Davey & Louise from England, and Dudley & Patty from Vancouver, (Canada)…. They are a hoot…. Dudley was debating Gretzky as being the greatest hockey player ever and I don’t think he realized no one was actually arguing with him :)
The show our first night was called “Let Us Entertain You”, but it was more like “Let us introduce every crew member on the ship to you” We ARE the youngest non-crew members on the ship as far as we can tell, and I think by the end of our tirip we may very well be celebrities… we kinda stand out among all the retirees… :) but I think we are acclimating to “retired” life pretty well…
Day 2 (our 1st full day), we slept till nearly 10am, nearly missing breakfast (horrors!! I don’t think chris really believes in room service :) and went to an astronomy lecture on constellations that hopefully has armed us with the knowledge of what to look for when we have stargazing nights. We spent the rest of the afternoon, lazing in the sunshine…ahhhh….
Dudley had a game for us at dinner, to name 11 parts of the body (no slang) that are only 3 letters long… it’s harder than it sounds! Davey was quite perterbed that he kept guessing the same answers right after we said them… :)
Day 3, we got busy and blazed thru a talk on our first port, Nuku Hiva in the Marquesas & Papeete, Tahiti…a culinary demonstration with Chef George Geary (anyone know him from Food Network?) on CHEESECAKE (YUM!!!), which by the way, I did not know there were “savory” varieties of, (K & K would have loved this) …. Then off to get my Georgia O’Keefe on with a Watercolor class (I promise pictures of the masterpiece upon completion) hosted by 2 crazy ladies who apparently believe that listening and painting can not be done at the same time (“put your paintbrush down!”)… chris was a bit disgruntled by this “rule”, I thought he might throw his paint pallet at one of them :) then I hightailed it to the gym (yes, its true! 2 days in a row!)… we also met 2 more table mates, Tom & Sam(antha), also from the UK… very nice… chris, tom and dudley got into a debate about socialized medicine and why america won’t let obama pass his plan…. I distracted my self with evesdropping on other conversations… the entertainment this night was a British comedian (in the most loose definition of the word… we left before it ended)… he had a few funny jokes, but it was almost funnier how awful he was :)

I don’t know if I’ll blog again till we start hitting the islands, but then again, who knows what craziness we will run into with Dudley, Davey & the rest of the gang :)
Chris is already planning another world cruise, but I’ll see if we are quite as anxious by the end of this voyage… J The food is great (even sushi at the lunch buffet) and the rooms are slightly larger than RCCL, but I think Royal excels above and beyond when it comes to entertainment and service… I’m not complaining at all, quite enjoying myself in fact… just evaluating….
Miss you all….

thoughts on babies and other life changing events

so i came across an article that grabbed my attention about how to preserve relationships with your BFFs when one of you hits a different phase in life....
since pretty much everyone i know is having babies and i am not, naturally i was intrigued...
it seems that i've always been a bit behind the curve in my life experiences as far as timelines are concerned, which doesn't really bother me; but it seems to bring continual adjustments in interpersonal relationships...
just as i've "caught up" with everyone in adjusting to the "getting married" phase in life, they all start having babies.... now, despite my snarky comments, i actually enjoy kids quite a bit.... i was always on the fence about having my own and realized that the man i was with would determine alot of my vision for that future....
now, i have had much more excitement than fear for my friends as they have announced their impending bundles of joy... but i'd be lying if i didn't say there is a tiny bit of trepidation... things change pretty radically when that tiny life enters their world and priorities shift, as well they should...
but once all the talk centers around birthing, burping, feeding, and diapers i know i won't have much to contribute... i'm already used to being told i'd never understand certain things until i experienced them - that started with the whole married thing, and it's true....
so will the things my girlfriends & i have in common seem trivial and insignificant to them once they are elevated to "mommy" status? or will we be able to keep a common ground that becomes an amalgam of both sides? this is probably selfish in the big scheme of things, but as things change and life goes on, these were just some thoughts floatin' in my cranium...
i suppose time will tell....

look-a-like contest

as i fly around the friendly skies i find myself often running into people that look like other recognizable people (like celebrities)... today, there were redheaded twins that looked like the Weasley brothers in the Harry Potter movies sitting in my overwing section, and a pilot who looked like a slightly younger version of John Locke from "Lost"...
i gotta say the nicest actual celeb that i've run into so far was Jim Belushi from "According to Jim" who occupied a seat in the overwing several months back.... other celebs i've had so far:
Lou Diamond Phillips (Young Guns)
Ron Jeremy (former porn star and reality show castmember.... i only know this from watching VH1)
the guy with the glasses from the Sonic commercials who always says dumb stuff to his wife
Kevin Nealon (comedian and was the "zen" golfer in Happy Gilmore
Val Kilmer
Bing Crosby's wife (i think her name is Kathleen?)
George Gervin (former NBA basketball star)
the girl who played Ruthie, the youngest, on 7th Heaven
Judd Hirsch (best known for his role on Taxi, i think)

i think that's all i can remember right now.... i know we've had lots of pro athletes and musicians that i'm just not familiar with, but it is kinda fun to run into these people in "real life"....

so i've been thinking of starting up my blog again, particularly to chronicle future travel experiences... just a disclaimer, i will continue to ignore rules of capitalization and punctuation, but not intentionally grammar...so be forewarned if this is a pet peeve...

we (the hubby) and i just finished an 8 night cruise to mexico with my parents...cabo san lucas, mazatlan, and puerto vallarta... it was super fun and relaxing and i loved getting to share the experience of my parents 1st cruise with them... there was dancing, skip bo and much hilarity among other things, all of which chalk up to a good experience in my book ...

the next trip on the agenda is a bit of an insane undertaking.... correction, the next BIG trip...
before we hit the BIG trip i am looking forward to my August girls' weekend in SAN to hit the beaches, shop and see Wicked! B, A, M & i concocted this idea on our 1st girls outing since it went so well and we discovered how much fun we had traveling with each other!
my mind has been bouncing back and forth between this trip and the BIG one and tonight i've been doing research for the BIG one...
here's a link to the itinerary for anyone that hasn't seen it yet
www.hollandamerica.com%2Ffind-cruise-vacation%2FCruiseDetails.action%3FwebItineraryIdForAudit%3DWA9032%26durationCode%3D4%26noOfFlexibleMonths%3D1%26portCode%3DLAX%26shipCodeSearch%3DAM%26flexibleMonths%3Dfalse%26pageNumber%3D1%26voyageCode%3DA945E%26destCode%3D%26dateCode%3D9_2009&h=ffcf4f7a05d2c7dbf3a8081eb5e5b795

we leave sept 30 from LAX for a 32 day cruise on Holland America thru the South Pacific to Australia ....the original idea was to just fly to australia and tour the eastern coastline, but then we came across this smokin' deal and couldn't pass it up.... we still get to see most of what we wanted to, plus so much in between that would normally cost an arm and a leg to get to (e.g. fiji, tahiti, etc....) AND we are going to try to fly to New Zealand and spend a couple weeks there after we finish the cruise in Sydney. we figure we should make the most of going 1/2 way around the world....
i vacillate between hyper excitement and terror when i get into planning this trip.... excitement for sheer experience of it all, terror for the commitment and unfamiliarity....
right now my brain is just getting tired from information overload so i'm resume more on this topic later, but thanks for coming back if you're reading this now ....