Molly’s Next Big Adventure

  Well, Australia came and went by in a flash. An advantage of cruising is getting to stop by locations which can be far apart and difficult to access by plane or car, but the downside is the brevity of the stops, almost all less than one full day, with the ever present knowledge that the ship will not wait for you if you aren’t back on time if you aren’t on a ship sanctioned excursion. That thought is never far from my mind.  I’m a pretty adventurous soul and am fairly confident in my skills at map reading, communicating in English and endurance in walking. Up until now in our journey when arriving at a port of call it has been our common practice to go out together on a tour, usually organized by the ship, then return Gary to the ship. He is most comfortable if he is safely ensconced back aboard and then I will take off again for more casual exploration.  I have a bare minimum of essentials with me which include my ship pendant necessary to get off and back on the ship,...

  Greetings from the southern tip of New Zealand. Since I’ve last written we have traveled from Hawaii stopping briefly in Fiji and have stopped at three ports of call in New Zealand. Today we are cruising through the Fiordland National Park.  Here are a few highlights from our stop in Fiji. We docked at Suva City, the main shipping port not only for Fiji, but the entire South Pacific area. It is a major industrial area, not the part of the country that is featured in the travel enticements. We opted to take a bus tour to one of the small villages in the mountains about an hour out of town. The village houses about 170 residents and is just a small compound along a river that apparently floods with some regularity.  We had a tour given by a delightful young man, Jack. He is 19 years old, and attending a culinary school in Suva City. His dream is to be a chef on a cruise ship someday.  The only two story house is the one belonging to the chief. All of the homes were e...