Sunday, 15 January, 2017

It has been an amazing week aboard the Sun Princess cruise ship - we are having a fabulous time!!! 

We set sail last Sunday evening - our room is on the 10th deck, room B710.  We were originally assigned a cabin near the front of the ship, but were given this cabin as an upgrade.  We were a little worried about the location having been told previously that it might be very noisy due to the engine being at the back of the ship, but we haven't noticed any difference from any other cabin we have been in.  The cabin is bigger than our previous inside cabins and it's nice to have the extra space.  Our cabin steward is Emilio (Emil) and he is very friendly and very efficient - our room is always spotless and our bed is always made perfectly.  We especially appreciate the turn-down service and chocolates on our pillows at night. :-) 

Back of our ship - the 'Sun Princess' 

 Dad's first meal from the buffet for lunch on Sunday 

 Views of Fremantle, W.A.from the ship - the 'Sun Princess' 

 Top deck of the 'Sun Princess' 

 View from the top deck looking forward 

 Dad dressed up for our first dinner onboard 

Me dressed up for dinner 

For our dinner meal, we are seated at a table of ten - we prefer to be at a table of six, and even eight worked for us on our last cruise, but ten is just too big.  We do have some lovely table-mates, however: Alex and Gloria, Maureen and Greg, Margaret and Wyn and Robyn and Graham - they are all from Australia.  We have been mixing it up as to where we sit each night so that we have a chance to talk with each couple and get to know them a little better.  Our waiters are Jessie and Victor and they are great - Jessie is always joking around and laughing which helps to add to the nice atmosphere of the table.  We find that with such a large group, it tends to end up with two or three conversations going on at the same time.  For lunch and breakfast (on sea days), it's open-seating which means that when you arrive at the dining room, you are seated at the next available table.  We really like this as it gives us a chance to meet a variety of people.  We have also eaten a few times at the buffet which offers a lovely large salad bar.  
Our first port of call (Monday) was Geraldton which was a tender port - that means that we had to take a little boat from the ship to the shore.  When we got to shore, we walked along the boardwalk into town.  Once there, we walked a few of the streets ending up at McDonald's for a welcome cool down and an ice-cream.  From there, it was back to the ship.  Geraldton is a very small town and there's not much to see or do there.
Today (Sunday), we docked in Darwin - it was very hot and humid in town.  We caught the Hop On Hop Off bus in town and had a fabulous 90 minute tour around the city of Darwin.  The tour had a recorded commentary which gave us some good information about the city of Darwin and its history. The commentary was really easy to hear which isn't always the case on a bus like this.  We didn't get off the bus, but rather did the circle tour and were given a discount because we didn't get off.  When we visit Darwin in the future, we would like to see their museum and art gallery as that sounded really interesting.   

 From the left front and going clockwise: Margaret, Alex, Gloria, Dad, me, Maureen, Greg, Robyn, Graham and Wyn (our dinner table group) 

On Monday, we participated in our first trivia game - we love playing trivia on the cruise ships and go to as many of them as we can - some days we have done up to four of them.  When we went to the venue for the trivia game, we asked a couple if we could join them and they were very welcoming. They are Sheila and John - originally from Yorkshire, England, but now living in Bunbury which is south of Perth.  They are also keen trivia gamers and we have teamed up with them for every game so far.  We did very well in the first half of the week, earning three wins - our prizes were lanyards, water bottles and fridge magnets - not a bad haul, eh?  We have not done as well in the second half of this week - many more teams have joined in and so, although we generally answer many of the questions, we have been short of the mark lately.  Our team is called 'Team Awesome' and we are all about fun more than about winning.  We have had a few couples join with us along the way for a game or two, and most recently have had Joan and Lyn(wood) join us for the afternoon and evening trivia.  We laugh a lot and to us that's what it's all about. 

Dad, John, Lyn(wood), Joan, me and Sheila (our trivia group) 

Each night, they have a show of some kind in the Princess Theatre (which seats about 550) and also a show in the Vista Lounge (which seats about 480).  So far, we have seen a French Canadian vocalist Claude-Eric, The Princess Singers and Dancers who perform theme productions ('Save the Last Dance' and 'The British Invasion' so far), comedian Jeff Green (so hilarious we went to two of his shows) and musician/pianist Jon Darsk (amazing on the piano - his hands moved so fast, we couldn't believe it!!!).    

 Tender boat going from the ship to the pier at Geraldton

 Dad and I on the tender boat 

 Our ship 

Marina in Geraldton 

Dad looking out over the harbour  

 Old sailing boat in the harbour 

 Beach in Geraldton 

 Me beside palm tree in Geraldton 

 Toilets on the beach in Geraldton (look like Rubik's Cubes) 

 the beach at Geraldton 

'Yamaji Art' - Mara Arts Aboriginal Corporation

'Zephyr' - artist: Dr. Nigel Helyer - Zephyr is playfully named after Zephyrus, the Greek God of the gentle west wind - a light air that brought spring to the classical world - The Zephyr kinetic sculpture is designed to withstand the wildest of Geraldton days and will  produce harmonic sounds from its built-in sounding pipes on the stormiest days as an ironic tribute to Zephyrus 

artwork on a wall in town 

I thought the flowers on this tree were beautiful  

buildings around Geraldton

Our second port of call was Broome (Thursday) which is known for its pearl industry - we had to take a shuttle bus from the ship into town.  The bus stops at the town, Cable Beach and then returns to the ship.  When we found out how humid it was, we decided to just stay on the bus and do the circle tour.  The bus driver gave us a commentary as he was driving - again there's not much to see or do in Broome.  When we got into town and saw how long the line was to get back on the bus (the people had to stand in a long line in that humidity while waiting for the bus to arrive), we were glad that we had made the decision not to get off.  There were a few market stalls at the first stop and a few small shops and some larger chain stores there, but nothing worth getting off the bus for.  We were originally going to take a tour which was a camel ride on the beach, but since I had hurt my shoulder, I didn't want to take a chance that it would be a jerky ride and hurt it again.  We spoke with a woman when we got back on the ship who had ridden a camel on Cable Beach - she said it was an interesting ride, but the hour long ride was a bit too long.  She also said the beach was nice, but we weren't worried about stopping there since we have a beautiful beach in Hervey Bay.   

 Our first formal night for dinner

Pictures of Broome

 Broome Airport

 McDonald's

 Markets in the city

 the line-up for the bus to go back to the ship

 painted murals

 pearl shop

 the Sun Princess docked in Broome

On our sea days, we have attended a couple of line dancing classes - they are led by the deputy cruise director, Matt, 33 from England and they have been so much fun.  Matt is hilarious and energetic and always cracking jokes - he has also led some of the trivia games - he has really made our trip a lot of fun!!!  Dad and I have both really enjoyed our line dancing lessons, although we were both sweating by the end of the classes. 

Matt, 33, from England

We have only been in the pool once so far, and other than line dancing, eating, watching shows and playing trivia, we have spent our time reading or napping.  It has been such a fun and relaxing cruise so far. 

WWII oil storage tunnels entrance

  Photos taken on the bus tour around Darwin

 No,that's NOT a real crocodile 😊

 Lawn Bowls Club

   

The Sun Princess 

Sunday, 8 January, 2017

Another busy week - looking forward to our cruise next Sunday!  As always, there were plenty of appointments this week, but also plenty of socializing time for me. 😊

On Monday, my friend, Maureen, and I went out for lunch and a movie - Maureen is about Nana's age and we get along really well.  She was one of my counsellors when I was the Primary President.  We enjoy going out for something to eat and to a movie whenever we get back from one of our trips.  This time, I chose the cafe for lunch and she chose the movie - it turned out to be in the same place.  The movie theatre here has a lovely little cafe attached to it where we were able to get an iced chocolate and a chicken wrap before watching the movie.  It's always nice to catch up with friends.  The movie Maureen chose was called 'Red Dog - True Blue' - she had seen the first movie called 'Red Dog' which was actually the sequel to the movie we saw - kind of confusing, I know.  The movie we saw started with Red Dog being found in the middle of nowhere and explaining how he came to be there and the first movie ended with him being left in the middle of nowhere and his adventures from then.  It was a beautiful family movie which we both enjoyed -  I was glad about this because the last two movies we have seen were not very good ones.

On Tuesday, I met up with my friend, Chantelle, who I used to teach with (iced chocolate time again) - she was doing her teaching country service for four years way up north and has decided to take a break from teaching here in Queensland and is moving with her boyfriend to northern New South Wales for a while.  It was great catching up with her - she is younger than Krystal, but we get on really well, too.  I love it how, when you get to be in your 20's (and older), age doesn't seem to matter as much when it comes to making friends. 😊

On Wednesday, Dad and I drove up to the Jayco dealership in Bundaberg.  The fellow up there had sent us some samples of colours to choose for our trailer, but we couldn't get a good idea of them on the computer, so we decided to make a day of it and drive up to see him in person.  We looked at the swatches of colour (for the couch and dinette seats' cushions) and the laminate colour (for the countertops).  I had chosen the colour I thought I wanted and Dad was happy with my choice, but when we got up there and looked at them again and talked about it, we decided to go with other colours.

On Thursday, I got together with my friend, Haidi, from church - another iced chocolate. 😊  Dad and I enjoy hanging out together and chatting, but it's just different with our female friends, isn't it?  I love it that it can be ages between our visits and yet we just pick up where we left off.  That night, we had the missionaries over for dinner - Elder Ha and Elder Potter are very diligent missionaries and I love the spirit that is in our home when they visit and share a message with us.

On Friday, Dad and I drove to the house of a young girl in our church.  She was moving and getting rid of a lot of stuff she couldn't take with her to her new place.  She told me that she had remembered how much I loved a ceramic giraffe she had in her garden and asked me if I would like it.  I couldn't believe that she had remembered this as it was a number of years ago.  I was thrilled that she did remember, though, as I really did like it and was so happy to be able to bring it home and put it on our back patio.  I am loving all these different giraffes I am collecting - especially since they are all so different, especially with the material used to make them.

Yesterday, Dad and I flew to Brisbane for the first leg of our trip.  We stayed at the Novotel Brisbane Airport - a lovely hotel right next to the airport - as we had an early morning flight to Perth this morning.  We are so excited to be going on this cruise - we have made a decision to go on one cruise a year from now on - we just love being spoiled! 😊

Sunday, 1 January, 2017

Happy New Year!

This week was a bit of a slow week for us - mostly due to me still working through things with my arm/shoulder.  I had one physio appointment this week - with a new girl (this making the third physiotherapist I have seen at this office) who is Canadian and was quite good.  She massaged my shoulder and arm and gave me some new exercises to do along with the others I had already been doing.  Yesterday, I told Dad how excited I was that I could actually wash my hair with both hands!  I was also glad that I was able to come off the medication by Thursday - I did not like having to take so much Advil and Tyenol, but it was really necessary for recovery.

I also had a facial appointment (always relaxing!) and an afternoon tea appointment with my friend, Bronwyn - iced chocolate time again - yummy! 😃  Dad and I also managed to get in two visits to the beach this week which was great - we both enjoy being. in the ocean especially in the hot weather we have been having - we are so happy that we live so close to the water.  We also had the missionaries, Elder Potter and Elder Ha, over for dinner on Thursday night - they are such nice young men and we loved the spiritual message they gave us after dinner.

I taught the Relief Society lesson at church today - I love teaching and being able to teach in our ward when we are home helps me to feel a part of the ward.  The lesson was on goal setting and the sisters said that the lesson was really good - which is what I was hoping for since we often talk about goal setting at the beginning of each year and I was worried that the sisters would 'groan' at having another lesson about goal setting.

Sunday, 25 December, 2016

Merry Christmas!

The week started off not so well with my shoulder/arm hurting so much.  You know how much I dislike taking medication, but the pain was so bad that I had to take something.  I am definitely a wuss when it comes to pain and there were a number of tears shed in the first half of the week.  I went to physiotherapy on Monday and he said to me that he thought it might have something to do with my rotator cuff or shoulder muscles (he used some long medical term).  Anyway, he gave me some exercises to do (it is called 'the pendulum') and told me to take the pain medication as it would help with the inflammation.  He also wanted me to continue to use the ice pack on it to help with that as well.  I got a facial that afternoon and that really boosted my spirits.

On Tuesday, Dad and I drove up to Bundaberg (about 90 minutes away) to check out if they had any sales on their camping trailer being the week before Christmas.  They didn't have any sales on, but we had another look at the 'Swan' which we want and had a sit down with one of the salesmen.  We knew exactly what we wanted including all of the extras.  He wrote everything down and went to his boss to get a quote.  The boss actually did take some money off, but not that much.  We told the salesman that we would think about it some more and call him back later this week.

On Wednesday, Dad and I went to visit with our friends, Faye and Bill, who just recently bought the same trailer as we are going to buy, to talk with them about what extras they added and why and to see how they felt about their purchase after using it to travel a long distance just recently.  They gave us some good ideas and suggestions and advice.  After talking with them and talking it over with each other, Dad and I decided that we wanted to add one more extra to our list - an outside shower and hot water system.  That costs $1,700, so I asked Dad to write an email and ask the salesman, Kurt, to see what deal he could get for us if we added that to the list.  He came back to say they could give it to us for an extra $1,500.  I asked Dad to email back and ask for the extra cost to be only $1,000. (after all, we were spending a TON of money to buy this camping trailer).  Kurt called Dad back and said it was a go and we put a ten percent downpayment on it right then and there.  We are both really excited about getting it even though we have to wait until March to have it delivered as it won't be on the production line until then.

I went back to the physiotherapist again on Thursday, but hadn't taken any painkillers before the appointment as I didn't know if I should or if he would want to see what my shoulder/arm was like without the meds.  It was so painful, though, so he couldn't work on me at all.  We just talked about what was going on with my shoulder and he told me that it could take up to six weeks for it to heal.  That was a bit of a disappointment since we are going on our cruise in two weeks.  He told me that taking the pain meds was very important (even though I don't like taking them) as it would allow me to do the exercises without the same amount of pain I had been experiencing.  So, I upped them to the max and it has been amazing how much it has helped along with the exercising.  I am getting more movement in my arm and I am having to take less meds in just that short amount of time.  So, I am feeling more positive about how much longer I will have to take the Advil and Tylenol and also about how long it might take to get this shoulder/arm back to normal.

I read something this week from President Monson about when we experience challenges - he said that "such difficulties allow us to change for the better, to become something different from what we were - more understanding than we were, more empathetic than we were...' which really helped me be less pessimistic about my 'challenge'.  Although this shoulder/arm pain may not be a challenge for someone else, it has been a big one for me.  When I read this quote, I thought about how I have more understanding now about what Grandma Martin has to go through living with constant pain every day and also how I feel more empathy for Dad now with what he has had to deal with in his back pain.  I also feel grateful that, even though I have had to go through this now, it happened at a 'good' time in that it started on Dad's last day of work.  See, there is always a silver lining in every cloud.

Dad picked up our kayaks today!  We have been wanting to buy kayaks for ages and when we were down in Melbourne a big sale came on in the camping store in HB, so we ordered them online and the manager kept them for us in the back of the store until Dad could come and get them.  They look fabulous and we can't wait to get out on them (once this shoulder of mine gets better).  Mine is white and purple and Dad's is white and blue.  We still have to buy life jackets, seats and paddles - we are waiting for a good sale to come on in the camping store since we are not in a rush to get them.

Our 'Glide Reflection' kayaks - they are sit on kayaks, but they are quite stable as they have a flat bottom

Today has been a really lovely and restful day.  We started out going to church this morning - they just had Sacrament meeting and the talks were really good.  It was nice to see everyone again and to catch up a little on what has been going on since we were last here in HB.  After that, we came home and had a lovely Christmas lunch (barbecued lamb chops with salads); watched a church video about Jesus; made an advent calendar to start using next year; listened to Christmas music and watched a tv Christmas program with Andre Rieu.  We finished off our wonderful Christmas Day with pavlova.😃

 Our back patio with the Christmas spread on the table

 Our Christmas spread: barbecued lamb chops, garden salad, potato salad and coleslaw with V8 and cranberry juice

 Dad's Christmas lunch - a very full plate

Our advent calendar we made - it's made using a mini cupcakes pan - covering each cup is a picture of Christ with a magnet on the back - in the bottom of each cup, there is a scripture about Christ - the idea it to read a scripture each day of December until Christmas Day - there are also suggestions for how we can be of service for the 25 days, which we can perform as we strive to be and remember Jesus Christ during the month of December

 Our Christmas dessert

Sunday, 18 December, 2018

It's been a week of heat and humidity in Cairns.  Dad's course was only for the week here and everything went very smoothly.  He is now done for the year and is looking forward to getting some well deserved rest and relaxation in the next six weeks.  It is the rainy season in Cairns right now and it did rain every day we were there, at some point.  We were able to get out one day for some sightseeing, though.  One of the guys who Dad taught suggested we take a drive up to Port Douglas, so we did that on Friday.  It was a very beautiful drive between the ocean and the mountains (hills, really 😃).  When we got there, we checked out a few sights, but the humidity there was so high that we mostly enjoyed everything from our air-conditioned car.  I would love to walk the main street one day, though, and check out the stores - there looked like there were some cute shops to check out.

 More yummy meals from the 'Cock and Bull' pub (loaded nachos and shepherd's pie)

Dessert time - 'Death By Chocolate' - chocolate mudcake surrounded by chocolate mousse topped with chocolate ice-cream, whipped cream, chocolate sauce and a strawberry on top - yummmm! 😃

 Scenery on the way up to Port Douglas

 Palm trees in Port Douglas

 Coconuts

 Dad in front of lighthouse in a park in Port Douglas

 Me on a beach in Port Douglas

 Dad taking in the view from a lookout in Port Douglas

 These trees are so pretty

 The marina in Port Douglas

 Old lighthouse in Port Douglas (front and back)

 Christmas banners which were hung along the main street (the pictures on them were drawn by local primary school children)

 On the drive back to Cairns, we stopped at this area which had a bunch of rock formationss (like inukshuks) - they have been stacked by people and when they get knocked down by the high tide or a storm, people come in and rebuild them

Yesterday was not a fun day - I woke up in the morning with not being able to lift up my left arm and so we went to a chemist (pharmacy) to see what the pharmacist would recommend I do until I could get in and see a physiotherapist back home.  After I told him what my symptoms were, he suggested I get an ice pack to take down the swelling, Advil as an anti-inflammatory and a sling to hold my arm still.  They all help for sure, but it's still a dull ache so I am hoping my physiotherapist will be able to tell me what's going on when I go for an appointment tomorrow

We arrived home this evening and I can honestly say "it's nice to be home" - we have been travelling so much in the past six months, that it's nice to be able to just come home to familiar surroundings and relax for a bit.