I took the big leap and booked a 2-week cruise on the Diamond Princess from Auckland to Sydney back in October and boy am I so happy that I charged up the card!!!

In brief, we flew to Sydney (where we enjoyed a 20 hour layover) and then on to Auckland where we boarded our ship. during our 13 day return Sydney, we stopped in Tauranga, Wellington, Akaroa (Christchurch), Dunedin, Melbourne, Tasmania. we were also lucky enough to be able to cruise New Zealand’s Fjordlands. It was touch and go there, but the weather cleared.

Now for my big poem…

I have quite a few stories to tell and lots of pictures to share.

So, I will start with Day 1 and work from there!

We stumbled off the plane at 10am on Dec 28th and into an unbelievably gorgeous day in Sydney. Sunny and in the high 70s, it was a very welcomed change from our Jakarta weather of hot and wet or less wet and hot. the taxi que (line) was thankfully short and the ride to our hotel, the Marriott on Circular Quay (pronounced “key”), was super quick – only 30 minutes of playing the tunnel game. You know…the tunnel game.

Here’s how you play. Hold your breathe through the entire tunnel and you get to make a wish. Mobil Bay tunnel had me blue every time…remember that game Peddy clan? the boys loved it…as did the driver. It has now been passed on to another generation and a very nice Indian immigrant taxi driver!

Anyway, after checking our bags with the desk, we hit the streets looking for something better than airplane food, preferably on the harbour with an opera house view. Unfortunately, hunger prevailed and after two blocks we tore into some less than average burgers at Hungry Jacks (what they call Burger King in Australia). no matter, at least we had made it to the harbour and soon had Captain Cook Habour Boat Tour tickets in our hands.

With an hour to kill I suggested we walk around to get a better view of the Harbour Bridge…and then there she was!

I instantly told Richard to give me my cell phone so I could call my twin Catherine. I didn’t care how much my Indonesian cell company would charge me for a roaming long distance call. I just had to be with my twin…anyway that I could. Her husband answered the phone and asked what was wrong since they knew we had left on vacation and it was late for them…later than what would be considered polite for a casual phone call…this was no casual phone call.

“Nothing, oh nothing. Everything is fine. I just need to talk to Catherine.”

And we talked… It has always been her dream to be where I was standing at that moment and I had to make her a part of it in some way. She’ll be there someday and then maybe she will call me.

  Me calling you Cat. I love you!

 I dried my tears and we walked all the way to the end…just so the boys could see the mighty underbelly of the bridge. Seeing the line of ants walk across the beams at the very top of the bridge, the boys declared that they want to climb it next time…so, it is on the list:)

We walked back to the dock and made sure to pick out a restaurant to return to for dinner. It had an opera house view of course! then we boarded the boat for a 3 hour tour…a 3 hour tour.

 The Sydney Harbour is Australia’s largest natural harbor and we were bound to see most of it’s shores. HEre is a view as we head out from Circular Quay

This is one of the many beaches in the harbor. the water is gorgeous, but filled with sharks. Notice the shark protection around the beach?there are a few beaches were shark protection has been removed…not a  beach I would swim at. Also, there are 2 nude beaches along the shores of the harbor. I took pictures of course, but I wanted to keep this post G-rated:)

This is the headwaters of the Harbour. beyond this light house is the Tasman Sea.

Every has a boat here. According to the customs official I chatted up when we were waiting for our luggage, 80% of the residents own watercraft. Aussies are water babies! in fact, most of the continent’s population lives within 1-hour of the ocean. he also told me that the almond scares him more than the poisonous creatures in Australia. Apparently, an almond brought in from overseas could carry a disease that would wipe out the eucalyptus . there are over 800 varieties of Eucalyptus and Australia’s forest are made of them. one diseased almond could deforest the continent. I guess that is why they are so persistent at customs!

Patrick had a serious overdose on shortbread and chocolate. His supportive father and brother are trying to help him through the worst of his tummy bloat. Captain Cook Cruises gave us a lovely tea on the boat and Pman (on Tman’s encouragement) talked the crew into giving him leftovers. Oh…he moaned for hours!

On the way back I got this shot.

We all had a great time on the boat tour and the older American tourists behind us even complimented the boys on how good they were! It was icing on the cake. could the day get any better? Yep, getting into our room and washing the layer of travel muck off!

 Our room was great. I splurged for our 1-night in Sydney and was well rewarded. Look at the view!

Clean and staring out at the gorgeous day we all fell asleep and woke a couple of hours later…too late to make it back to the restaurant. so we grumbled our way to the hotel buffet. we all know hotel buffets are not that great, but were we in for a real treat!

WOW is all I can say. the Marriott Circular Quay Buffet was OUTSTANDING. It was a buffet of delicacies. Patrick gorged himself on broiled lobster tails and prawn as big as your hand. Thomas had his pick of premium steaks but decided to go for the rack of lamb. Richard reveled in the gourmet stir-fry bar with dozens of exotic fixins including his favorite wild mushrooms. I dove into the superior cheeses and hard Italian meats. we all topped it off with several helpings of fantastic desserts including a perfect Pavlova (which is gluten-free and now my favorite dessert). This was a buffet of the Gods!

And so ended our day in Sydney. fat and happy we went back to our room and I called the front desk and asked for 4am wake-up call due to an early flight. the bell desk then called and asked if we needed a cab and a bell to help with our luggage. they arranged everything! Sydney was PERFECT!!!

The bell desk actually called at 4:00am as requested. Darn it! no matter…

We head for the airport, too tired to play the tunnel game, and checked-in at the Air New Zealand desk. Since they are a Star Alliance partner, we flashed our gold cards and we were instantly upgraded! Not that there was business class on this 3.5 hour flight, but we received express passes through immigration and security, premium noise cancelling headsets, first-class breakfast, and lots of cooing attention from all the flight attendants. I LOVE Air New Zealand!

Not only was their service excellent…their safety video totally rocked. we saw a “best of” video that isn’t on You Tube yet, but check out these out!

We have flown all over the world in with too many carriers to list, but we were never more enthralled with a safety video. the boys were glued to their screens hooting out loud! It was a riot.

My fun continued on the flight with in-flight entertainment. while the kids and Richard chose to play with IThings I explored the Kiwi Music feature. It turned out to be a quick 3.5 hours. I didn’t get through all of it. here is the link:

http://www.airnewzealand.co.nz/assets/PDFs/ife-jan12-777-747-cd-library-radio.pdf

I really liked most of the artists. I even bought Autozamm, Beastwars and a few others off ITunes when I got back to Jakarta.

Landing in Auckland we were immediately whisked away by the Princess transfer to the ship and missed out on some sight seeing as well as the Churrascaria we spied on the quay. It looked yummy, but it was time to get on the boat. Wildfire Churrascaria might go on our next time listJ

Finally…time to board the ship!!!

 Yes! we made it!

…hello Tauranga/Rotorua!

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Our Cruise Down Under « rinehartworld.com Blog