Tasmania Cruise - Day 6 (At Sea) & Day 7 (All over!)

Day 6 was one of our favourite sorts of cruise days - a full day of doing almost nothing!

So that this isn't the shortest blog entry ever - here's the view from our cabin:

We deliberately opted for this "obstructed view" because that's the sort of cabin we had booked on our (now abandoned) 38 day cruise from Southampton to Singapore - I wanted to be sure that I'd be ok with no balcony and not much view.  Probably would have been ok, but I'd still prefer a balcony.
Anyway, there's not much else to report, just the usual sadness at the cruise ending.
 
Now, we've just got to survive a kitchen renovation and my retirement, and then hopefully next October there's another cruise on the way!

Tasmania Cruise - Day 5 - Hobart

Well, I'm finally catching up on the blog posts - almost a month after the event!
Second day in Hobart we hired a car and - as in Burnie - had no real plans about where to go.
First drama - getting out of the city.  We decided to start with a trip to an "Apple and Heritage Museum", but we had an amazing amount of trouble getting out of the city in that direction.  Many of the streets in the city are one-way, and the map app on my phone didn't know about all of them.  And, at one point it told me to do a u-turn on a road that was effectively a free-way! We also ended up driving on a street that I'm pretty sure only allows bus and delivery traffic - oops.
However, we eventually found our way out of town.
The museum was a disappointment - I should have realised it would be once I saw that it was a 'site of interest' in the documents Princess prepares about their shore excursions.  The description was the classic "come here on a shore excursion to spend money on food and souvenirs but don't really expect too much else", and it unfortunately lived up to that standard. However, we found a cafe in town and had a nice coffee while considering our next move
We had considered going to the Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary and also to some wineries but in the end we decided against this.  Instead, we decided to go up Mt Wellington.  Unfortunately there was so much twisting and turning on the road that I managed to get carsick.  But, when we got to the top, it was absolutely worth it - spectacular views in all directions.

 This is the view of Hobart from Mt Wellington - the little white blob in the water is our cruise ship.

This is Paul on top of Mt Wellington

Fortunately, getting back into Hobart was nowhere near as dramatic as leaving.  We managed to find a servo to stop up the petrol (therefore avoiding having to pay the outrageous prices Avis charge to top up) and had no one-way street trouble either.
Disappointing afternoon back on the ship though - for some reason they were doing work outside our cabin.  Now, I understand that they are always needing to do minor maintenance, and I understand that sometimes this might involve multiple people bashing heavy hammers directly onto the metal hull just outside your cabin.  What I'm not happy about is the fact that we weren't warned - usually when there's going to be noise they let you know, but not this time.
Paul astoundingly managed to nap through a couple of hours of this (with a pillow over his ears!) but I couldn't.

Tasmania Cruise - Day 4 - Port Arthur and then Hobart

Two ports in one day today.
Overnight we sailed to Port Arthur.  This is a tender port, and one we have visited before.  So, we decided to stay onboard and have a lazy quiet time.
Once everyone was back on board, we sailed for Hobart at about 5pm and docked there around 7pm.
After dinner we had a shore excursion - a ghost walk.  Interesting tour; we walked around some of the older streets near Salamanca Place, and the guide told us stories about various historical houses, obviously concentrating on ghost stories.  I thought that they were going to include some pretend ghosts - I was quite sure that there was someone in the top middle window of this old hotel moving the black fabric around - but no-one said anything so maybe it was a ghost after all ......

The tour didn't go as long as advertised, and a few times she talked about 'showing us photos later' which didn't actually happen.  However, it was an interesting walk and talk.

Tasmania cruise - day 3 - Burnie

We arranged a hire car with Hertz, picked it up with no real dramas.  The plan was to have no plan, just get in the car and drive, which we did.  We found a nice little town called Penguin and had a coffee there.  Then, we went further along the coast to Devonport and had a look around the town.
Then, we got into the car and drove back to Burnie.
Doesn't sound too exciting but there was some lovely scenery and the weather was simply glorious
Tasmania was already on our list of 'places to see when we don't feel up to cruising any more' and today simply confirmed that decision.
Today also confirmed that there is apparently a total lack of supply of Travacalm in Australia at the moment. The pharmacies around home were totally out of stock - I asked at one and he said that the supplier is having problems and "everyone is going on cruises".  And, for interest I checked out a pharmacy in Sydney and one here in Devonport with the same results - no Travacalm.  I had enough to get me through this cruise, but I'm going to have to stock up somehow for next year's cruise!

Tasmania Cruise - day 2 - sea day

Classic, totally restful sea day for us.  Biggest decision for the day was whether or not to risk trying to get into the dining room on 'formal night' in clothes that were 'business wear' at best.  No problems, but still on our own at the dining table.

Tasmania Cruise - Day 1 - boarding

The ship was at the White Bay Cruise Terminal which is an abomination.  You can only get there by car, taxi or ferry, no other public transport and you certainly can't walk onto the docks.  I have now decided that any time we cruise into or out of Sydney in future, it's going to be on a cruise ship that's too big to go under the Harbour Bridge, so it can't be docked at White Bay.
If you're cruising out of Sydney from the Overseas Passenger Terminal, you can drop off your suitcases quite early, and then wander around the city until boarding time. No such option at White Bay.  So, we went into the city first and dragged our suitcases around in the rain until we found a place to sit and have coffee, then annoyed another taxi driver - apparently a $24 fare from the city to White Bay was beneath his dignity or something. 
Got on board quite quickly and found our cabin.  The whole idea of the cruise is actually gone now - the main plan was to make sure that we'd be ok in an oceanview cabin for a 38 day cruise next year, but we have just recently cancelled that cruise anyway.  Possibly a good thing, because I don't think I'd have liked this setup for 38 days.
However, for 6 days it's perfectly acceptable although a little noisy, there are three separate crew work areas beside it.
Went to dinner and found ourselves to be the only people at a table for eight.  Quick and quiet meal!

Tasmania cruise - getting started - 4 November

Up at way before dawn to be ready for the taxi out to the train station.  The taxi arrived on time, but the driver was unpleased to discover that I had prepaid his taxi company a set amount for the fare - he said that the fare would normally be higher.  It seemed pretty much a normal amount to me, but the real surprise was that he didn't know that the company is offering set price, prepaid fares.  Presumably they're trying to compete with uber
No dramas on the train - it was the usual slow and creaky trip, but still much cheaper than flying and much more comfortable than the bus.
Raining when we got to Sydney, so we got a taxi to our hotel and fortunately the room was already done so they checked us in.  We then went off for a walk down Glebe Point Road - there's a really nice 'cafe' sort of vibe.  Had lunch at a nice cafe.  Got back to our room and discovered that what we had thought was an interesting way of setting up the TV (so you could watch it while lying in bed) was actually because the TV had pulled out from the wall.  Mentioned this at the front desk and they immediately moved us to a bigger, nicer room.
Went to sleep fairly early after such an early start, and was then woken at about 11:30 by a fire alarm - first the warning, then the 'get out of here' whoop whoop.  I was so confused being woken up that way; it took me what seemed like ages to find clothes that I could leave the room in.  Turns out it was a false alarm, although it took them a while to be certain.  Then over the next 2 hours, we had two more of them.  Not good.
Overall, it was a nice motel - fair price and in a nice location. Not sure if I'd book there again though, the memory of the fire alarms is a bit off-putting.

And another cruise

I don't always pick cruises because of the ship, but it definitely has happened at least once in the past, and I've done again.
Part of the reason for picking the "Asia Repositioning" cruise next October is that it's on the Ovation of the Seas - built in 2016, equal 5th biggest cruise ship in the world (with its sisters Quantum and Anthem of the Seas) and by far the biggest cruise ship to ever come to Australia. 
It has been on my list of "ships I want to cruise on" ever since I heard it was coming here, and this particular itinerary is a bonus because it goes to a few places that I have barely visited - Singapore, Perth and Adelaide.  And, the fact that it leaves from Singapore also makes it an easy start since we can fly direct from Canberra to Singapore these days. 
I'll definitely be trying out the North Star - a big viewing pod that swings out from the ship and gives you great views of the ship and the ocean.  The Ripcord and Flowrider are out of my comfort zone, I think, but I'm pretty sure to give the Arcade a go!
Another opportunity from cancelling our plans for the 38 day Southampton to Singapore cruise is that it left a Princess 'Future Cruise Credit' (FCC) unused.  Most cruise lines have something similar - for Princess you buy these onboard for $200, and then later you get to book a cruise with them using only the FCC for deposit.  And, as a bonus, they give you a small onboard credit on the next cruise - in this case $200.  So, effectively, $200 for free (although I don't kid myself here; they're not going to be making a loss on these things!)  We originally used the FCC for the 38 day cruise but you don't lose it when you cancel the cruise, so this time I took the opportunity to use the FCC to book another cruise.  And it's another ship that has been on my 'must do' list for a while - the Majestic Princess.  Smaller than the Ovation of the Seas, but newer.  And with enough mod cons that I really wanted to give it a try.
So, we're now also booked on a Sydney - New Zealand - Sydney cruise on the Majestic Princess in February 2019.  Plenty of time to see if the new kitchen bankrupts us or not  :-) 

Another change of plans

Our house was built in 1975.  When we bought it in 1992, the kitchen was still the original and already in need of overhaul. 
It's now 2017, of course it's still the same kitchen, and it really can't wait any longer.  Talk about a horseshoe nail - the plumber can no longer replace the washer in the tap, as there's no metal left to seat it on.  To replace the pipe, the wall needs to be knocked out. And to do that, almost all the cabinets in that part of the kitchen have to be removed.  There's no way to remove them without destroying them, and once you remove them half the kitchen is gone.  And, really, renovating half of a 42 year old kitchen??? 
So, we'll be renovating the entire kitchen, back to the bare walls and starting from scratch, because we can't replace the washer in the tap :-)
And, it hasn't take us much time to realise that next year's big holiday has now become an extravagance we probably can't afford on top of the big unknown that the kitchen renovation is already becoming.
So, that cruise will be cancelled - no money lost, we had only paid a small deposit and we'll transfer it to another cruise.
We'll still probably have a smaller holiday; in fact I've already paid a deposit on a cruise on a different ship I'm also really keen to see - so, we're already booked on a 14 day re-positioning cruise on the Ovation of the Seas, leaving Singapore on 19 October 2018 and coming back to Sydney via Perth, Adelaide and Hobart.

Wellington and the Great War Exhibition

Back in October 2015 we were on a cruise and found ourselves in Wellington quite unexpectedly. 
At the time we promised ourselves that we'd get back to Wellington to see the Great War Exhibition, and now we're going to do that.
I have the first week of January 2018 on leave - the original intention was to extend my enforced Christmas leave and go on a cruise (which would have taken us to Wellington).  However, we decided against that in the end; cruises are just too expensive during the school holidays.
So, instead, I'll be doing my first non-cruise-related trip to New Zealand.  Singapore Airlines flies direct from Canberra to Wellington which is really convenient; going to Sydney first is an expensive and slow way to get out of the country.  We're going to fly there on New Years Day and back on the Friday.
The only serious plan we have is to visit the Great War exhibition, but there are certainly other things to see and do in Wellington, so it should hopefully be a nice (cool!) break before my last few, hectic months at work.

On another note, we're now getting to the point where it's possible to start planning for next year's big holiday and cruise.  As is always the case, we're going to have to settle on a date fairly soon - this time the controlling factor is the flight out of Australia. 
We're going to avoid the "Canberra-Sydney-huge flight to London in economy" approach this time.  Instead, the plan is to fly direct from Canberra to Singapore in economy, then fly business class with Finnair to London.  Their business fares are quite reasonable, particularly given that we're only flying one-way.  But, we're going to have to book soon to get a seat.  So, it looks like we'll leave here on 2 October 2018. 

Retirement update

Well, the "retirement cruise" truly is going to be a retirement cruise.  I have told the boss that I'll be finishing up work sometime between January and September 2018.  Most likely I'll work up to Easter (so, the end of March) then I'll use up all the leave I have available at the time, and retire once the leave runs out - so sometime in April.
As far as the holiday is concerned, this means we can now spend some more time in England before the cruise. Originally we had to keep it to only about a week, otherwise I would have rune out of leave before we got to Singapore.  That's no longer an issue 😏.

Well, I had a failure to post!

Last time I posted here was on 12 March, talking about our little upcoming cruise - but I didn't ever report back.
Well, we did actually go on the cruise.  The suite was wonderful - the bathroom was bigger than the one in our house, the balcony was really nice (but the weather wasn't all that clement so we really mostly got to see rain falling on it) and the in-suite breakfast was just stunning.
We won't ever be able to afford to cruise in a suite again of course, but it was great to give it a try!

4 days to go

All of a sudden it's March, and our little "Sydney to Brisbane" cruise is only 4 days away.
This one hasn't needed a lot of planning - we're getting the train to Sydney, cruise to Brisbane, and flying home.  And, for the two days in Brisbane we only need a hire car and a place to stay on the Saturday night, both of which are organised.
I've been so busy at work I haven't had much of a chance to think about this little holiday, but it should be interesting - this is almost certainly the only time we'll ever cruise in a suite, so I'm looking forward to seeing how the other half live!