BRUNEI & KOTA KINABALU

4 sea days from Darwin.  Lots of activities on board.  I took part in Runway at Sea.  The shops do not seem to be very busy so they did a little fashion show to showcase their clothes and jewelry.  We also attended the Chef's Table.  You start in the galley where they serve 5 different appetizers along with champagne.  Then it's up to one of the specialty restaurants where we had risotto with prawns followed by rack of lamb and a veal tenderloin, all accompanied with copious  amounts of white and red wines.  One afternoon there was a wine pairings.  It was basically a full meal with escargot, followed by a pasta dish and then a filet.  Each course was paired with expensive white and red wines.  Despite the amount of food it was really a wine tasting as we got about 3 ounces of each wine to taste.

BRUNEI  - Day 36 - Crossed the equator again on Monday.  City of Bandar pop around 420k.   Climate average 95.  Language - Malay, others - Chinese & English.  Currency - Brunei or Singapore $.   $1.00 US is about $1.41 Brunei.  Region of Bandar Seri Begawan is the capital and the largest city in the Sultanate of Brunei, a country of SE Asia located on the north east coast of Borneo.

Omar Ali Saifuddien Mosque - on the banks of the Brunei river, featuring marble minarets, golden domes with courtyards and lush gardens full of fountains.

It is important to recognize that many activities common and accepted in western cultures are prohibited and punishable under Sharia law - for example - wearing indecent clothing, refusal of woman to wear Hijab, use of the word Allah by Christians,  the discussion of faith by any non Muslim,  and, finally, homosexuality.  Bottom line religious laws prevail.  Alcohol is prohibited and smoking very restricted.

Dress - clothing which reveals shoulders and knees, such as shorts, short skirts, and tank tops are not appropriate attire.  You must dress with respect to the local culture.

Motor town? -Due to the lack of public transportation, low taxes, and low price of oil, Brunei has the highest rates of vehicle ownerships that are about 1 car for every 2.09 people.  Cars are usually new - didn't see any junkers around.  Even saw several cars with my Initals on their licence plate

The Sultan is 70 years old and is really loved by the Brunei people.  He treats them so well - free health care, free government schooling but if children attend an international school it costs from $800-1000. per month.  Once a year, usually in July, all citizens can go to his palace where they are treated to a buffet meal and then get to shake his hand .

KOTA KINABALU -  in Malaysia which is also on the Island of Borneo.  Currency $1 US is about $4.20 Ringgit , $1 Canadian = about $3 Ringgit.  Once a British colony it gained independence in 1963.  Diving & snorkling are popular.

Went to a wild life park where we saw clouded leopard, pygmy elephants, orangutans, proboscis monkeys, ankola cattle,  gibbon monkeys, sun bears, many birds including the bird of paradise - many are endangered.  There are more than 100 species of animals - the park covers  280 acres.

People of KK are very friendly -always smiling.  There is a lot of construction throughout the area - both buildings and roads.

#1 my new licence plate
#2 & 3 the Mosque
#4 the golden chariot  used in the 25th anniversary parade
#5 pygmy elephants
#6 sun bears
#7 proboscis monkeys

Cairns & Darwin

We're now on the second of 5 segments of our  cruise and there are 587 passengers.  16 different nationalities are aboard with 413 US and 74 Canadians.

We are now dining with a friend we met a couple of years ago on our cruise to the South Pacific.  She is on her 5th World Cruise and is booked for next year.

3 sea days from Sydney including Valentines day.  Princess celebrated by having an extensive brunch and formal dinner.  The highlight of the day was the Captain performing renewal of wedding vows for any interested passengers.  We were one of maybe 100 couples who participated.  The passenger choir first sang and then the Captain took over.  Many passengers obviously anticipated this as they had red apparel to wear.  One couple was dressed all in white and she even had the head wreath popular in the South Pacific islands.

CAIRNS -  Day 27  Home of The Great Barrier Reef - the world largest -stretches  some 1250 miles along the Queensland coast and is made up of more than 2000 islands and 3000 reefs - 90 minutes by high speed catamaran.  Cairns also serves as the gateway to one of the world's ancient rainforests with vegetation as impressive as the Amazon - has the largest concentration of ancient flowering plants in the world.  Pop - 144.  Temps at this time of year 90 to over 100 and very humid.  Cairns is also home of the Kuranda railway and many white sand beaches.

A hot and humid day in Cairns (95 with close to 100% humidity).  We did none of the tourist things as we've done the reef, tram and Kuranda railway when we were here before.  It was a day to get a haircut and buy wine.

DARWIN - day 31 -another 3 days at sea from Cairns.  Situated on the Timor Sea.  Located 2100 miles from Singapore and serves as a gateway to countries  like Indonesia in Southeast  Asia.  Pop about 135k.   Climate tropical which means it has  a wet and dry season.  Temps around 98 with high humidity this time of year and frequent showers.  Darwins - known as Top E nders drink over 60 gallons of beer per person per year.  Even more interesting is  the fact that they compete in the annual beer can regatta, a race featuring boats, rafts and other vessels made out of beer cans.

Darwin town center is cleaner and nicer than Cairns.  Len and a fellow he met in the gym did their version of a pub crawl - pubs are plentiful and he says the  beer was good, especially with the high temps.  More Aussie wine was on the shopping list.

1- some of the Whit Sunday islands on the way to  Cairns
2 -skyline of Darwin from the ship
3- sunset leaving Darwin

SYDNEY

Three sea days from Auckland in the Tasmanian Sea.  We expected the waters to be rough and we find them quite bumpy although seasoned travelers say it's the smoothest they've encountered.

SYDNEY -Day 23.  Pop - 4.6 million.  Highlights - one of the most beautiful harbors in the world.  Sydney Harbor Bridge nicknamed the coat hanger.   Sydney Opera House - world class performing arts center and is an UNESCO World Heritage site.  Other tourist attractions - the Blue Mountains, an area called The Rocks which is home to 5 star hotels, pubs, shops, galleries and museums, and Bondi beach.

We dock at White Bay cruise terminal.  It is a 20 minute shuttle ride to Darling Harbor - this must be in the middle of the night as it took us over 35 minutes to return to the ship.  It is the newest cruise terminal and terribly inconvenient.  There are 3 ships in port - Carnival got to dock at Circular Quay  Seaborne and Princess are in White Bay.  All passengers require a visa to enter Australia so we all have to clear customs when we arrive.

Darling Harbor is a tourist trap - many restaurants and expensive stores.

We did a walking tour from just outside Darling Harbor through several parks, past museums, past hidden bars, down to Circlular Quay and The Rocks.  Our guide was an Aussie girl who, with a partner,  formed the tour group.  Her mother is from Calgary and one cousin is currently working for some construction company on Lethbridge.

I can't think of any city we've visited that is as busy as Sydney.  It doesn't matter what street you walk down it is packed with pedestrians.   Everyone is talking or texting on their smart phones and paying no attention to where they are going.  There also seemed to be  more smokers than in the US or Canada.

Pictures are of the Harbor Bridge and the Opera house as we sailed in around 6 am

Vancouver and San Francisco are beautiful ports to sail into but Sydney I takes the cake.

Tonga/Bay of Islands/Auckland

Crossed the international dateline at midnight Monday.  Tuesday never happened for us so we hope nothing important happened that day.

TONGA - is one of the great points of origin and departure encompassing many, many islands.
Size - 290 Sq mi. ,  pop  - 12k,  language - English/Tongan.  Tonga is the only nation in the South Pacific with it's own royal family (a constitutional monarcy). Tongan society is quite conservative so people dress and behave modestly - even on beaches people tend to cover up.   To take photos permission must be granted.

We did a tour and found it quite interesting.  They refer to Tonga as The Kingdom, have a king &  queen, drive on the left, mandatory that they attend school from 6 to 18 years, have free medical coverage,  are mostly catholics although the king is methodist, and retirees get a pension of $65/month - not sure if that is US $  (1 US is equal to 2 local).  Climate always 30+ and humid.  Very friendly people.

BAY OF ISLANDS, NZ - from Tonga we head south for 2 days to NZ.  Next stop Bay of Islands which is 149 mi north of Auckland.  Bay of Islands stretches over the Pacific Ocean north of NZ north island.  Climate is semi tropical.  Pop 58k,  currency ANZ.  There are 144 islands in the Bay of Islands.  Home to a big variety of marine life and birds including little blue penguins and playful dolphins.

This is a tender port so we are anchored in the bay looking at just a small portion of the many islands mentioned above.  Everything we can see is very green - the dark green of the trees and an almost lime green for the rest of the vegetation.

The village is a tourist town - many tours for sightseeing, fishing.  It was a Sunday and a holiday weekend so many places were closed but there was a market, a lot of souvenir shops and restaurants  open.

AUCKLAND - day 19.  Sitting on the tip of NZ's north island with the South Pacific Ocean to the north and the Tasmanian sea to the west towards Australia.  Pop -1,500,000, temp this time  of year around 75.  Currency -NZ $ - (1$ US is about $1.5 NZ - about par for Can $).

Auckland is a cosmopitan city just waiting to be discovered by walking,   Also, explore the wine country - world renowned Pinot Noirs.  Auckland is popularly known as the City of Sails - has around 135k yachts sitting in her harbour (more per capita than any other city in the worid).

We did a walking tour around the downtown and harbor areas.  A lot of new modern buildings mixed with the old.  The waterfront reminds us of Fisherman's Wharf in SF, but better done.  The guide told us that Auckland has become very expensive and more homeless people have appeared in the last few years.

Finally, don't be sheepish - there are around 9 sheep for every person in NZ - since there are roughly 4 million NZ, that's a lot of sheep

Picture 1 - entertainers at Ancient Tonga; #2 - on the way to town at The Bay of Islands; #3 - kauri trees in Auckland.

American Samoa

Jan 29 -  Crossed the equator today.  Rainy but warm.  Tonight is formal with a Captains cocktail party prior to dinner.  Awards were given out to the top 3 most traveled guests on board.  The top prize went to a couple who have over 1700 days aboard Princess ships.

Food - has been very good with a wide variety of choices.   We have bananas,oranges, kiwi, papaya, blueberries, raspberries and strawberries to start each day before we get into the main course.  We then skip lunch.  Appetizers come out around 5 and then dinner at 7:30.  There's been lobster, a lot of shrimp, salmon and several other varieties of fish, chicken, lamb, veal and, of course, steak.

Entertainment - all the entertainers seem to perform 2 nights while on board - never the same show.  If you ever hear the name Tom Franek go see him.  He's a pianist and is quite amazing - among other things he can lie on the floor while playing.  The production shows have small casts compared to the bigger ships - 8 singers and dancers including the 2 stars.  All very talented.

Am. Samoa - Feb 1 -  day 13 of 94

A total of 6 islands (54 Sq.  miles - pop. 58k - located halfway between Hawaii and New Zealand - 4200 miles southwest of San Fran).

We land at the village of Pago Pago (pop 12k).  Language - English, Samoan.  Govt - US territory similar to Puerto Rico.  The islands are currently separated into AM Samoa and the independent kingdom of Samoa (in other words some of the islands have kings).  American Samoa citizens cannot vote in the US election.  In the waters are turtles and sharks.

Currency - U S  $.  Temp. -90 degrees minimum and humid.

We understand that Am. Samoa has all the bad habits of the US - Drugs, gangs, etc.