Thanks David, for letting us know the terrible news from Victoria in your blog comment - as you can see from the previous blog, we've been totally out of contact. We're feeling for everyone in Victoria - a blog comment might be the best way to let us know how you're getting on.
God Bless!
Frances & John

Back in the Southern Hemisphere

Apologies for our non-communication ... when we crossed the equator, the ship lost all web communication for two days! We feel totally cut off - particularly as our emails don't seem to be coming through either!
Fortunately, this is a wonderful way to be cut off - life on board the Carnival Splendor is totally sybaritic ... we wake in the morning, watch the sea from our bed, discuss whether to get up for breakfast (which we do, eventually, as it's too good to miss). Then we go to the library, and the web cafe, before meeting friends for lunch. Sometimes we even exercise in the afternoon, before a superb dinner, a show, drinks with friends etc etc - or else we go ashore, and soak up the great places we visit.
Yesterday we made our first Brazilian visit, to the city of Fortaleza ... yes, you've never heard of it ... but it's HUGE - about 3 million people - with more highrises than Brisbane and Melbourne combined. We went to the cathedral (really modern and simple), a market, and several of the beaches ... saw very few locals as this was before midday - even the first mass, for the early risers, doesn't start until 12 noon, as most people party on until 5am, then sleep most of Sunday.
Tomorrow we go to Recife, and the World Heritage town of Olinda. We're not doing this on an organised tour, but on our own - it will be interesting to see how we get on!

From the Caribbean

Two days in the Caribbean, and we're feeling homesick ... we couldn't get over the similarities between the islands and home!
Dominica is, of course much more mountainous than the Sunshine Coast, and MUCH poorer, but almost every plant we saw was one that we knew from home. Birds were different - a great big Sisserou parrot, and tiny green humming birds, but we even saw many gum trees and sheoaks, as well as almost every plant we have in our garden. We travelled to a splendid waterfall, drank rum punch, and admired the marvelous cricket ground, donated by the Chinese Government!
Barbados is MUCH wealthier - near Bridgetown, the capital, are hundreds of million-dollar mansions, but all across the island people seem to have a comfortable lifestyle. We hired a car, and took new friends Janet and Collette (sisters from Pennsylvania who sat on the floor with us while we waited out the bomb scare as we were boarding in Fort Lauderdale) on a tour of the island - they were impressed that we could handle a right-hand drive car! John had a great talk with Garfield Sobers' cousin - with so many American tourists, anyone who loves cricket is greatly welcomed!
Lunch was at Bathsheba, on the far side of the island, fried flying fish eaten in a little shack with red, green and yellow shutters, then we headed back through spreading canefields, past herds of Nubian goats and more familiar plants. There was a Pirate Party last night, but we went to see a ventriloquist perform instead - the entertainment is terrific.
Rougher today, now that we're out in the Atlantic - 12 foot waves, we're told. Some are suffering, but we're still enjoying the wonderful cuisine - and walking lots, so that we don't roll home!

All aboard! ... ?

Well, here we are on the Carnival Splendor - at last! We were due to board at 1.30 Saturday Afternoon, in Fort Lauderdale, but spent the next 8 hours shut in a shed with 1200 others! Somehow, there was a bomb alert, so we waited ... and waited .... and waited, knowing that those on board ahead of us were eating a delicious lunch and drinking champagne - while we sat on a floor and waited hours for water! We're luckier than some, though - 500 or more people tried to board without a Brazilian visa and were turned back - if they get one in Miami today, we'll meet them in Barbados on Wednesday.
Eventually we made it on board the Splendor at 9.30pm - so tired that we didn't unpack until after lunch on Sunday. But it's worth it, now that we're here. our stateroom is roomy and bright, with a glass-fronted balcony so that we can see the world go by - yesterday we saluted Samana Cay where Colombus first landed in 1492, and San Salvador, his second island stop. If the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria "sailed the ocean blue", they were luckier than us so far - the Caribbean is a very gloomy sea so far, but we hope that it will be sunnier in Dominica tomorrow.
The Captain's cocktail party tonight - John resplendent in evening dress, of course - and we'll join new friends there ... sharing a corner of concrete floor with strangers soon develops friendships! Fortunately the ship is so big that there's LOTS of walking, so we hope that that will counteract the superb meals we're eating ... we'll see. We've heard of fires in Victoria - hope all is well for all of you.

That's LA for ya!

Safely arrived in LA, in awe of the QANTAS service- it truly couldn't be faulted! After arriving at the Sheraton (luxury, to use up the Agoda points from our Japanese trip in 2007) we headed for Union Station to make the bookings for our train trip in 7 weeks time, using the wonderful Dash buses, which go every 5 minutes, and cost a quarter (25 cents) no matter where you go.





Union station is a delight, built in 1939 in Art Deco style, and completely unchanged since - this COULD be because they haven't got around to it, if it's anything like the service we received!





Eventually, though, we headed to the Pueblo de Los Angeles, one street away. This Mexican area is the original site of Los Angeles, and bursts with life, colour and music. It's a wonderful place, which we visited briefly last time we passed through LA, on a train, and couldn't resist revisiting.





As we headed back downhill, everything began to happen - A U-Haul truck screamed around the corner beside us, followed by four LA Police cars, 3 police motorcycles, an LA Police helicopter low over us, and news helicopters. Everyone was talking about it, and it was headline news on TV that night and the next day ... as a Mexican schoolbus driver told us ... That's LA for ya!

Mexican for lunch, Japanese for dinner - and then we slept ... for twelve hours! We were thoroughly refreshed then, though, to set off around LA on the tourist trail again. Macy's was first, as it's attached to the Sheraton - however we didn't stay long as it was so lonely - never have we seen a store with so few customers. We wandered the streets for a while, lunched at Ralph's, a 'fresh food market' that we'd love to take home with us, particularly the roast dinner bar, then back onto the Dash.

This time it was down to USC and then back to the Downtown area with the bus full of red-clad teachers, heading for a rally to protest against the imposition of compulsory 'furlough' days without pay, imposed by the Californian government as a cost-cutting exercise. We avoided the rally and headed for the Central Library (all six storeys of it) and then back around the streets, with a lengthy visit to an antique bookstore where John found a soulmate in Leonard, the proprietor ... LA was fun, because of the people we met.

We're ready to go! Our house-sitters, Terry and Sue, have arrived. Our ports are packed ... and Theodora the cat is sleeping on them, so that we can't go! We leave home at 8 tomorrow morning ... depart Brisbane on QANTAS Q15 at 10 past 12 ... and get to Los Angeles at 8 am the same day!



We think that we'll sleep all the way - it's hard work spring cleaning the house from top to bottom, so that it looks perfect for incomers! We've been blessed with visitors every day for the past week, too, so life's been hectic.



We had thought that we might have finished yesterday, and had time for a bit of a rest while everyone else partied for Australia Day. Instead, we were asked to be down at the park in the centre of Coolum at midday, for a surprise, "in your best bib and tucker"! Of course, all our good "bibs" and "tuckers" were packed, so we had to UNpack the bags ... and just as well we did, because it turned out that we are now the Coolum Citizens of the Year!! It almost seems a bit rude to say "Gee, thanks for that, and now we're leaving you for three months" ... but it hasn't put us off.



Next blog will be from Fort Lauderdale, where we'll board the ship. South America, HERE WE COME!

Our plans

We plan to leave on 28 January 2009, and to stay away until 27 April 2009.

First we will fly from Brisbane to Los Angeles, with QANTAS, and spend a night there, to allow ourselves time to acclimatize, and to book our AMTRAK tickets for mid-March. Then we travel overnight, on an Alaska Air/American Airlines codeshare, to Miami. We'll spend a day and a night in Fort Lauderdale before boarding the Carnival Splendor, at Port Everglades, the port at Fort Lauderdale on 31 January.

Once settled in our balcony cabin (sorry, 'stateroom'!!) on Deck 6, we spend two days at sea, travelling to the Caribbean, then spend a day on the tiny island of Dominica and a day on Barbados. We plan to travel on a guided tour in Dominica, but will hire a car and drive ourselves around Barbados.

Three more sea days, including an Equator crossing, and we arrive in Brazil, where we visit four ports over a week - Fortaleza, Brazil's 4th largest city - Recife, and the nearby World Heritage town of Olinda - Salvador, where we plan to travel 80km north to a turtle rookery - and Rio de Janeiro, fortunately just before the carnival, which we believe is wonderful but super-overcrowded.

We'll reach Buenos Aires, in Argentina after two more sea days. This is the end of one cruise, and the start of another - we are technically doing three cruises, but like some 1400 other passengers we are continuing on from one to another back-to-back. Buenos Aires is the only port where we spend two days, and John's looking forward to 'following in the steps' of Evita Perron ... the real one, not Madonna! Those of you who know John's musical and dancing skills will appreciate the fact that he's NOT taking tango lessons!

From Buenos Aires we suddenly travel north again, briefly, to Montevideo in Uruguay, then southwards to Puerto Madryn on the pampas. Here we'll travel to a sea lion colony at Punta Lomas and a Welsh village at Gaiman.

Cape Horn is, of course the destination we are keenest to reach, but we'll only be able to 'round the Horn' if the weather is satisfactory - if not, we may have to stick to the Beagle Channel. At Ushuaia, the Argentinean port from whence many people head to the rocky Antarctic Peninsula, we plan to experience Tierra del Fuego on the narrow-gauge train line previously used by prisoners consigned to this frigid outpost.

In 1972 , when the Chilean Revolution took place, John was visiting Punta Arenas, on the Strait of Magellan. These days, we believe, it sports multi-storey buildings, paid for by nearby oil wells, but we plan to view them only briefly, on our way to visit an estancia a couple of hours away.

Punta Arenas is more than 3000 km south of Santiago, and the nearby port, Valparaiso. It will take us six more days to get there, cruising the Strait of Magellan and the Chilean fjords on the way, and stopping at Puerto Montt to visit the Chilean lakes district by bus and catamaran. The second cruise finishes in Valparaiso.

We have one more stop in Chile, at arid Arica in the far north. Some people will leave the ship here to fly to Macchu Pichu, but we've chose to book a trip to the National Park at Lauca, more than 4500m up into the Andes, hopefully viewing geoglyphs, Inca ruins, villages, llamas, vicunas, cactus forests, volcanoes and lakes with flamingos on the way. We'll continue on by ship to Callao in Peru (where Torres' voyage, so dear to John's heart, began) and visit nearby Lima as well.

Our last stop in South America will be in Ecuador, at Manta. Apparently this area is the home of Panama hats (NOT Panama !?!?!) and we plan to visit some of the villages where they are made and sold, before heading back across the equator for three days at sea on our way to Mexico.

Our two stops in Mexico are at Acapulco, where we hope to see the famed cliff-divers, and Puerto Vallarta, where, unlike the many beach-seeking Americans on board, we hope to travel into the countryside to visit a number of little villages.

Although the ship travels on to San Francisco, we have arranged to disembark at Long Beach, near Los Angeles on 19 March, as this will give us several more days for the land-based section of our trip. We'll spend a day at Disneyland (in honour of the Mickey Mouse toy Frances so loved as a small child) and the next day plan to catch the Texas Eagle for a two-day trip to Fort Worth Texas. Our reason for stopping here is to catch another train for a four hour trip to Oklahoma City ... why? ... well, we haven't been to Oklahoma before, and this is the best way to get there, so we'll stay a couple of nights and look around.

Back to Fort Worth again, and on for another day through Arkansas and Missouri to Chicago, where we plan to spend a night before continuing on to Minnesota, to stay with our friend MaryAnn Stellmach - we spent Christmas with MaryAnn and her late husband Bob in *, and are keen not only to visit her, but to see the Stillwater area when it's not covered with snow. After a week with her we'll hire a car, hopefully to visit friends in northern Wisconsin and Minnesota, and will then travel west to the Black Hills of Dakota for Easter.

From here we'll head for the Little Big Horn in Montana, and travel further west to the Rockies. We'd love to have gone to Yellowstone National Park, but it's always snowed-in until May, so we'll continue southwards to Salt Lake City, where Frances is looking forward to attending a refearsal session of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and also hearing an organ recital.

Then it's westwards again, to Lake Tahoe and to Yosemite, where we'll spend a couple of nights before heading to visit friends at Avila Beach near San Luis Obispo CA. One last day's driving and we'll be back in Los Angeles, ready to catch the plane home. On the 13 hour trip to the USA we technically arrive in LA 4 hours before we leave Brisbane, but because of the International Date Line our 14 hour trip home takes us from 11pm on Anzac Day to 6 am on 27 April.

As you can imagine, we're really looking forward to our trip - but no doubt it will be great getting home top Coolum, to Theodora the cat (who's being looked after by Terry and Sue, our house-sitters) and our own beds! We promise to 'blog' as often as we can while we travel!