Perth, Australia and the Indian Ocean
What a difference in topography. Here it is flatter, much drier. Some of the kids who are 6 years old have never seen rain. We took a free hop-on/hop-off bus around the port town of Fremantle and decided we didn’t have time, nor the inclination to go into to the big city of Perth. Fremantle was small, quaint and manageable. They had tons of museums, so we chose to see the maritime museum and then visited the market. Honestly, that museum had far more maritime information that I thought was possible. Of course, Carter read every blurb, but I found some very soft benches and “rested” while he did a thorough investigation.
The sun here is intense, so you can understand why the people of Australia have more melanoma than anywhere else in the world. There was a cool breeze, thank goodness. The market was much like the Pike Street Market in Seattle, so we did some browsing and even found some crushable hats that offer great UV protection. Then we took our last money and bought some dried fruit – mango, papaya and apricots. Unfortunately, it was so good that none of it every made it to our room. It was eaten by the medical staff when we stopped by the infirmary to let them know that we were back on the ship.
Poor Carter has been constantly busy with work. As he says, he has only seen one detached retina in his career of ER and in the last 6 weeks, he has seen 2 cases. Then the next great challenge has been dentistry. This is the first year the world cruise has not had a dentist, so Carter is learning dentistry quickly. He had to have 5 dentistry consults just in Perth. Luckily, they had a wonderful dentist there and he had heard only rave reviews about her. Too bad we couldn’t kidnap her for a while.
Two days ago the Captain gave his 1pm report and said that we were heading into Typhoon Nicholas. He said he would try to stay away from it as best he could, but that in the early morning we might be experiencing rough seas and high waves. This was not reassuring, but what can you do? You are stuck on the ship and you go where it goes. I decided that losing sleep over it would be stupid, so I slept well that night and awoke to a little rolling, but no discomfort. Yesterday at 1pm the Captain announced that he was able to totally avoid the typhoon and although we would experience a little rain, we wouldn’t have the winds. What a relief!!
Carter has befriended one of the older women who lives in the Suites (in the olden days that would be the 1st class cabin). He was joking with her that he had heard that the toilet seats were made of gold – and she instantly invited us to tea for yesterday afternoon. The tea was lovely, with enough food for 20. Carter didn’t let much go to waste but he is working out hard this morning to try to limit the damage. The Suites are lovely, probably 3-4 times the size of our cabin, plus a verandah. But they are on a level higher than ours and I find the movement we get a little excessive. Carter announced after the visit that the toilet seats are NOT made of gold.
Bali is next. Carter has arranged for many visitors who work for the company in Jakarta. Hope the medical clinic isn’t crazy, so he can attend to the visitors and it isn’t my responsibility.
Labels: Personal
posted by Hills @ 6:37 PM
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