Day 4 - Sydney to Darwin 19/5/12

Day 4 – Sydney – Darwin 19/5/12

At the time of starting to write this the update from yesterday has still not been able to uploaded dur the connection just hanging, and or dying.

I thought writing this blog may become a chore, but so far it has been quite enjoyable, it is as relaxing as reading a book. Speaking of books, when we left home I was ¾ of the way through Book 2 of Game of Thrones. I downloaded all the rest of the books in the series onto the iPad, thinking that would keep me occupied...but..I left book 2 at home..and I cant start reading book 3 in all good conscious yet...bugger. So I have started another paperback to keep me going, with the intent of buying yet another copy of book 2 when we get to Darwin on Tuesday.

With the Pilot still on board guiding the ship, we continued northwards through the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. At about 8am we passed about 2 miles Frankland Island, and a couple of hours later we passed Fitzroy Island. The seas have been incredibly smooth all the way up. Apart from a little bit of lumpy stuff when exiting Sydney Heads, the first few days have been as smooth as we experienced in South China Seas last year – TAKE NOTE DIANEE !!!! :)

We sailed really close to the coast today, hugging the shores as we passed Cairns, and then Cooktown about 2pmish. There are clearly defined lanes through the reefs and shoals of the Marine Park, which we assume the pilot is fairly pedantic about following for obvious reasons. About 7pm the ship passed Cape Flattery.

A bit of a lazy start today, we still got up about 7am, but decided to have a sedate start to the day for a change, and we did our exercise in the afternoon, Zumba (Donna) and laps (Steve). A yummy breakfast again – yep smoked salmon on toasted bagel, with a dollop of cream cheese – again – just cant resist it. We had breakfast with couples from Brisbane, Perth and Sydney – so far everyone we have met have been nice folk.

We made it to Trivia today, so we had the full team batting, and yet again we were 2 answers off the winning score. A 30 min Trivia game becomes a 90 minute social catch up, with the ladies chattering away..ok, maybe the men too, when we can get a word in LOL.

Lunch in the Restaurant (of course), was yummy (of course). We met a mum and daughter from Ballarat who are getting off in Dubai, but are continuing to travel through Europe for a few months. Another couple from Gold Coast (Surfers) and a couple from Lake Macquarie who actually did the full round the world cruise in 2010 on the Dawn Princess.

Other than the little exercise mentioned earlier, the afternoon was mainly spent relaxing on Promenade deck, watching the coastline, which was quite close, thankfully not as close as the Costa Concordia !!

We did finally get the cabin a bit more sorted..yeah yeah, I know it is day 4...but you know we have been kinda busy doing nothing, and if you try and do nothing really well, it can be quite taxing. Sooo, we have finally finished unpacking, stacking all the winter woollies under the bed for when we may need them in the North Atlantic.

Pre dinner show tonight was a combination of the comedian George Casey, and singer Mark Preston..again quite entertaining.

Suffice to say, another yummy dinner in the restaurant. Our dinner table folk are becoming more familiar with each other, and quite a bit boisterous...good fun. And we are together every night for the whole 14 weeks..sheesh.it could get ugly:)

Happy Birthday Rob !!! xxx