January 2024 - Cruising from Sydney to Auckland then relaxing in Rye

Another year has started and, with it, we kicked off our first trip – a cruise on the Viking Orion from Sydney to Auckland.

My Dad had booked this cruise but was not well enough to go and asked us to go in his place. We didn’t need to be asked twice!

We missed our eldest’s birthday (he turned 28) but he and his fiancée were holidaying in Singapore anyway so I didn’t need to feel badly about that! Their wedding is at the end of the year so I will have a married child this time next year. Wow – when did I get that old??!

The cruise was fun. The timing wasn’t great as it coincided with the other 3 kids and partners being on holidays. We ordinarily would have had lots of family time at Rye but, instead, we were sailing the High Seas! Also, we would not have chosen to cruise so soon after the cruise to Antarctica.

Having said all that, we enjoyed it. We flew to Sydney (an adventure in itself as wild storms closed Melbourne airport twice whilst we were there!) By the time we arrived at the Viking Orion at the White Bay Cruise Terminal, the restaurants had all closed service. We had room service on our balcony looking at the Sydney skyline so it was a lovely end to a stressful day and a lovely start to our trip.

The first full day of the cruise was in port so we Ubered to the Sydney Cricket Ground for Day 1 of the (cricket) Test between Australia and Pakistan. I had been to the SCG to watch AFL (football) but never cricket so it was a fun experience. We then had the privilege of sailing under the Harbour Bridge and out of Sydney Harbour. We did this once before – in 2017 as an extended family group doing a South Pacific cruise. We were docked at Circular Quay that time though so we had never cruised underneath the Bridge. It was a windy evening but warm and we stayed on deck until we were well out in the Ocean. Sydney is a magnificent port to cruise out of/into and we savoured every moment.

Next stop was Geelong and we did the included excursion which was a bus tour to Queenscliff. We had quickly worked out that 98% of passengers were elderly Americans. For nearly all that we spoke to, this was their first trip to Australia and to New Zealand. (They all looked to be 75-85 years' old so I am assuming this was their first and only trip to “this part of the World” as they referred to it).

We have been to Queenscliff many, many times but to hear a local talking about Melbourne, Geelong and Queenscliff and to see the other passengers’ reactions was a treat. I felt very proud to be a Melburnian, Victorian and Australian. The highlight of the trip that day was stopping by the side of the road to look at a group of 20 odd kangaroos sheltering under a tree. I hope the Americans knew that this wasn’t an everyday occurrence!!

From Geelong, we sailed to Hobart. We had decided to travel independently that day so had booked a tour of Cascades Brewery. We walked off Constitution Dock and slam into a replica of Douglas Mawson’s Antarctic Hut. We were unaware that it was even there and had a lovely hour or so reading all the information displayed. It was extra special given that we had just returned from Antarctica.

The tour of Cascades was interesting. It was a historical tour rather than a brewery tour so we learnt all about how the Brewery started. The founder, Peter Degraves, had run away from a pile of debt in England. Short story is that the debt caught up with him and, whilst he was serving 5 years in jail in Hobart for those debts, he came up with the idea to change his Hobart business from saw milling to brewing beer! The brewery continues to operate today and Cascades is the oldest brewery in Australia, dating from 1824.

From the brewery, we walked a short distance to Cascade’s Women’s Factory (formerly a women’s convict prison). The site is practically bare but it comes to life via a QR code which contains narration and stories. It was a very moving and sobering experience.

Two rough sea days followed (just as rough as the Drake Passage crossing from Ushuaia to Antarctica). The Orion is a lovely ship and we enjoyed Hathi yoga, the pool (under a closed roof due to the rainy weather), eating (!!) and generally relaxing.

The next few days were a port a day – Dunedin, Christchurch, Wellington, Napier, Tauranga and, finally, Auckland. We had been to NZ twice a long time ago – 1995 (North Island) and 2006 (South Island) – so we were keen to return. We had bad weather in Dunedin and Auckland but, luckily, we had sunny, warm days elsewhere. 

Each city had something special but we particularly enjoyed Christchurch, Napier and Rotarua (which we accessed from Tauranga).

Christchurch is just so pretty. We loved walking around the Botanic Gardens and past the Avon River. There are a few magnificent Gothic Revival buildings constructed of dark grey Basalt and we took plenty of photos of the cobalt sky against the verdant greenery and the imposing, dark grey of the buildings.

We had never been to Napier and we were stunned at the many preserved Art Deco buildings. It felt like walking through a film set.

In Tauranga, we organised a tour to the geo-thermal areas of Rotarua. The heat, the smell and the geysers were amazing!

We had a lovely time and we want to go back to NZ and see some countryside. Maybe in a motorhome if we dare?!

Back home to our kids and our doggies in Melbourne, we saw a couple of great musicals - “Grease” and “Groundhog Day” - and we have enjoyed a couple of weeks at Rye.

All the kids came down for the “Australia Day” long weekend and we had a lovely time together except that I contracted some bug and had no voice for the whole weekend! I am still coughing but on the mend.

In Writing Wins for the month, I had the Editor of GoWorld Travel Magazine email me  whilst we were cruising NZ and commission me to write two specific pieces about Australia. This is a first for me and I was (am) very excited. With some emailing to and fro, that request has turned into 6 stories – wacko!! Three are already written and submitted with one more almost done. I will link them here once they are published. I also have a couple of other travel articles in various stages of writing and publication – top secret at the moment!!

I am very excited and proud that, in less than a year of freelance travel writing, I am at the stage of having commissioned travel stories in publication queues. 

Writing about my travel writing made me feel a bit introspective. I went back and re-read this blog from the beginning in December 2022. Apart from noticing weird formatting in a couple of entries (which I will go back in and attempt to correct!), it is a happy read. It seems my initial misgivings about semi-retirement have been buried in many holidays!

I am very happy not to have the stress of running a business anymore. Not a business the size of the one we had anyway. As I mentioned, I am writing this recovering from a nasty cough so I look and feel pretty lousy but, ordinarily, I feel so much healthier than I did in the last few years of the business. I have lost some weight and lost some worry off my face. I have more energy and I am much more present. I am not perpetually preoccupied trying to solve a million issues and making mental “to do” lists. 

Having no children at school any more helps too. I have thought about this a bit the last week or so with all the back to school ads. Back to school was always a bit stressful – Who needs new shoes? Who needs new stationery? (Of course, all of them always wanted all new stationery supplies!) Have the books arrived? Do I have Contact to cover them? (I did give up on this in the last couple of years!) Which nights are the Information Sessions on? Are the kids in classes with their friends? Are their teachers OK? Have I applied for the new travel pass for the year? So many things that I don’t have to do anymore (picture me here gaily skipping down a path with a basket of flowers in my hand!)

I have had time to read lots of novels. Without guilt. I have had even more time to experiment with writing – some fiction, some memoir and a lot of travel writing. I have enrolled to do another self-paced writing course. This time on point of view so that I can write better fiction. Maybe I will have a go at writing a novel? I did write 20,000 odd words about losing and finding our precious doggo, Harry, but I felt there wasn’t enough in that story. It’s there though to do something with one day. Maybe. 

I am loving having the time to spend indulging myself in a hobby – writing. I could never have done that with the kids and the business. I was already spread too thin.

I also have my casual legal job assessing students to take up some time when the academic year cranks back into gear.

All in all, I think this semi-retirement thing is going quite well;)