Author Archives: Neil

This week, Neil and I have been in the three largest cities in Australia. The first stop was Brisbane. It is a gorgeous city that has a wonderful botanic garden and miles and miles of bike and hiking trails winding within the urban landscape of a vast downtown expanse. We met many friendly Aussies andContinue reading “Sunday, 8 March 2020—Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, Australia”

Today is Neil’s 30th birthday and we are on the northern portion of the eastern side of Australia. Yorkeys Knob is a small beach community that is on the outskirts of Cairns, the regional capital of far north Queensland. It is a small place and because our “Ocean Liner” is so large, it could notContinue reading “Sunday, 1 March 2020—Yorkeys Knob and Airlie Beach, Australia”

Today we alighted in the delightful and relatively small city of Darwin—about 125,000 population. It was named for Charles Darwin who, as we all know, published The Origin of Species in 1859, but mulled over the research for it for several years prior. From what I gathered here today, however, it was only Darwin’s crewContinue reading “Monday, 25 February 2020—Darwin, Australia”

We have been on our “Ocean Liner”—or boat—now for a week straight. The Corona virus, which is obviously a serious issue, caused a lot of caution for people who make important decisions about people’s lives and their health. If this issue was not bizarre enough, we have a person on board now—a big English televisionContinue reading “Tuesday, 18 February 2020—Fremantle, Australia”

It is all messed up. The Corona virus has altered just about all our plans and many other people’s as well. Although Neil and I will not be able to stop in any anticipated Asian ports, the anguish caused for many others is far more extreme. For example, my brother, who had a Fulbright ScholarContinue reading “Tuesday, 11 February 2020—Kelang, Malaysia”

I am ashamed to say I had never heard of Muscat or Oman prior to our voyage. Yet, after we arrived and walked around the city of over a million people, as we were told, we found Muscat to be a delightful place. The mostly Muslim people we encountered were quite friendly and easy toContinue reading “Wednesday, 5 February 2020—Muscat, Oman and Colombo, Sri Lanka”

We have been at sea until yesterday since we last checked in with our friends on 24 January. Then we set out from the port at Aqaba in Jordan. You might think six consecutive days at sea would be boring—and it certainly has that potential. Yet at least two things helped us keep our sanityContinue reading “Friday 31 January 2020—The Run Up to Dubai, United Arab Emirates”

On our second day in port at Haifa, Israel, Neil and I traveled about two hours by bus to Jerusalem. For the second day in a row it rained steadily in Israel. Despite this obstacle to photos and such, we went to the Garden of Gethsemane and the church attached to it. Some of theContinue reading “Thursday 23 January 2020—Haifa, Israel and Aqaba, Jordan”

It is odd, after being a Christian and a church-type for so many years, to wake up on the Sabbath and physically travel to places like Nazareth and Galilee. We awoke rather early today and caught a bus to Nazareth. There we got a look at the Basilica of the Annunciation which experts repute toContinue reading “Sunday 20 January 2020—Haifa, Israel”

Neil pushed me vigorously in Lisbon a few days ago (in a caring way, of course). We did our own walking tour of this remarkable and quirky city. It is built, as the locals told us, on seven hills—as is Rome if my memory serves me well. All in all, my trusty Fitbit revealed thatContinue reading “Thursday 16 January 2020—Messina, Italy”