Five Days and Four Nights on the Indian Pacific Railroad--And Our Trip Ends

The Train is Late

No, the train ran on time, at least some of the time. I’m the late one. We completed our journey on the Indian Pacific railway, slept a short night in Sydney, and then spent nearly 30 hours getting home. Use of the internet was limited on the train and on the airplanes and our time in airport lounges was spent while exhausted. Finally, alas, the battery on my iPad has reached the end of its life. It’s good for only a short time away from a charge cord. (I have a decision to make before we depart for Mongolia and China on August 30th.) Hence, this is an after-action report, written from a few notes I recorded during the experience and extraneous stuff after that to keep you entertained, such as the credit card I just found out has been compromised, probably while in Broome. That issue consumed much of our first day at home. Never a dull moment, however I would welcome one.

From my notes:

Five Days and Four Nights on the Indian Pacific Railroad

I’ll be sparing you my recent habit of providing a new posting almost daily.  Not that little is happening. Each day on the Indian Pacific has activities on and off the train, but maybe both readers and this writer could use a break. Plus there is limited online capacity while on the train and the internet is available only in the lounge/dining car. I’ll add notes each day and inundate you at the end of the train trip.

This, you may recall, is not our first ride on an Australian train across the continent. Only this time, rather than travel north-south, as we did on The Ghan five years ago, we are traveling west to east, Perth to Sydney. For this trip we upgraded to a cabin with a double bed, brought down in the evening as a murphy bed, much like our cabin on the Trans Canada rail last year. What is a relatively spacious cabin during the day becomes quite crowded with the bed down. Storage space, as you would expect, is limited. In fact, we put everything we wouldn’t need, or at least hoped not to need, in our large bag, which has been stored in a baggage car and, hence, unavailable to us before reaching Sydney. 

Our train, in both directions. We have yet to see the engine or caboose. (Ok, cabooses don’t exist anymore.)

Frances and I each decorate ourselves with some Australian fauna.

The cabin’s shower is decent, once one gets used to being a pinball in the shower thanks to the rocking train. And the lighting in the cabin and bathroom is good, which is more than I can say about several of our recent hotel accommodations. (Backlights behind mirrors may be stylistically fashionable but are miserable for shaving or for Frances putting on make-up.)

Our first evening was a disaster for me. All the riders of our class (“platinum”) met for dinner in the dining car. The din was too much for me. I couldn’t even understand Frances as she tried to speak to me during the meal—even with Roger (my hearing aid accessory) assisting. But the food was good as it has been thereafter, mostly. The following meals have been somewhat quieter, thank goodness, with everyone not eating at once and the tables spread out.

The Indian Pacific has 28 cars. As I implied above, I can’t see both ends of the train at once. There are over 200 passengers. The staff serving us are young and friendly. Most of the passengers in our class of service are older, although, to be honest, we are now on the higher end of this older range. And the first Americans we met on board? From Austin, Texas, if you can believe. They, too, have just finished a cruise of the Kimberley, although on another cruise ship.

The first morning after departure was to include a tour of Kalgoorlie and the iconic Super Pit. It was here in 1893 that Paddy Hannan stumbled across serious nuggets of gold, hence igniting the largest gold rush in Australian history. The “Golden Mile” of Kalgoorlie has since produced 38 million ounces of gold. Much of this was and is being produced from the “Super Pit”, a colossal open-pit mine now nearly two miles in diameter and over a half mile deep. The mine operation is still going strong.

I wrote “was to include” as our visit was extremely curtailed. In the middle of the first night there was a medical emergency on board for which the train had stopped for two and a half hours. The tour in Kalgoorlie thus was reduced to a drive-through of a quite interesting town and ten minutes overlooking the Super Pit. Curtailed or not, I am grateful we had at least this opportunity. It’s an awesome sight.

Two bus-window shots of buildings in Kalgoorlie. It’s a quite well-preserved gold rush town. I missed taking shots of the brothel or the Catholic church constructed of bricks made from unrefined ore from the pits, meaning still containing gold. Does a worshiper just chip a piece from the building to put in the offering plate?

Views of the Super Pit. It’s hard to describe how massively large it is. The owners are investing another billion and a half dollars into the mining operation, meaning the gold is far from being played out.

Even with a 3x telephoto taken of operations about half-way down the pit, the machinery looks tiny. The machinery is far from tiny as Frances in the right photo can attest.

One exception to the good-food compliment was the morning snack we received at the Kalgoorlie rail station. The tour originally was to start at 6:00 a.m. before our return for a brunch. The several-hour delay didn’t change this plan. At the station I eagerly accepted the pudding-like offering--and managed one bite. When we finally got our brunch, we were hungry—and, fortunately, satisfied.

The terrain, as we travel east and deeper into the interior, changed from lightly forested to scrub plants. We’re passing through the territory of Nullarbor, which means, in Latin, “no trees”. It’s an accurate title. Earlier we passed Rawlinna, a sheep station with over 30,000 sheep spread over two and a half million acres of land. I didn’t spot any sheep at that time, but later spotted a half dozen cattle, making me wonder how animals scattered over so much territory are ever efficiently rounded up. I know that helicopters are now used—but still. For this stretch the tracks are dead straight for almost 300 miles, the longest such stretch on earth.

Our last stop of the day was in the town of Cook, current population: two. Once a modest town of 200, Cook’s reason for existing, a train stopover, refueling, and train-driver change oasis, is now a minimal operation. Had the night been clearer and the moon less bright (it’s full), the star gazing would likely have been outstanding. We settled for a partial view of the heavens and a tolerable tawny port. In the cool of the evening, those who chose the hot chocolate were happy. It is winter in Australia, after all.

Intended as a star-gazing opportunity, our brief and chilly stop in Cook was devoted to evening drinks and conversation.

Monday morning we were greeted by a sunrise that cast the train’s shadow midway up some distant trees. Small groups of sheep and kangaroos dotted the countryside. One lone kangaroo I saw was immense in size. We even passed a large, very shallow lake, a temporary phenomenon of the wet winter weather.

Our cabin is on the south side of the train, with the rising sun casting the train’s shadow on the distant land and vegetation. These photos through our window don’t quite capture the gold and dark contrast on the passing landscape.

Mid-day we passed a massive wind turbine complex. Someday, perhaps, we’ll figure out how to use less energy producing, transporting, constructing and maintaining these machines than each produces over their twenty-year lives. Plus I know that Australia is working to address the problem of storing the produced energy, with massive batteries in Adelaide, for instance, for periods when the winds aren’t blowing and, for solar, when it’s night.

When we were near Adelaide, we disembarked from the train and were bused to Steppeltsfield Winery in the Barossa Valley for wine tasting and dinner. Neither was a disappointment. The wines were young (the rose bottled just this year) but drinkable, especially after being paired with appetizers. The big treat, though, came when we were all served a tasting of a 102-year-old port. Seppeltsfield Winery was established in 1851, making it one of the oldest wineries in Australia.

Left: The requisite picture of the wine barrels of a winery; Right: Our food-wine pairings. The salmon was my favorite, with or without the wine.

Nearly 200 of us were served dinner at one time at the winery, and the meal was excellent, even without considering the generous pours of the lubricants throughout the dinner and after. A special treat was the band that played during dinner and long after. All the music was vintage American (and some British) pop, played and sung by a guitarist, a violinist and a keyboardist. Most of us danced at least some of the time and the Australian staff seemed to enjoy and dance to the music as much as did we old fogies. The hosts sent us off with one more glass of port. It was a fun night and few of us would have survived a random roadside sobriety test.

Left: Texas line dancing in Australia! Right: An absolutely excellent band, and with good voices.

We re-joined the train late Monday evening at the Adelaide rail station. Yet another glass of port awaited us in our cabin. It didn’t take us long to fall asleep, although, to be honest, we had a tougher time staying asleep that night during the frequent changes in speed and rocking cars.

The rain caught up with us for our morning excursion to Broken Hill, called the Silver City. We had a choice of one of five excursions and we chose the generic Silver City overview. As implied by its name, the city was and is known for its mining operation. Parts of the tour were interesting, but the on-bus part was not our favorite, what with rain-drop covered bus windows and, for me, uncomfortable bus seats. The seats were very upright and, worse, were form-fitted at the top. For medium-sized persons, I’m sure they were quite comfortable. For those of us on the taller side, the curved headrest dug into shoulders and forced one’s posture forward. I finally found relief in the back seat of the bus. One sits on the engine there and the view is only to one side, but at least I could relax.

The town of Broken Hill has many buildings preserved from its early heritage. The home on the right is, shall we say, more modern. The architect claimed these were build to confuse his children when he told them to go stand in a corner.

The weather improved enough to visit the miner’s memorial and enjoy the view of the city below, as well as our waiting train. Yup, there are indeed 28 cars plus two engines.

Left: On the city’s overlook is the Lode Miners’ Memorial, with the names of all miners killed during operations documented, including date and cause of death. Right: A hilltop view of Broken Hill. Our train is below and (in a wider view) we could see our entire train.

The last stop was to visit the city’s Sulphide Street Railway & Historical Museum, which included several smaller museums in the same complex. Sulphide Street, not exactly a conventional street name.

Left: The last steam engine. Right: A Dodge railcar.

A few more of the museum’s trains on exhibit.

Here my notes end, so I’ll make things up now. 😊

Our last morning was a return to the Blue Mountains outside Sydney. It was a repeat of a tour we took in March 2020, but certainly worth the second visit.

Left: A last dawn view from the train. Right: The Blue Mountains, so named as, like the Blue Ridge Mountain range in the Appalachians, the mountains often have a blue haze.

Views from the cable car. Our route actually included two cable car rides and a steep railcar ride once use by miners.

Left: The Three Sisters. On our last trip we hiked to them. This time, a picture sufficed. Right: I took this same photo during our 2020 trip to the park. There was coal mining half-way down the cliff to this and nearby spots.

Left: We walked part of the elevated boardwalk through the Blue Mountains National Park. It’s very much like a rain forest. Right: I lost a staring contest with this raven-like bird.

After the visit to the Blue Mountains, a charter train took us all to Sydney station, where we reunited with our luggage. From there, we and the McKennas were driven to stay the night in a hotel close to the airport. We had a morning flight to catch back to the U.S. Our last supper in Sydney was at an excellent Indian restaurant, found previously by Brian. Brian won’t like this, but he is so good at selecting memorable restaurants, that I’ll defer to his choices as often as possible. An action passed is an action completed. Sadly, we’re not scheduled to travel again with the McKennas for a year and a half, so, until then, Frances and I will have to find special places to dine on our own.

Last thoughts on our train ride:

The train was an unexpectedly rough ride. These are not the smooth rails of European trains and I don’t remember this degree of pitching and swaying on the Trans Canada run, although there was the familiar clickety-clack of the rails. (Maybe it’s the fog of memory erasing the less pleasant moments of the earlier rides.)

The McKennas made it back to their home in 20 hours, hotel to home. We took almost 30, thanks mostly to a miserable connection time. (Over seven hours in the Vancouver lounge) The flights were on time, the meals mediocre to really bad, and the wine satisfactory. The only true aggravation was on arriving at the Austin airport. It took an hour and five minutes before our one checked bag arrived at the carousel. But at least it arrived. (AirTags give one a feeling of comfort that their luggage has indeed made the trip.) I wonder if it was Air Canada or Austin airport that was the problem. We “ubered” home, the first time we have not driven our own car to the airport since 2015 (our six-month European saga). Our driver had never been to Georgetown before, but, with map apps, that is no longer an issue. Despite the $100 charge, I was glad not to have to drive that last hour late at night.

I just learned that Air Canada flight attendants went on strike. We’re home just in time!

So, indeed, we’re home, dead tired, but happy that we have another trip to clog our memories. This third trip to Australia likely will be our last. We’ve been to places in Australia that even most Australian have yet to visit. Nevertheless, we will not be putting away our suitcases. In two weeks, we leave for a month-long journey to Mongolia, China and Tibet. We have 14 days to get our energy and enthusiasm back up to operational levels. Wish us luck—and thanks for reading.

The McKennas and the Dallens drinking a port over 20 years older than any of us--and giving thanks to our continued experiencing of the wonders of world-wide travel.

The Bells of Perth

Perth

Having been to and reported on Perth in my posting of seven years ago (geez, time flies), I’ll limit my comments to a few highlights of this visit. We spent four nights in the Quay Perth hotel, in a room with a great view of the river and, while quite comfortable, oddly minimalist in its in-room amenities. For instance, there are no towel bars in the bathroom and only one peg (near the shower). We draped our wet towels over the bathtub.

While, for our stay, our view was great, the foundation of a building between the hotel and the riverfront is being prepared. I wonder how the hotel will fare when that new construction destroys the view.

The view from our room and the Elizabeth Quay  area

More pictures of the quay area

For our first full day, we did a lot of wandering, visiting the original court house, now a museum, and exploring St. George’s Anglican cathedral. We returned to the cathedral later to listen to a concert.

In the Supreme Court and Government House Gardens

Government House and the old court house, the oldest building in Perth

St. George’s Anglican Cathedral. We came back to watch much of a concert by a high school chorus and musicians. A violinist playing Vivaldi was quite good.

The town is filled with statuary. The stern-looking one in the middle is of Fanny Balbuk Yooreel, an aborigine. Actually, they all look stern.

More in the park area. It’s winter, so the roses have been cut back to stalks.

The day after our return from Rottnest we toured the Bell Tower. As the elevator was out during our originally scheduled tour, we changed to a later one that included being on the level where the huge ANZAC bell played at noon. The bell was cast and installed in 2018 to commemorate the sacrifices and war dead of the Australia New Zealand Army Corps, which lost so many men during the Gallipoli campaign of WW I.

The Bell Tower

As part of the tour, we got to ring several of the famous Swan Bells, twelve of which are bells first cast in the 14th century and originally mounted in the belfry of St Martin in the Field in London. 

We’re each ringing one of the Swan Bells. At first, it’s a bit tricky getting the rhythm right. Right: The ANZAC bell, 14330 pounds. Its peal is a deep, mournful tribute to the ANZAC dead and brought tears to our eyes.

For having toured while the ANZAC bell was pealing, we were given medallions. We then went to the Perth Mint (which we had visited in 2018), where the medallions were engraved with our names, gratis. To get there and back while avoiding the arriving rain, we jumped on buses in both directions, without a clue as to what we were doing. (Within a limited area of downtown, bus rides are free, at least that is what we understood. Everyone before us mounting the bus “clocked” in, which made us nervous.) We just guessed where to get off. Sometimes you just have to be lucky.

At the mint and our engraved medallions.

That evening, the rain abated and we were able to walk the twenty minutes to an excellent restaurant, a recommendation of the McKennas, who patronized the place the night before. The ceviche was particularly good. In fact, all the restaurants we have been to in Perth have been excellent.

Left: The BOONJI Spaceman statue. Right: We pass Government House one more time on our return from the restaurant.

It’s Saturday as I write this and it’s steadily raining, our first adverse weather of the whole trip. We’re stuck in the hotel lobby for four and a half hours, waiting for our transport to the rail station. We tried taking a walk during a pause in the rain, but we had to scramble back to the hotel when the rain returned. I suppose we could have hired an uber to visit one more attraction but we’ve gotten lazy.

The rain is expected to be significant and lasting, a weather event called “training,” with a relentless series of showers. Oh, get us to the train.


The Quokkas of Rottnest Island

We’ve made it to Perth, on the far west coast of Australia. This is our second visit, the first being in 2018, at the end of a trans-Pacific cruise and at the start of another two weeks visiting a bit more of Australia—including a week in Tasmania. But you’ll have to dive into the archives for pictures and notes from that visit.

We started each day in Perth with a hardy breakfast in the hotel’s streetside restaurant. We’re staying at the Quay Perth. I have a hard time remembering to pronounce Quay as key.

I normally create postings in chronological sequence, but I’ll deviate from this a bit. We have four nights in Perth this visit, and in the middle of the stay we spent a full day on the island of Rottnest, 12 miles off the coast of the continent and 20 miles from Perth. It is now a vacation destination and beautiful nature reserve, 85% if it devoted to the later function. It was once the location of a notorious prison for aborigines found guilty of crimes under British law. Given it is the winter season, the crowds were reasonable. I would hate to come to the island at the height of the tourist season.

But first, the name: Rottnest. It means Rat’s Nest in Dutch, a name given by Willem de Vlamingh in 1696. This is because the island was and still is a major habitat for quokkas, who the Dutch thought must be huge rats. There are still 10,000 quokkas on the island, its only mammal. All larger animals died out 7,000 years ago when Rottnest became separated from the mainland with the post-ice age raising of the seas. It’s also been uninhabited since then, as the aborigines built no boats. (Yet, aboriginal lore accurately described whales off the coast that could only have been seen by ancestors viewing from the west/Indian Ocean side of the island.)

(Random aside: If Rott (or Rotte) means rat, does is Rotterdam mean Dam on the Rat River?)

The ferry ride to Rottnest first navigated from a pier near our hotel in Perth to the busy port of Fremantle. From there we crossed the 12 miles to Rottnest. The water was choppy, which we understand is typical.

These lighthouses framed the entrance to Fremantle Harbor. The monument (presumably a sail) greeted us on our arrival at the island.

The island is surrounded by a ring of reefs, once and still hazardous to navigation. Two lighthouses and other markers are in place to aid seafarers.

The island is all state owned and the few all-year residents are those who work the evening and night shifts for the island’s services. The rest of the employees commute from the mainland, on the same ferries we tourists use.

Besides being a beautiful nature reserve, there are over 100 species of birds that either reside on the island or use the island during migrations from as far away as Siberia and Alaska. A warm tropical current (the Leeuwin current) moves along the island from the northwest while a colder current comes from the south. This brings to the island a great mix of fish species and other sea creatures. 

As I alluded to above, an early use of the island was for a prison for aborigines. It opened in 1838. (The British arrived in 1829.) The first prison warden was particularly cruel and over 10% of the 3700 prisoners once incarcerated there died while in custody. When the prison closed in 1931, the structure was next used to house holidayers for eighty years. The complex is now closed and in the process of being restored as a museum to its original use.

Left: A resting place. Right: The entrance to the prison complex.

During WW I and WW II, the island was used as an internment camp for Germans and Austrians (WW I) and then Italians (WW II) living in Australia. But for most of WW II Rottnest was a fortified bastion protecting Fremantle Harbor and its submarine base, the largest allied submarine base after Pearl Harbor.

The islands use as an internment camp didn’t completely disappear. From March to May 2020, the island was used to quarantine Australians and foreign visitors coming into the country. Why? COVID, of course. We were in Australia during March 2020, you may recall, and took one of the last flights out of the country to return to the U.S.

There is a small museum housed in one of the older island buildings that describes much of the history of the island. It is located near the oldest surviving building on the island, a small structure that is now a tiny Anglican church. 

We walked to one of the lighthouses, then on to the restaurant where we had lunch. The lunch of fish and chips was excellent, but Frances, against her wishes, shared part of hers. We had been warned about the seagulls, but they attacked her platter aggressively. You think I am the only one of us who loses one’s cool? You would have been surprised at the language Frances used after a gull snatched one of her fish. (We still had more than enough to eat.)

We climbed up to the Bathurst Lighthouse. It is operational and not open to visitors.

More welcome beggars were the quokkas, one of which looked up at me with pleading eyes. Alas, I was a heartless soul, so the quokkas moved on to more promising tables. So much for quokkas being shy, nocturnal animals. (With ten thousand of them on the island, a few had to develop abnormal behaviors.)

Quokkas are normally nocturnal but we spotted several score roaming the area. And the rock in the air? The island had several interesting constructions.

Left: This is Frances with her lunch, before the raid by the seagulls. Right: How could resist the pleading eyes of this quokka? Alas, I figured fish and chips might not be their preferred food, so abstained from sharing.

Left : Quite a few of what were residences of the islands early administrators are now lodges for those on holiday. The island has hundreds of more conventional lodges. Right: Inside one of the smallest and humblest churches I’ve ever visited.

With the splendid reefs, Rottnest is a snorkelers’ and SCUBA divers’ paradise. However, the primary tourist activity on the island is cycling. Rottnest is a perfect place for exploring by bicycle.

We took a guided bus tour around the entire island. The seas were turbulent and beautiful. The interior is covered with forests, both sparse and dense.

There is a second lighthouse (Wadjemup) in the middle of the island. Right: The remnant of an old wreck.

Left: Scores of bicycles are loaded and unloaded on the ferry. Right: This is the first time I’d ever seen eFoils. They followed the ferry for quite a distance while we were cruising in the Swan River. So did a few kayakers ride the wake of the ferry, albeit with aggressive paddling.

It was a wonderful day with perfect weather. Rains are coming, but that is a problem for another day.

Next post I’ll return to our activities in Perth, a city that we enjoyed very much. 

A Day in Broome

Broome, the capital of Kimberley. Population, 17,000. That’s 42% of the total population of Kimberley, an area the size of California. Founded to support the pearling industry, Broome is now an active tourist destination. We’ll have but one night here before boarding a Virgin Australia flight to Perth.

We disembarked the Pursuit at 9:30 a.m. and boarded a cruise-provided bus to be delivered to our four-star rated luxury accommodation, the Continental Hotel. Four star? Google and TripAdvisor must have a sense of humor. We waited several hours before our room was ready. The delay clearly was from limited staff as the vast majority of rooms were, to our eyes, not in use.

And our room? A square, white walled minimally furnished accommodation, with a queen bed, a single stool-like chair and a cabinet for luggage and clothing. There were four hangers( which, in truth, was enough for a night). There was a patio door leading to a semi-private area with a table and two chairs. This was the “upgrade” we had requested.

OK, it was fine for one night and the bed was comfortable enough and the shower sufficient.

So, what to do for the rest of the day in Broome? Our decision was to walk the mile and a half to the Japanese cemetery, which we heard was worth a visit. It was, but we didn’t walk. As we exited the hotel a taxi was discharging its passengers. Five minutes and $8 later we were dropped at one end of the cemetery complex. We wandered through the Anglican,  Malay, Moslem and Catholic sections and, when we reached the far end, had fears we were trapped. But the gate there that looked to be locked, wasn’t, and we exited, turned right and found the Japanese Cemetery.

Random pictures of the cemeteries, with many old and unmarked graves. Plastic flowers are a common decoration of the gravesites.

The Japanese cemetery was restored a few decades back and is quite attractive.  The Chinese section is supposed to be nearby but perhaps is merged with the Japanese section. There is an aboriginal cemetery close by in a forested area, but we couldn’t find it. I suspect we were not supposed to find it.

After that visit we walked the quarter mile to a shopping center for a light lunch. (Remember Woolworths and Kmart? They’re still around, at least in Broome). Even that short walk in the heat convinced us to flag down another taxi and head back to the hotel. That was the extent of our daytime exploration of Broome.

The McKennas visited the Broome Museum and quite enjoyed their visit. We’ll have to read Brian’s write-up to get the details.

That evening, the four of us patronized a Thai restaurant in what is called Chinatown. Maybe it once was an area where Chinese lived, but now it is an interesting stretch of shops and restaurants, laid out in small clusters of establishments. Our meal was absolutely delicious. (Pork Panang Curry and Shrimp Pad Thai for the curious.)

We had brought into the restaurant two bottles of wine we had saved from the cruise, a white and a red from American wineries. The red, a pinot noir, was sealed with a cork. The waitress had to look around for a cork screw—we had forgotten that almost all wines bottled in Australia, both red and white, have screw caps!

This is about all I can report about Broome. We did have an amusing incident at breakfast at the hotel. I had ordered two servings of granola at the counter. A man waiting for his coffee walked up to get it and tapped the credit card reader to pay for it. Only, it was my charge he tapped to pay. “No worries,” he grinned, “I’m on a business trip,” and refused to attempt a correction. (The cashier was relieved.) I paid for his coffee.

The Broome International Airport is wonderfully small and ours was the first flight out this morning. When we land in Perth, two hours and twenty minutes south, we’ll finally leave the warmth of the subtropics and begin experiencing an Australian winter.

Top left: Woolworth’s and Kmart, alive and well? Top right: Should you find yourself in Broome some evening, check out this restaurant. Bottom: The departure board at the airport, with a purely Australian attitude toward keeping passengers up to date. 


The Cruise Comes to an End

It’s our last day on board the Seabourn Pursuit. We skipped this morning’s excursion to Hidden Island. Its sandy beach was certainly inviting to many and one last zodiac ride was tempting, but so was sleeping in and enjoying a leisurely latte. Actually, we were up early enough to watch the sun rise, albeit in our bathrobes.

Our after sundown departure from Talbot Bay

Watching the sun rise at Hidden Island.

Besides packing for our disembarkation next morning, we attended two lectures. One was on the history of Broome and, at the second, we enjoyed the photographs taken by the ship photographer, Harry.

I pondered whether to recap our experiences over the last ten days, but I’ll settle on just a few comments.

You will recall the difficulty Frances and I had over four days getting from Austin to Darwin. Those memories are now fully submerged by ten days of exploring a remote and beautiful land, the Kimberley—all while experiencing the pleasure of being lodged in a luxury suite on a luxury-level expedition ship. It’s doubtful that Frances and I will ever again luck into such a special suite. (We are still mostly clueless as to why the multiple discounts came our way.) We are also getting to that age where zodiac rides are becoming problematic. This doesn’t mean we’re giving up cruises, mind you. We’ve made down payments on several over the next few years.

This was our second cruise with Seabourn. Both were on one of their expedition ships. (The first, you may recall, was our trip to the Amazon.) Seabourn is generally of the same high level as Regent, Scenic, Oceania, and Silversea. Our Viking and Gate1 experiences have been river cruises only thus far. There are differences among them, but these are becoming vaguer in my mind over time. We like smaller cruise ships and the Pursuit is no exception.

I am very impressed with the quality of the internet connection (StarLink) and hope the other cruise lines adopt an equally good service.

Argh. I have been wearing hearing aids for over  40 years. This evening I walked into the shower and, for the first time ever, began shampooing my hair—with my hearing aid in. I am now certifiably senile. I say aid, as one of them is being repaired by the VA. Fortunately, the hearing aid survived its bath.

I’ll finish with a few pictures taken by the expedition’s photographer. I especially like the crocodile. It’s been a most memorable voyage. 

The Horizontal Falls and Cyclone Creek

Well, a frustrating electronic disaster just occurred. I had just complete the draft of my latest blog posting when I lost every word of it. After several desperate but unsuccessful attempts to recover some of it I received our travel-mate’s daily posting. Brian methodically produces a daily log, as opposed to my more cavalier timing. Reading his blog made me realize his was a better description of the day’s activities than was mine, I’ll simply use his write-up and hope he forgives me. I’ll use my own pictures. He has a better camera (it can’t be the photographer’s talent, of course) which I don’t want you to get used to. 😏

Brian’s write-up:

“Another good day yesterday.  We arrived at the Horizontal Falls right on time for the full flow of water from the upper pool to ours.  To call these falls is a bit of a misnomer but in fact at times there can be a very significant drop from the upper pool to where we were in the zodiac.  It can be about a 13’ drop at times and ours was about 5-6’. 

The falls are located in Talbot Bay and are a natural phenomenon where tidal currents create the illusion of waterfalls flowing horizontally.  This occurs due to the region’s large tides (up to 33’ difference) forcing massive amounts of water through narrow gorges in the McLarty Range.

With zodiacs we could only approach the falls and feel the force of the water and the whirlpools created by the current.  Which was plenty of fun and action.  There is a jetboat company that is quite an operation.  It actually goes through the falls and onto the next level of falls about a half mile away.  Then it shoots through the falls again on the way out.  It’s the Horizontal Falls Company out of Broome.  They fly you out of Broome in a seaplane, it lands at an artificial island where, for even more money, I’m sure, you can stay overnight and probably make several rides through the falls.

Just checked, it’s about $1000 for a half day adventure and over $2000 if you want to stay on their floating island overnight.  Not cheap so glad it was included in our cruise, even if we didn’t jet through the falls. 

After all that excitement of the falls, we then cruised through Cyclone Creek.  This was a beautiful cruise through canyons of rock that clearly demonstrated how active geologically the area is.  While on the King George River we saw rock formations that were strictly horizontal.  In this creek you could see how the rock uplifted and folded and just how massive amounts of rock and earth move over the thousands of millennia.  Our zodiac driver was Keith and he gave excellent talks on the geology and also on all the little critters one can so easily miss.  He’s a big fan of those mud skippers and, while we didn’t see any of them, he did point out several little crawly things and crabs along the shore.

He also explained why the creek got its name.  It’s a series of winding turns that go farther and farther into the canyon.  And thus it provides quite a good shelter for even large sailing vessels when there are cyclones.  Each time we came to a turn in the creek, we’d look forward and there would be another one. 

Later in the afternoon several of us in the higher suites got a very nice private visit to the bridge.  We got nice explanations of the equipment and how the ship navigates through the tidal channels and narrow passages.  The staff captain had a nice Irish accent and came from Cork.  He spends three months on a ship and three months at home.

For dinner we invited the Dallens to join us on our veranda as we sailed through the narrows and watched a beautiful sunset and then a clear star filled night sky.  An excellent end to a very good day.”

We approach the falls.

We are in the gap. The four-engined speedboat when through the gap to the next gorge.

Another shot of the falls plus a picture of the seaplanes used to bring in tourists from Broome.

The fascinating geology of Cyclone Creek

Left: The “Kimberly Rose” and, no, I did not angle my camera. Right: Beyond each lagoon-like stretch was yet another.

Left: Fiddler crab; Middle and right: Both active and abandoned termite mounds.

The McKennas and the Dallens on the ship’s bridge.

Montgomery Reef

The largest inshore reef in the world is located off the Kimberly coast. It’s 154 square miles in size. Virtually all of it is submerged in high tide. When the tide recedes, lagoons and islets emerge, with water cascading down into the channels for hours, before the rising tide covers it all again. The tides rise and fall by forty feet. As fish struggle to get to the main waters during the ebbing tide, birds and sea creatures of prey are waiting. All this happens twice a day. The waters teem with wildlife. David Attenborough featured this reef in one of his many wildlife specials.

For our own trip, initially we enjoyed the tumbling waters flowing every hundred yards or so from the rising reefs. At first I thought there weren’t an exceptional number of birds to view—but then we turned our attention to the channel waters. Here we saw numerous turtles and many other aquatic animals. I at first tried to capture the sights on my iPhone, but eventually I gave up and enjoyed the show. We watched an eagle ray leap many feet out of the water, likely to evade a shark. We saw a nearby shark and a gigantic sea snake (and a smaller one). Turtles were so numerous that we stopped calling them out when spotted. We will have to wait until the end of the cruise to get access to the extraordinary photos the ship’s photographer has been taking.

The larger of the two sea snakes we saw was large indeed.

I filched from the internet a drone shot of the reef draining process and a picture of an eagle ray mid-jump. The one we saw was going the other direction.

For many, the afternoon excursion was a visit to Freshwater Cove. The highlight here was exceptionally colored aboriginal wall art. Unfortunately, the route to the art was declared to be arduous, so we missed the tour. Brian went so we’ll get a summary and perhaps a few photos from him. I’ve included a photo with an example of the art as shown at our briefing. All this is a reminder to readers to travel as much as possible while one’s health, stamina and physical condition can take best advantage of what our world has to offer.

Missing the hike allowed us to attend a ship captain’s reception for a small group of diamond-level cruisers plus those of us in the high-end suites. (We’re learning how the other half live. We could get used to this—as soon as our lottery number hits.) I’m glad we went as the hors d’oeuvres were lobsters and caviar.

Tomorrow it’s the “horizontal falls”.   


The Pearls of Kuri Bay

Today’s excursion was a change of pace. We were given the opportunity to tour an outpost of the pearling industry. Pearling in the Kimberley began with the aborigines. The first Europeans arrived in the 1860’s to exploit the abundance of pearl oysters, the large-shelled pinctada, which produces large, high quality pearls. The locals tend to refer to the entire animal as a pearl. Hence, so will I unless my descriptions get confusing. (No comments about all my descriptions being confusing. 😁) It was not until the 1880’s that the industry became well established, centered on the town of Broome. Isolated Kuri Bay was and remains a particularly abundant site of pearls. However, until the late 1950’s, harvesting the animals produced only an occasional pearl (only one in a thousand). The primary product was the shell, commonly called mother of pearl. Mother of pearl was used for buttons, jewelry, inlays, and other ornamentation. At its peak, the Kimberley area, despite its remoteness and frequently hostile environment, accounted for 75% of the world’s pearling production.

In the early 1950s, the industry collapsed, due both to over-harvesting and by the introduction of plastic for buttons and other uses that displaced mother of pearl. Later that decade, the Japanese developed techniques for cultured pearls, which revitalized the industry. There have been ups and downs since, but with quotas on the number of pearls harvested and other improvements, pearling is back and thriving.

Our visit was to the Kuri Bay facility of the Paspaley Pearling Company, operating (with third generation ownership) since the 1930’s. There are about 40 personnel in Kuri Bay. Access is only by sea or seaplane. There are no others around, beyond perhaps a few aborigines. The few attempts at farming and ranching have failed due to the area's hostile environment (from poisonous and venomous plants and animals to cyclones). The wonderful weather we have enjoyed has hidden these extremes from us.

Photos I took from a hilltop above the settlement.

As we docked the tide was out and we were barely able to land at the end of the dock. Two hours later, all the moored boats were afloat.

We took a guided walk around the facility and the adjacent hill.

Right: lodging for the workers.

The pearling operation goes on all but three days a year. Employees work four weeks without break and then have two weeks off. They are transported between Kuri Bay and Darwin or Broome twice a week by the company’s seaplanes. Seaplane rides were offered to us, but we passed on the opportunity. They were far from free.

Back to the pearling operation. It’s not an easy process. Pearls (the complete animals) are collected by divers being pulled along by eight ropes trailing a slowly moving craft. Air is supplied from the boat. The more pearls collected, the more the diver earns. It is exhausting work but not nearly the grueling experience the divers in hard hat suits once experienced with a whole day underwater. Air for the divers was hand pumped from the boats until the early 1900’s. It is estimated that 10 to 25 percent of these deep sea diver died from the bends and related problems. In 1910 the U.S. Navy issued, for the world, dive tables to be used to avoid the bends, but for many years this guidance was ignored by the industry.

Photos of photos of the pearl collection process. The boats pull eight divers at once.

Once the pearls are collected, they are cleaned, seeded with a bead made from a Mississippi muscle shell (for some chemically desirable reason) and placed in racks in the sea to grow and mature. The pearls are raised, cleaned and returned to the ocean every three weeks. When three years have passed, the pearls are removed from the racks and opened. 30% of the pearls are near perfect spheres, a percentage the pearlers are always trying to raise. The rest of the animal is not wasted. The pearl meat is considered a delicacy, tasting similar to abalone, and the market for the shell (mother of pearl) is again growing. We tasted ceviche of pearl meat and it was delicious.

Our guide, who was excellent—and who loves the pearling lifestyle—opens a fresh pearl shell. His family lives in Darwin.

The pearl we found was nicely round. Shape is but one of five grading criteria, the most important being luster.

This legacy phone booth was the only non-radio contact for employees with the outside world until wifi and other modern communications. Middle: “Our” pearl, but we could not keep it. Right: Pearl meat ceviche.

I thought I would include here the statistics for our passengers’ nationalities. We are told most Seabourn cruises have a large majority of Americans as passengers. This cruise, being relatively short and with an all-Australian itinerary, is an exception.

AUSTRALIA 177

BELGIUM 6

HONG KONG 2

NEW ZEALAND 12

SWITZERLAND 2

UNITED KINGDOM 5

UNITED STATES 44

As for the crew, more than 30 countries are represented.

Late in the afternoon whales were spotted off the bow. We could observe them from our veranda. Brian’s photos of the event were much better than mine, so I will use his.

On our return to our suite, we were greeted by an over-the-top towel creation, and outside we enjoyed another beautiful sunset.

We ate in the sushi bar that evening. Meanwhile, the McKennas, not fans of much of anything out of the sea, particularly raw fish and sushi, indulged in a multi-course feast in their suite. It’s a great cruise.


Ashmore Reef

First, a reminder to myself: Never edit and post to the blog at 5:00 a.m. So, apologies for the miscues in the last post. I’ll try to keep my typos, misspellings and convoluted sentences under the civil engineer’s 5% acceptable error rate standard.

A Cruise for the Birds—and Turtles and Fish: Ashmore Reef

Two hundred miles off the northwest coast of Australia is an atoll of low-lying islands and coral reefs that, by shape and condition, would appear to be an artifact of long extinct and eroded volcanic origin. Rather, it is an uplifted shelf. No matter. Ashmore Reef contains several marginally vegetated islands, several purely sand islands, and an extensive complex of coral reefs. Today the reef is a marine park and nature preserve.  A large variety of birds nest on the islands or use it as a stopping point on their migrations. Only one cruise ship a day is allowed to visit.

A territory of Australia, Ashmore Reef’s proximity to Indonesia (100 miles) causes it to be a place of people trafficking and asylum seekers. Indonesian fishing boats also dot the area. For us, it was a destination for viewing birds, an occasional turtle and reef fish.

Getting to the reef from the Australian mainland involved ensuring all veranda lights were off and windows covered to prevent birds from crashing into the ship in the night. The next day, a booby did land on the deck just below our veranda, but it visited for just a few minutes before resuming its fight.

We opted out of snorkeling for the day, deciding on a zodiac ride around the reefs. The morning was perfect for both the snorkelers and sea-top viewers.

The zodiac ride was not our first event for the day. Both Frances and I indulged in early morning massages, as good a way to use up our shipboard credits as any. The massages were worth every penny. (Silly us, we went into the ship’s small shop with our credit in mind and saw some attractive tanzanite jewelry. Thinking a few small pieces would be good gifts, I inquired as to the price of a nice-looking broach. “Normally $8,000, but for you $4000,” was the reply. We smiled, bought a tube of sunscreen, and left.)

We were on the first zodiac to depart the ship for the reef area. There is a strict buoy-marked path from where the Pursuit was moored to our destination area. A nearby Australian coast guard ship enforces conformance to the rules of the visit.

We were greeted by boobys, frigate birds and sea turtles in route. While our focus was to be bird viewing, the water was so clear  and calm that we spent much of our time watching the coral reefs below. Our guide declared that this morning was the calmest and clearest (in looking down at the reef) she has ever experienced.

The top left picture is of a green sea turtle. We saw several turtles, but they are visible on the surface for only a second or so, taking a breath of air before slipping back under the water. The picture below is of an injured or ailing bird. Our zodiac guide called it in. Assistance would be on its way. I really don’t know what they will do to help. The other pictures are just notional examples of the many birds in the air or on buoys around us.

Don’t look for anything special in the pictures beyond a blurry fish or two. We really did have a good view of the reefs.

The left-hand picture is of passing stingrays. On the right, a booby held court on the deck of our ship, just below our veranda.

Left: This seemingly derelict survival craft is used to temporarily “house” trafficked persons who were intercepted in route to Australia. They are eventually returned to Indonesia. Right: The Pursuit’s bridge is a marvelously modern operation. 

Scenes of the Ashmore Reef.

After returning to the ship, we had a busy afternoon, including a talk on sea turtles, the standard day’s summary and next day’s plan, a reception, and a dinner with the hotel manager. That humble title is deceiving. He is responsible for all operations involving passengers. Stefan is Austrian, but now lives in Cape Town, South Africa. He works two three-month shifts a year. A odd lifestyle, perhaps, but one with the benefit of six months off each year. 

Somewhere in between these activities we visited the bridge. Meanwhile, our perfect weather is morphing into something with a bit more wind and waves. Now I’ll have an excuse for my typos. 


Mangroves, Crocs and Mudskippers—Hunter River

Hunter River and Porosus Creek

Today’s zodiac excursion was a trip up Hunter River and its tributary, Porosus Creek. River and creek are misnomers, actually, as these, in reality, are inlets from the ocean. They are salt water from the ocean to where the upland rivers fall into the sea-level channels.

The cliffs at the entrance of Hunter River

Porosus Creek is well known for the number of saltwater crocodiles what reside along its banks. We were not disappointed, although we were told the ones we saw were small. So were the unusual mudskipper fish, which skitter along the mudbanks, much of their time out of the water. They can grow up to a foot long, but the ones we saw were closer to two to three inches.

We did see crocodiles close enough to not use telephoto, but they were too low in the water to capture a good photo. These shots were from farther off.

Mudskippers don’t have lungs. Rather, they absorb oxygen through their skin, mouths and gills. They also carry oxygenated water in gill sacs.

Porosus Creek is also known for its mangrove forests featuring both types of Australian mangroves. One type has multiple spindly roots reaching down to the soil. The other has more conventional looking trunks. The tides in this area are are typically 17 or 18 feet low to high, but at times can be double that. Our excursion was at low tide. This was good news for viewing crocodiles but we could not get close to the mangroves. The afternoon zodiac cruisers had a high tide, hence were close to the forest but viewed few crocodiles. 

These photos show mangroves of both indigenous types. The high tide line on the mangrove trees was obvious.

We were not alone on the river. Where Porosus Creek enters Hunter River was anchored an expedition ship (smaller than ours), and even up the Porosus they was a yet smaller ship. Hence our zodiac fleet was in competition with others. Fortunately, there were enough room and crocodiles for us all.

One problem with keeping crocodile density high is that less scrupulous visitors often throw fish and other food to the crocs in order to attract them. This causes the crocs to associate food with boats of people, making them very dangerous. The rangers have to shoot the more aggressive ones as the food-people association cannot be unlearned.

One event we did not participate in was the helicopter flight to Mitchell Falls. By pictures, this would have been a wonderful excursion. At nearly $800 per person, we thought we’d make do with other’s pictures.

For our afternoon, we enjoyed a tour of the galley of the main restaurant, called, uh, The Restaurant. There is a second restaurant one deck up of almost equal size that maintains a separate galley.

The galley operation is small compared to those in the larger cruise ships but still occupies a considerable space over three decks on the Pursuit. Meals are prepared individually as they are ordered. For this cruise, with two-thirds of the passengers being Australian and New Zealanders, there is an extra supply of lamb chops on board. That is what we had that evening.

I thought I’d end with this morning’s sunrise, just to prove we were up and about.