Our first view of the Sydney Opera House

Sydney’s Harbour Bridge viewed from Deck Six forward as we arrived

Toward Australia

Day Twenty (Sunday, February 8, 2009)-- Today is an at sea day as we travel southwest out of the Melanesian islands toward the great continent of Australia. Squeekie and I have used this day to catch up on our writing, she doing Edison work and I writing the blog and sorting through the many pictures we already have taken. The ship seems to be traveling faster that the 18 knots Captain Olav said we would go in order to arrive in Sydney on Tuesday next. Today we learned, first from Captain Olav, and later from others on board, of the promotion of our son-in-law Fabian Wiechert to position of Fleet-wide Corporate Dining Trainer; we are very proud of him and hope that this significant promotion will give him more time in Seattle to be with Leslee. Apparently an e-mail message went out fleet-wide today, because many officers on board the Rotterdam know about this. Fabian, we are proud of you!

The seas are very rough today, much more so than the other day last week, and I actually got a bit queasy from the sharp rolling motion. I look forward to arriving in Australia, in part because the calm waters of a harbour seem to be heaven-sent right now. In fact agents of Australian immigration are aboard the ship and every passenger must have a personal, eye-to-eye passport check meeting with an agent today. Squeekie and I stood in line for about 20 minutes to do this. We must have passed muster. . . .


Day Twenty-one (Monday, February 9, 2009)-- It is another at sea day today, and the Rotterdam is running through the rough seas at a fast pace. Captain Olav came on over the loudspeakers at 1 o’clock this afternoon to explain why we were traveling so fast. Apparently yesterday a passenger had a medical emergency which requires hospital treatment more sophisticated than can be done aboard ship. We are too far from Australia to permit medical evacuation by helicopter, so we are pushing through the rough waves of the Tasman Sea to arrive as early as possible on the docks in Sydney. Olav said that he anticipated arriving around midnight.

Squeekie and I decided to stay up and watch the Rotterdam’s arrival in Sydney. We picked up the pilot at 10:40 pm, and entered the complex harbour where Sydney lies. For some of the travel through these waters Squeekie and I stood outside on the forward deck on Deck Six, just below the navigation bridge on Deck Seven. Just minutes after midnight we tied up at the “Overseas Passenger Terminal,” a dock which lies at the foot of the famous Sydney Harbour Bridge in the district known as “The Rocks.” An ambulance was waiting on the dock to remove the passenger. When Squeekie and I returned to our cabin to catch some sleep before our fist big day in Sydney, we looked out from our verandah and there, in all its dramatic glory, stood the famous Sydney Opera House. We are in Australia!