Down Under



Koalas in the tree

Greetings from Melbourne, Australia!

We have been in Australia for a week now.  We spent a couple of days in Sydney touring around.  We saw so much in the short period of time that we have been here – the Blue Mountains, saw koalas and kangaroos, Bondi Beach, Chinatown, Manly Beach, Sydney Opera House, the Rocks.  Our last day we were to climb the Sydney Harbor Bridge.  You know – that iconic bridge that you always see on TV during the New Year’s fireworks.  But it was POURING rain.  Even though they take people up in all sorts of weather, we all felt that it would be no fun walking in the rain.  It would’ve been like a suicide attempt.  Oh well, that’s life and nothing we can do about that except come back!

Guiseppe and I flew to the Great Barrier Reef where we spent 3 nights there.  It was glorious and everything we expected the Reef to be like.  Just beautiful.  He got to scuba dive, which was his big thing.  I got try it too.  We also flew to a place called Whitehaven Beach.  It is famous for some of the purest and whitest sand in the world – so much so that they used this sand to build the Hubble telescope.  It was so romantic.  Not a soul in sight and a picnic in the sand. 

We are now onboard the ship and Melbourne is our port of call today.  Last night the chef onboard cooked a special Chinese New Year’s Eve dinner just for us at my request.  I know my parents were disappointed that I am not home for the holiday, so I made sure that we followed all the traditions of the holiday here.

Onboard the ship, we have been tasting some interesting wines.  Silversea takes pride in offering something for everyone.  Yesterday I had an inzolia white with my lunch.  Inzolia is an indigenous grape to Sicily and it’s crisp, light and refreshing with flavors of lemon juice and grapefruits.  The champagne is free flowing and we usually finish our evening meals with a glass of moscato d’asti.  It’s sweet like orange blossom with effervescent bubbles.  The bubbles keeps it fresh and not coyingly sweet. 

We miss home, but so far we are having a wonderful time.

Hope all is well at home,

Jennifer