Bart Bear's Blog

We cruised home from Hawaii on our favourite ship "Radiance of the Seas". The ship stopped at Tahiti, Moorea, Bora Bora, Wellington and Picton. The Oldies worked on the cruise. Dad gave talks on astronomy every day at sea and Mum also answered questions from the passengers and was ready to show them the sky at night, but the sky was cloudy most of the time. Their "boss" was the Cruise Program Administrator, Michael. He is the best one they have ever had and he is now one of my Official Uncles; Hi Unka Michael, I hope you are still having fun. We did a working cruise along this route 7 years ago, but most of the passengers (including Mum) got pretty sick and we missed seeing most of the shore stops. This time we saw everything we could. First picture is me saying "A hui hou" (until we meet again) to Honolulu. The next 2 are the ship at Moorea and Bora Bora. And if you ever wonder how the Pacific Ocean got its name, the last picture tells it all. This is how calm the sea was until we got to higher southern latitudes near New Zealand. The Tasman Sea between NZ and Australia was, as usual, the roughest part of the cruise. I watched for whales and other ships all during our 12 days at sea and didn't see any of either. I did see some absolutely beautiful ships in and near the islands we visited. Images of them and the islands coming soon.

Labels: astronomy, cruising, Hawaii, New Zealand, Tahiti

Did anyone guess where I have been since the last post? A country with 4 letters in its name, only 3 of them different? It was, of course, Fiji and there will be a batch of Fiji photos following over the next weeks. Let's finish this series of New Zealand photos with these taken on the way out of Auckland harbour. The channel to the north is fairly narrow and marked with many lighthouses. Here are a few that I managed to see on our way out. The top left one is the Bean Rock light. This is off North Head of the  Hauraki Gulf at the entrance/exit of the inner harbour. It has been there since 1871. The next photo is of Rangitoto Island and its red and white striped tower. This tower was built in 1905, but it has never had a lantern room on top, just an open light. Rangitoto is a dormant volcano; it will make a real mess of the harbour when it decides to go active again.The third photo shows some ships waiting at the end of the channel for "Voyager of the Seas" to exit. The smaller ship fitted in with us, but the big car carrier decided to anchor and wait. In the background you can see Tiritiri island. On the south-eastern end of the island is Tiritiri Matangi lighthouse. Built in 1865, this is NZ's oldest active lighthouse and it and the keepers' cottages are being actively preserved. You can take a day trip to the island by ferry from Auckland. The photo was taken at extreme magnification on Dad's camera; sometimes the old guy can keep pretty still.

Labels: boats, cruising, lighthouse, New Zealand

We were in Auckland on Christmas Day. Most things were closed but the Sky Tower was open. This is a 328 metre high telecom tower right in the CBD. It has an observation deck on the 51st floor. Knowing that Dad is a wuss when it comes to heights, of course we took him there. Well, we found that Mum has a bit of a problem as well. You see, some of the floor was glass and you could see right down to ground level. You can see the different techniques used by the Oldies to make their crossing of a glass section. Dad treated it like nasty medicine; hold nose, close eyes and get it over with quickly. Mum used the cover eyes and shuffle method. After the first crossing, they were OK. You get great views of the city from the tower. Here are two looking over the harbour. The left one shows one of the many large marinas dotted around the harbour. Kiwis are mad on sailing and really give the USA solid competition for the America's Cup. The right one is looking over the CBD to where the ship is docked. The ship that you can see at the other dock is "Golden Princess". In the background is Rangitoto, the most recent volcano of the dozens in the Auckland area. It has never gone off while I was there.

This afternoon we fly out from Canberra, on our way to one of my favourite places. Hint: it is one of the few countries whose name is 4 letters long and only 3 of them are different.

Labels: New Zealand

Here's "Voyager of the Seas" at two very different harbours. The top photo is at Mt Manganui, the port for Tauranga. Where cruise ships dock here is away from the main port area, which is much more busy. You have to take the shuttle bus to get into Tauranga. The bottom one is at Auckland. Here the ships dock right in town. You can (if you are feeling fit) walk from the ship to the CBD. The other photos? Well, while most of the passengers are ashore is a great time for small bears to go exploring. The crane thingy in the top photo is the gadget that lowers life rafts into the water. The rafts are in those white canisters and when they hit the water they pop open and become a raft holding around 100 passengers. I would love to see this happen, but although I climbed up to the base of the crane I just couldn't reach the handles. Mum says that's just as well because if I had managed to drop one overboard I would have been in big trouble. Actually, Mum kind of limits what I can do. Just look at her reaction when I was trying to see what this cable did. I work on the basis that signs written for people don't apply to small bears.

Labels: boats, climbing, cruising, New Zealand

I always try to watch from the top deck when we are leaving a port. Usually cruise ships arrive early in the morning and if the Oldies are sleeping in sometimes, I can't watch the arrival. However, the ship usually leaves late in the afternoon and I can watch that. Leaving Tauranga is one of my favourites. The channel is rather narrow and takes the ship close to Mt Manganui. People turn out in droves to watch the ship depart. The narrow beach at the base of the mountain is usually packed with them. There are also lots of channel markers, big boards with guide lights on the port side and a couple of these cute little "lighthouses" on the rocks at the starboard side. People to watch, some crazy cars on the road around the mountain trying to race the ship, lights and beacons to find; I really do enjoy leaving port. 

Labels: cruising, lighthouse, New Zealand

On Christmas Eve last, our ship, "Voyager of the Seas" docked for the day at Tauranga. The ship actually docks at the port, Mt Manganui (see posts from our previous NZ cruise), and we went into Tauranga by shuttle bus. The bus stops on the opposite side of the railway to the town centre, and there are signs at every pedestrian crossing warning about possible trains crossing. Mum and I waited for ages, but no trains came. Tauranga is one of the largest cities in New Zealand, and is the site where the Maori first settled in NZ. Naturally, the shops were all decked out for Christmas. I counted 14 different small Christmas trees  in the few streets we had time to explore, and some of the arcades were really pretty. I enjoyed the port more than the town, because there were colourful tugboats, pilot boats and private ones to look at. Our ship dwarfed them all.

Labels: cruising, New Zealand

One of the things that New Zealand does best is chocolate. I love chocolate, and the Oldies are pretty good at making it disappear too. Every place we visited on our New Zealand cruises has its own chocolate shop, and here are two of the top chocolate places in NZ, probably the world. Actually, the top photos are not of a chocolate shop, but of a really great cafe in Wellington called "The Chocolate Fish". It is a barbecue cafe, everything comes barbecued on bread or bun. My carnivore Dad loved it. The Chocolate Fish is one of the old buildings on what was the Shelly Bay Air Force base. Shelly Bay was defence land from 1907 until the base closed in 1995. It is slowly being developed, some of the old buildings being heritage listed. If you visit Shelly Bay and the area looks sort of familiar, it is where the Skull Island scenes in the 2005 King Kong movie were filmed. The best chocolate shop we found is the Silky Oak Chocolate Factory shop near Napier. This place has walls and walls of all sorts of choccies and they are so good that just about every tourist bus stops there. I managed to climb up to where the Christmas specials were, it was just two days to Christmas and I needed some presents for the Oldies. Following usual practice, I picked them out and Dad paid for them.

Labels: New Zealand

Mum was hyper in Napier. She took hundreds of photos of details of Art Deco stuff, even the tiny details on doorknobs. Here are a few examples of her images. The top two are inside the National Tobacco Company building. All of the columns that are part of the structure of the building, or just ornamental, are decorated with sculpted vines and flowers. The windows have coloured glass art on them. Even the door hinges, handles and knobs are decorated. An Art Deco lover could spend hours in this building; we had to just about drag Mum away to see the rest of the town. Of course, she found the Art Deco shops and got all excited by the jewellery and the figurines. Actually, I thought the little ladies were very nice. In one of the streets there is a life-size statue of a lady like these, with a funny-looking dog on a leash. Across the road there is a statue of a small boy climbing a streetlight pole. There is probably a lot more statues that I didn't see, but we will be back. The photo in the middle? Well, I said that Mum was impressed by Art Deco jewellery so when she found these left-over bits from the extras in "The Great Gatsby" the result was inevitable.

Labels: cruising, New Zealand

Our third stop in New Zealand was Napier, the port for the Hawkes Bay region. In 1931 much of the city was totally flattened by an earthquake and the city was rebuilt in the Art Deco style that was the fashion of the time. Today the rebuilt old city has one of the largest collection of Art Deco buildings in the world. Mum is an Art Deco nut, so one of the main reasons for choosing the December cruise on Voyager of the Seas was its day in Napier. We had a brilliant guide, John, one of the Tours By Locals team. He made sure that Mum got the most out of the day. Unka Mark and Aunty Vicki came on the tour with us and they say it was the best day of the whole cruise. The first photo shows us at a lookout point with views over the city and Hawkes Bay. There are several interesting (or peculiar) houses along the roads in this area.  In town, the classic building is the National Tobacco Company building, now a museum. I will show some photos of the inside in the next post. The  bottom images are of the T&G building and the Art Deco Centre. You can also see some vintage cars in the photos. There are lots of these in Napier and they come out whenever a cruise ship is in port. In February there are big Art Deco festivals where the town, the cars and the people all "go back to the 1930s"; naturally, Mum is planning to be there for one of them. She spent a lot of time (and a fair amount of cash) in the Art Deco shops, so has her gear all ready.

Labels: cruising, New Zealand

When our Wellington guide, Robbie, found out that we were very interested in military history, he added a special extra to our tour. The Dominion Museum is holding a special Great War Exhibition, telling the story of New Zealand in World War One. The exhibition was created by Sir Peter Jackson, so naturally it is spectacular and very moving. The museum is next to Wellington's cenotaph and the two are linked by a series of two-dimensional soldiers lining the entry ramp. Sir Peter's crew have really brought exhibits to life. Two that really impressed this small bear are the tank crossing a trench full of German soldiers, and a mounted troop hauling artillery to the front while a French aircraft passes overhead. The exhibit that is the most impressive that I have ever seen took up a whole room. It is a diorama of the battle of Chunuk Bair at Gallipoli. This battle has the same significance to New Zealand as the Lone Pine battle (which took place at the same time) has to Australia. The diorama contains literally thousands of small figures of New Zealand and Ottoman Turk soldiers, nearly all different. You can identify NZ Major-general Godley and his staff, NZ soldier Cyril Bassett who earned the VC for his effort laying telephone cable, and there is even a combat cameraman. Robbie told us that Sir Peter had modeled this little guy on himself. Of course, Sir Peter wasn't at Gallipoli; he was born in 1961 😜. We really enjoyed our day with Robbie. If you are ever visiting Wellington, look him up on the "Tours by Locals" web page, you won't do better. The exhibition will be open until the end of 2018.

Labels: aircraft, models, New Zealand

Our guide in Wellington, Robbie, took us all around the harbour shore. From the lookout on Mt Victoria we could see the airport. This is a tricky one for pilots. The runway is short and really large aircraft can't use it. The wind is pretty well always strong, but it varies in direction and speed quite a lot. You can find you-tube videos of some scary landings and take-offs from this airport. There are lots of small car parks around the harbour and from several of them we could see our ship. The hill behind the ship is the one that the cable car runs on; you can see photos we took from there in my November 2014 posts. Of course, harbours usually mean lighthouses. Across the harbour entrance we could see the two on Pencarrow Head that mark the northern harbour mouth. We saw these closer up on our last cruise, but the weather was too bleak to get better photos as we sailed out this time. On our side there was this small checker-board marked one at Point Halswell. This one marks the turn into the inner harbour. The area is a noted shell fishing ground and there have been several drownings of divers here. Needless to say, I wasn't given a chance to try the fishing.

Labels: boats, cruising, lighthouse, New Zealand

Our second port in New Zealand this cruise was Wellington, the capital. Wellington is known as "Windy Wellington" because the wind gets funneled down Cook Strait between the North and South Islands and hardly ever stops blowing. The sign on the hill near the airport tells how the locals see it, look close and you will too. We had a magnificent guide for our day in Wellington. Robbie took us around the city and bays showing us stuff that we didn't have a chance of seeing last time. We started by visiting two of the most unusual buildings. The one at the top is called the Beehive by locals. It is in fact the parliamentary office building. Parliament House is under renovation next door. The building on the bottom is the Old Government Building. It looks like it is made of stone, but is the largest wooden building in the southern hemisphere. It was built in 1876 to be the offices of the NZ civil service. Today it is Law School of the University of Wellington. Even close up, you find it hard to believe that it is actually all wood. The other interesting thing in the photo is the electric trolleybus. These have been in use in Wellington since 1924, but are due to be phased out shortly. I think they are an interesting idea. After looking at buildings (more photos to come), Robbie drove us up to the top of Mt Victoria. There are a couple of lookout points there which give spectacular views of the city. You may be able to see Voyager of the Seas in the background. It was very windy up there and the Oldies wouldn't let me loose to climb on anything.

Labels: boats, buildings, cruising, New Zealand

When your cruise ship docks almost anywhere in New Zealand you realize that NZ exports a heck of a lot of timber. As I mentioned in a previous post (July 2013) it is their 3rd most important industry. The log pile shown here is at Picton on the South Island. Picton is the port for the Marlborough region, where some of the best wines in the world are grown. Marlborough wines are becoming an important export item for NZ. The Oldies say that they have never met a bad Marlborough white, so naturally they had to visit a few wineries and try the samples. At one point in the tour they were within walking distance of around 20 different wineries, including their absolute favourite brands. The cellar door in the image is the Forrest winery. The Oldies hadn't met that brand before, but after this visit I expect to see it appear in the fridge at home. They are talking about going back to the Marlborough region for an extended stay, so I had better go with them to make sure they get home OK. The vineyard in the picture is actually on the North Island, near Napier. It appears that anything from the Hawkes Bay region is pretty good as well. Not that I would know, because the only way I can get to drink any wine is to move in quick while the Oldies' are looking the other way. The group photo was taken at Mission winery near Napier, another brand that obviously met with approval from this group of reprobates. Most of the passengers who visited wineries during the days at Picton and Napier found that the gangway back onto the ship seemed much steeper and wobblier than when they disembarked.

Labels: boats, cruising, New Zealand

If you love aircraft, particularly early ones, then Omaka aerodrome near Blenheim in the South Island of New Zealand is a place that you MUST visit. The Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre houses part of Sir Peter Jackson's collection of WW1 aircraft and memorabilia. The aircraft, original or replica, are not just parked on display. Many are set into sensational dioramas. Peter Jackson's movie director's skill has produced a museum that blew this small bear and his Dad away. Here are just 4 of the dioramas. Top left is an Etrich Taube being pursued by a French scout. Top right is an AIRCO dH-2, one of the first British fighters. I really love these old pusher aircraft with their maze of struts and wires. In fact, if you look carefully, you can me checking one of the struts and wires on the lower wing. The pilot is looking at a Fokker E.III Eindekker that is coming in on his left side. Bottom left is the wreck of Baron Manfred von Richthofen's Fokker Dr.1 Triplane. A group of Australian soldiers is removing the body and stripping bits of the aircraft for souvenirs. Bottom right is an RAF SE-5a that is about to crash after colliding with another aircraft. The pilot, Keith Caldwell, managed to climb out of the cockpit, balance the tumbling aircraft, fly it (standing on the wing) long enough to get back over the lines, and jump clear before it finally crashed. My visit to Omaka was far too short and I will be back. Sir Peter has the remainder of his collection at Hood aerodrome, near Masterton on the North Island, so I will definitely be dragging the Oldies back to NZ.

Labels: aircraft, New Zealand

Well, I am back from another cruise to New Zealand on "Voyager of the Seas". We got back a week ago, but I have been so flat out helping the Oldies unpack and catch up with loads of email that I have just gotten around to the blog. No worry, there will be lots of photos and info from the cruise over the next weeks. We spent a couple of days in Sydney before joining Voyager. We stayed in a great room overlooking Circular Quay. Scruffy, Milkshake and I spent most of the time on the balcony looking at the endless stream of cruise ships, ferries, yachts and small craft. The top left image is not Voyager of course, it is one of the Holland-America Line ships. We were awake just after sunrise on December 18 to watch Voyager arrive, very pretty in the dawn light. Unka Mark and Aunty Vicki arrived a couple of hours later and we embarked as soon as possible. Voyager has changed a bit since our first cruise in her. More cabins have been squeezed in and some of our favourite spots for listening to live music have gone, but it is still a great ship. Late in the afternoon we cruised out of Sydney Heads, past Hornby lighthouse (Mum's favourite), transferred the Pilot back onto his launch, and settled in for a couple of days crossing the Tasman Sea.

Labels: boats, cruising, New Zealand, Sydney

As cruise ships leave Auckland harbour in New Zealand they pass through the Rangitoto Channel. This channel separates Rangitoto Island from the mainland and passengers get a great view of the island as the ship passes. Rangitoto is Maori for "Bloody Sky", named after the death of a chief during a battle. Rangitoto is a dormant volcano, one of the 50 or so volcanoes in the Auckland area. I am not sure that I would like living in the middle of a volcano field, even if the last eruptions were around 550 years ago. Auckland civil defence groups have evacuation plans ready, just in case. The island is about 6km across and the volcanic cone is 260 metres high. Over the years the island has been a Maori settlement, a quarry site, the site of many military installations during WW2, and a wrecking ground for old ships (you can still see some on the northern beach at low tide). You can visit Rangitoto via ferry from Auckland. Since 1890 the island has been a recreation reserve and day trips have been run pretty well since then.Today, there is a walking track to the summit and 4WD tours of the island. And there are little lighthouses marking the safe channel, so this small bear had a happy time as we passed by on Voyager of the Seas in December 2012.Actually, we will be passing there again on Christmas Day this year; Dad and I are taking Mum on another cruise on Voyager for her big birthday (if any of you are on this cruise, do come and meet me).

Labels: cruising, New Zealand, volcano

As I have mentioned before, cruise ships often allow you to get great pictures of lighthouses. I think that this one on Taiaroa headland is one of the prettiest. It is at the entrance to Otago harbour, the harbour for the city of Dunedin, in New Zealand. It was built in 1864. We photographed it on our 2012 cruise on "Voyager of the Seas". Cruise ships dock at Port Chalmers and passengers usually spent the day exploring the port and Dunedin. Next time we are there I want the Oldies to take a trip out to the headland. Besides the lighthouse, there is a lot to see there. The headland was the site of fairly extensive forts and you can visit the tunnels and gun emplacements. There is a fully restored 1886 Armstrong disappearing gun in one of these. I have never seen a disappearing gun and would love to see it doing its disappearing act. You can often see whales, dolphins, orcas, seals and sea lions from the headland. There are colonies of penguins on a nearby beach, and a large breeding colony of royal albatrosses that you can visit with a ranger. Definitely a target for the next time one of Dad's lecture cruises takes us to Dunedin.

Labels: cruising, lighthouse, New Zealand

Yay!!!!! The time has come for us to pack our bags and head off on another cruise. This weekend we join "Radiance of the Seas" in Sydney for a cruise to New Caledonia and back. Dad is the enrichment lecturer on the cruise. He will be giving talks on astronomy every day at sea. If you ever happen to be on a cruise where Dad is lecturing, go and hear him; he is actually pretty good (but never tell him that I told you so). I love the days at sea, particularly when the sea is calm and the Sun is shining. Mum and I always try to get a "Kate and Leo" picture on every ship we sail on. Even when the weather is a bit rough I like it, you can get really moody photos then. I can't decide if I like the tropical parts of the South Pacific better than the colder bit around New Zealand. The ports of call are always pretty and interesting. The photo here is of islands in the huge lagoon at Noumea. We will be back there on Wednesday and this time I will make sure that the Oldies take sand-fly and mozzie repellant with them.

Labels: astronomy, boats, cruising, New Zealand, Noumea, South Pacific

OK, before the purists among you jump and clammer loudly that these are SHIPS, not boats, I admit that is the proper term, but "ships" doesn't alliterate with "Bart's". I absolutely love cruising and these are the ships that I have cruised on so far. "Dro Ki Cakau" was a happy ship. I did three cruises around various parts of Fiji on her. The photo shows her moored among the northern Yasawa islands. She was damaged beyond repair during a cyclone in 2010, and replaced by "Reef Endeavour". I cruised some of the Great Barrier Reef on "Reef Endeavour" in 2005, while she was based in Cairns. The picture shows her at Cooktown. What can I say about "Queen Mary 2"? She is the ultimate cruise liner, a superb mix of classic Cunard luxury and modern technology. I only had 5 days on her in 2011 and hope that we can afford a longer trip sometime in the future. The photo shows her arriving in Fremantle harbour. "Voyager of the Seas" is my favourite ship, so far. Dad was lecturer on her on a New Zealand trip in 2012. Although not as "posh" as the QM2, "Voyager" is a well-run and happy ship with lots of activities, live music of various types, and interesting places to eat. The good news is that we are taking Mum on another "Voyager" cruise for her birthday and Christmas this year. "Celebrity Millenium" was a bit of a let-down because the ship was kept too cold and lots of the passengers got really sick. The ship was OK, but didn't have the excitement of the others. However, the cruise from Hawaii to Sydney via French Polynesia took us to many places the Oldies wanted to see. There is a blank space in the mosaic for my next ship. This will be "Radiance of the Seas", which Dad will be lecturing on in April during a cruise to New Caledonia. I am looking forward to returning to Noumea and investigating a new ship. Love cruising.
You can see many images from these cruises on my blog, just search the ship name in the search window at top left of the page.

Labels: boats, Cairns, Captain Cook, cruising, Fiji, New Zealand, Noumea, Tahiti

One of the advantages of cruising, if you are  lighthouse fanatics like the Oldies, is that you can see lighthouses from the angle that they were designed to be seen from. Sometimes the cruise ship gets you fairly close as well. Here are three lighthouses that we saw on our New Zealand cruise on "Voyager of the Seas" back in 2012. The top one is the Iron Pot lighthouse at the mouth of the Derwent River in Tasmania (Hobart was the first port of call before we headed across the Tasman to NZ). It is the oldest tower in Australia, commencing operation in 1833. Macquarie lighthouse in Sydney started operation in 1818, but the original tower of that light was replaced in 1883. The lighthouse keeper's house on Iron Pot was a splendid mansion that took up most of the rest of the small island  (Google for the story) but it was removed in the early 1920s. The light was automated in 1977. The bottom two are at Pencarrow Head in New Zealand. They mark the entrance to Wellington Harbour. The one on the top of the hill is the oldest lighthouse in NZ, starting operation in 1859. The first keeper was Mary Bennett, the only female keeper in NZ. The light was often hard to see because of fog and low cloud, so the lower one was built in 1906. The top one stopped operation in 1935, the lower one is still operating. Voyager passed Pencarrow Head just as the Oldies were starting breakfast. They scuttled madly for cameras and spots at the dining room windows. None of the other passengers understood what the excitement was all about. Love these Oldies of mine.

Labels: lighthouse, New Zealand, Tasmania