Australia and New Zealand in photos

Beautiful Sydney, Australia . . . we only had four days here but I loved exploring this city. I already blogged a little while we were actually in Sydney (refer to the post two or three back) so I won't be doing a lot of writing . Just thought I'd post a few photos.

Famous Harry's Diner . . . home to the best meat pies in Australia. Sought out by celebrities and regular tourists like us. Jordan, who lived in Australia for a couple of years when his dad was a mission president there, told us that we had to find Harry's and order the "Tiger" . . . a beef pie topped with mashed potatoes, mushy peas and brown gravy. We were skeptical at first (especially Captain Nutrition) but it was love at first bite. Yum. Now I know why Jordan dreams about these meat pies!

View of the Sydney opera house from the ferry boat we were on. This was taken on Brent's camera. Sydney is such a beautiful city . . . the harbour bridge, the opera house and all the harbour-side attractions. I could have spent more time exploring this city.

We took a ferry from Sydney to Manly Island and stolled along Manly beach. Absolutely beautiful. We had some great fish and chips in the little town there.

I loved this little plaque posted along Manly beach. I say "Amen".

Moonrise at Manly Beach. Brent took this photo with his Binford 2000 camera.

Brent has yet to come up with a satisfactory explanation of why he took the above photo while on a little Hamilton Island beach excursion with Bob. Perhaps he mistook her for me . . . hee hee!

From Sydney we flew to Hamilton Island in the Whitsunday Islands. Anyone out there ever read the Thorn Birds (which I reread while we were in Australia and N.Z.)? Remember when Meggie had just given birth to Justine and Luke had all but abandoned her, the nice people she was staying with tended the baby and sent her on a holiday to Matlock Island in the Whitsundays where she had her famous rendevous with Father Ralph DeBriccasart? We stayed on Hamilton Island for about four days, and it was just as tropical and magical as was described in the Thorn Birds. All except for the March flies, nasty big bug like horseflies that loved to tear chunks out of our flesh. I guess there always has to be a fly in the ointment, as it were! I somehow just lost a photo of Brent diving into the water at one of the beautiful beaches on Hamilton Island. He was taking his chances because in December the tiny jellyfish called irukandji start moving in and stay around until April. If you get stung by one of these invisible little chemical factories, they release a nerve toxin into your system that's at best, excruciatingly painful and at worst, fatal. There's no antidote. You have to go to a hospital to be kept alive. A lot of people wear head to toe "stinger suits" to protect themselves. The water at the beaches is a clear beautiful blue and very inviting but I wasn't willing to take the chance. Yes . . . I'm a weenie, and proud of it! A night out on the waterfront on Hamilton Island, Australia.
These little "golf carts" were the mode of transportation on Hamilton Island. Julie and I had a lot of fun bombing around in our little cart on the wrong side of the road, at least from our perspective. It was good practice for driving a real car in N.Z. Speaking of which . . .

Beautiful Lake Wanaka, south end of the south island of New Zealand. Julie and I stayed at a little resort near here while Bob and Brent did the Milford Sound track. The next several photos are a tiny fraction of the pictures that Brent took on this world class trek.
It took them three days to complete the hike and Brent said that it was just incredible . . . the most scenic place he's ever been. This was the general area where the movie "Lord of the Rings" was filmed.
Merino sheep crowding the road and blocking our tour bus as Julie and I are headed to Milford Sound for an overnight cruise. New Zealand is famous for it's beautiful Merino wool sweaters, scarves, etc. New Zealand is apparently overrun with possums, so they are now "harvesting" the possums and blending the possum hair into their wool products. It's soft and more durable than the Merino wool. The kiwi bird, the national bird of N.Z., is endangered, so pretty much the thought here is "save the kiwis, kill the possums (and make them into sweaters).
One of the stops on our trip to the Milford Sound. There were huge fields that were just covered with the blue lupine flowers. The yellow stuff up front is Scottish Broom and the trees with the white flowers on the right are melaleuca trees from which tea tree oil is extracted.
This is a Kia bird . . . a kind of parrot like bird that loves to pick at the rubber on cars (around the windows, in the doors, etc.) and peoples shoes. They apparently can cause a lot of damage. People who camp in the mountains in New Zealand don't ever leave their shoes outside the tent door or they may not be there in the morning!
A beautiful walk that we took on the way to Milford Sound. These huge ferns were everywhere

. . . the size of trees!
We passed this cruise ship, in the Milford Sound, that looked pretty much like the one we were on. View from our little cruise ship on Milford Sound (misnamed by early explorers. It's actually a fiord). There were waterfalls everywhere, all the time. I've never seen so many beautiful waterfalls in my life.

The famous Franz Josef glacier on the west coast of the south island of New Zealand. We didn't have time to hike all the way up to it, unfortunately, but it was spectacular even from a distance. Brent staring down an ostrich.

Beautiful gardens in Auckland, on the north island of N.Z. This was our last day in N.Z. before we headed home. Bob and Julie May, our dear friends and traveling companions.

Waiting in line at the Auckland airport. Farewell to the land down under!