Travel from Warrnambool to Melbourne Airport. Staying the night at Novatel Melbourne Airport. Dinner in Italian Restaurant. Excellent antipasto. Young Italian staff. Very obliging. Could not finish Sue’s main meal as well as mine. Took sweets back to room to watch Sydney v Fremantle and Magic Round, Roosters v Dolphins. Breakfast at 6.15am, transfer bus at 7.40am. Top reception staff. Couple to our left going to NZ for 4 weeks. From Bussleton WA.

Early start for breakfast, 6am alarm, not too bad. Booked in for 7.40am transfer to T1 terminal for 9.30am flight. Checked tickets and found flight was changed to 9.10am with boarding at 8.45am. Oops, get a move on. Changed transfer to 7.20am. Driver very casual, late, close to 7.25am. Group of 8 getting anxious. 2 ladies from Tasmania going to Vietnam and Cambodia. One tiny young girl with heavy bag heading back home to Adelaide. Fortunately the transfer bus only stopped at T1 terminal. Suitable for us but all others going back toT1,T2 & T3. In T1 terminal needed passport and digital ticket to get stick on luggage ticket for each suitecase. Sue’s case rejected due to an old sticker. Finally sorted with assistance of Quantas lady. Now thru x-ray security check. Arms and legs spread, belts removed. Phew, pants did not fall down. Sue’s backpack retained for inspection. Sue sussed out good coffee where the flight staff were hanging out. Excellent coffee. Moved on then to gate 4. Strange not many people waiting. Getting bit close to boarding time, maybe flight changed. Checked Quantas app, no chang, but ticket in wallet showed flight from Gate 8. Another quick shuffle. Lounge full, getting ready to board. Sat next to father and son from Albert going to Darwin for chartered fishing trip. Same blokes we discussed the baggage loading issue at entry. Boarded the plane and settled in for the flight. Peter on window, Sue in seat 2, \240in \240the middle and a 17 year old cricketer traveling with squad from Tasmania, for matches in Darwin. 4 hour flight landed in Darwin 1.15 pm and took taxi to Novatel on Esplanade. Taxi driver was Indian surname Patel, not related to Kiran Patel from Mumbai. Booked into motel and rested up after flight. Woke at 5pm and went for walk along The Esplade towards the wharf, past Partiament House and back along Mitchell Street. Lots of pub type eating houses, nothing that stood out. For dinner we did 4 entrees and back to our room to watch Geelong win over Collingwood and Labour win over Liberal National Party.

Late start to morning. Watched insiders ABC 9am to 10.30am for federal election results, then offsiders, mainly NRL Magic Round in Brisbane. Breakfast at Novatel then we walked down to the waterfront wharf along Mitchell Street to east. Saw our fishing mates in the crockadile burger cafe along the way. Past Parliament House and Arts Centre. Crossed the Esplanade, lift down one level to the main road and viewed the multi story harbor apartment development. Huge. Large craft market in the harbor green. Rode lift down 5 floors to harbour green. People everywhere. Inland pool and beach area, also wave pool. Many eating houses. After touring every stall, Sue decided not to buy anything, looked for lunch spot. Found a spot in the Oyster Bay and indulged in their seafood platter for 2. Took a while to consume, but we did it. Checked out the wave pool and then walked back to the Novatel via the coastal path. Lots of historic signs about the history of Darwin and the bombing of Darwin by Japan. Too hot to read all displays along the way, 30•C feels like 32•C. Clothes soaked in perspiration. Not used to it. Back to the room for a rest, In house dinner, back to room to watch Q clash, Brisbane Lions and Golf Coast Suns. Tomorrow is a guided tour of Darwin and surrounds, 9am to 2.30pm. Looking forward to it.

Small bus tour of Darwin. 8 people on small bus. Down the Esplanade to the wharf area. Tour of the underground fuel storage tunnels. Unsuccessful construction as it turned out, trying to get secured oil/fuel storage. See photos. Next to Darwin Museum. Good, then to army barracks/display. Bombing of Darwin. Army guns. On \240the way called into Botanic gardens. Elijah, python in tree. Next to airfield barracks/museum. Lots of planes including the big B52 bomber and F111 jet. Hopefully no repeats of war. Dinner at a very nice Indian/Asian restaurant called Hanuman. Back to the motel to watch AFL reviews. Quiet day tomorrow ready for ship boarding 8.30am Wednesday morning.

Last day in Darwin. Did a bus trip to the north to suburb called Casuarina, past the Airport. The airport splits Darwin into 2 areas, north section and south section. The north section is more traditional housing like Warrnambool, the south Darwin CBD is multi story apartments and big businesses. Casuarina has a huge shopping complex, bigger than Gateway. Woolworths, Big-W, Target, K-Mart, Cole’s and lots of speciality shops. Lots of people inside keeping out of the heat, although not hot today just 28d feels like 34d. Mainly indigenous, looked healthy though, clean skin. Back to motel.

Checked out bombing of Darwin display on edge of coast beside us. The Japanese had taken over Singapore in 1942. The Australian Navy fleet had moved back to Darwin thinking the Japanese would not push further south. But alas they did. They followed with their aircraft carriers and proceeded to bomb Darwin with their expansionist program. When they attacked Darwin there were 64 ships in Port Darwin when they attacked, they were serious, 70 bombing raids, 682 bombs were dropped on Darwin and ships in the first 2 days with 188 planes with single bomb on each plane. \240There was a total of 111 air raids across Darwin. Lots of devestation. In the end Japan decided Australia wa too big to command and changed tack, not to incade. America also came to our aid and Japan retreated as they were too stretched with their resources. Photos attached.

Met a guy in the lift who was an accountant- auditor. Had flown up from Sydney to review a manufacturing company for a few days, Joey.

Ready for our boat trip tomorrow.

Early start 6.00am. Pack cases, breakfast at 6.30am. Taxi at 7.30am to Fort Hill Wharf to get onto the Coral Adventurer. At 8.00am there were only 40 people waiting in the wharf lounge and then directed to the ship. Morning tea. Not very crowded, then a whole bus load of people boarded. As usual “W” is last on the list for collecting our on-board packages.Sue 103, Peter 104. Crew number 45 to make full compliment of bodies on ship. Practiced putting on life jacket, the orange things, in case of overboard. They have a 2 orange tub type vessels that hold 85 people each. Nice and cosy if all else fails. Met some lovely people on board. Main meal of barramundi, nice, did not much go on the eel and raw crocodile entree. Prawn and crayfish slithers OK. Crew very busy dishing out food and drink. All young people been on ship less than 6 months. Our tour directors are qualified marine biologists and some have worked on Great Barrier Reef projects, now branched out to the tour operators. They are all very enthusiastic about their work. There was an evening Darwin War film, Sue and I started watching, but bailed out, good word to use on a ship, and left level 6 lounge/theater, down the rear outside steps to level 5 and into our room.

Breakfast tomorrow at 7.30am and onto the tender boats at 8.30am heading to King George River

Hopped on little tender boats and explored King George River. Sandstone cliffs, all the way to waterfalls at the head of the river, 60m high. Even spotted a pair of dugongs on the way. Everyone got a go on the zodiacs. Pictures tell the story. Lots of rock shots. About 12 kilometers to get to end waterfall. Back for lunch then went out on tender for more rock viewing.

Trip off ship to view C53 plane wreck crash landed in 1942. Flew from Perth to Broome, wrong course, without navigator, and ran out of fuel, did emergency landing on the salt pan. Crew of 6 survived.

After lunch went to Jar Islang to view indigenous rock paintings. Can show the rocks but not the paintings.

Seafood dinner and early to bed. Helicopter flight to Mitchell Falls tomorrow.

Early start, 7am breakfast. Tour of engineer room. 3 CAT diesel motors, 2 x 1360Kw and and 1 No. 890Kw.Total 3,610Kw. Almost 20 Touareg motors in series. These 3 motors run electrical generators, to a lithium \240battery which then run 2 electrical motors on 2 propellers. 2 Big Rolls Royce electric motors onto 5m diameter propellers. Simple drive system. Unused power goes to rest of ship operations and left overs to battery.

Desalination plant for ship water supply, plus all air conditioning.

Helicopter ride to Mitchell Falls, walk around for 1 hour and return to ship. Sue did Aboriginal art at Wollaston Bay.

In the afternoon Sue and Peter did a little boat cruise to Palm Island.

Drinks and nibbles on sandy beach and back to ship for end of evening.

Depart for Cathedral Caves on an island. One of 2,500 islands in the Kimberley. In the Ice Age the sea level was 120m to 150m lower than present day. These islands would have been top of mountains. Cave included chimney to mountain peak.

Next to Bigge Island for indigenous art including contact with Macassn visitors and Dutch trading vessels. smoking pipes on figures.

After lunch we went crocodile hunting along the Hunter River. Saw 4 crocodiles baby, 400mm, 1.2m and 2x 3m, one blonde. More interesting than first thought, seeing these beast in the wild. So many fish jumping above water. Crocodiles having a feast.

Explorer boat to Careening Bay. Some ship repairs carried out here in 1820’s after crashing into some rocks. Steep beach helped to lay the ship over, only 18m long, to repair the keel. HMC Mermaid was the name of ship to look up if you are interested. Repairs did not work and they had to keep pumping out water all the time to get back to England. Big Boab tree, 800 years old near the beach. Low level basalt rock below sandstone at water level.

In the afternoon took Explorers up Prince Regent River, 40 minutes at 29 knots, to look at waterfalls, crocodiles and fruit bats. A good days outing. Big crocodiles cruising and waiting for fruit bats to fall into the water. The rivers are so wide and deep blue colour.

Mid morning start to Montgomery Reef. The reef is tidal and appears out of the sea at low tide, traps water in the middle of the reef and the water then flow out in narrow streams. Photos reveal all. This is one of the wonders of the world.

After lunch Raft Point and Doubtful Bay. Photos to follow.

In the morning had a scienic cruise thru Talbot Creek viewing rock formations where the Kimberley crashed into mainland Australia. See photos.

In the afternoon rose on zodiac thru the Hirizontal Falls. Horizontal Falls are like a vertical fall, but flat on the ground. The tide is 6.5m between high and low level. On the ground there is a 2m swell getting into the rapids at the high end. Sue went early with about 0.5m swell.

Dinner was a BBQ on the breidge deck.

Day 9 of the cruise, one day to go. Gone so quick now. Out on the explorer to Iron Island and the Koolan Island Ore Mines, then onto Nares Point. The iron ore is 86% iron, the rocks can be welded together it is so pure. It is excavated and goes straight to China for processing into steel.

After the mining extraction we mainly looked at different rock formations that have been formed when the Kimberley crossed into Australia and bowed up lots of straight layers of rock making them vertical in places. Pure iron ore was exposed, now mined.

Saw a few birds. Sea Eagle and Ospray. No crocs today.

Some rough seas coming back from Iron Island to open sea.

Last day in the Kimberley. Visited the Lacapede Islands. Full of birds. Has the largest colony i the world of Brown Boobie birds. 5 to 10 meters of bird poo was taken from these islands for fertilizer in 1910. The Americans tried to claim this island as theirs at that time but lost the legal argument. Bit like Trump, it seems. Lots of birds and turtles, not to mention a crocodile living it up on abundant seafood. It had to swim 400km to get there.

Captains dinner and good night to all. 8.00am breakfast, bags packed in rooms ready to be loaded onto departure busses and leave the port of Broome to our motels or flights by 9.30am

May 17 2025, Saturday morning, end of cruise. Getting off the ship at Broome at 9.30am Darwin time and changing over to Broome time for Western Australia at 8.00am. Buses arranged to drop off the 100 people on the cruise to their various homes or to the airport. We were dropped off at the Frangipanni Motel for an overnight stay ready for midday flight on Sunday. Our room was not available till 2pm, so we caught the town bus down to the Main Street and the Saturday morning market in Broome. Lots of clothes and pearls. Had lunch at an Asian cafe in a nicely shaded area, then got back on the bus to the Frangipanni. Afternoon snooze and then to Cable Beach to see the famous sunset along the beach. Hundreds of people at the sunset and at least 100 4wheel drive cars parked down along the beach. We could see our ship in the distance with the next group of people doing the cruise back to Darwin.

May 18 2025 Breakfast at The Pearl Cafe, in a next door motel at 7.30am. The cafe has a pool, a nice spot to be during the day. Back to our motel room at the \240Frangipanni. Taxi booked for 9.30am. Got to the airport just before 10.00am. Two suite cases weighed in and tagged for the flight. Long queue of people doing baggage. Then thru security with our walk on luggage. Sue was sent to the naughty corner for full inspection of her backpack, bit like Mark, always has a double search. Peter had extra scan for metal zip on back pocket. Finally both made it through security. Bit of a wait in the lounge with other people. Some from the cruise, including 2 cruise attendants on leave for a few weeks. On the plane and in the air by 12.12pm, landed at Melbourne Airport 4.17pm Broome time, 6.17pm Melbourne time. Got our suite cases and walked to the Novatel Airport Motel.

May 19 2025 Departed Novatel Melbourne Airport at 10.40am after a 2 kilometer walk to find the Forester in the long term car park, section F. Got back to Warrnambool 2.30pm.