* take nothing for granted    
Unless otherwise indicated all photos © Richard McKie 2005 - 2021

Who is Online

We have 57 guests and no members online

Article Index

Kiriwina Island

Fortunately by the time we reached Kiriwina we were cleared to land in PNG - the Kiriwina people no doubt benefiting from money not spent in Rabaul. Not a lot of us had Kina, as many passengers had expected to change currency in Rabaul. So lots of locals wanted to exchange currency.

The western shore, near the main town, Losuia, is too shallow for a cruise ship to safely navigate so this landing, near a small village at the northern tip, is the setting for staged tourist entertainment and sales.  I was reminded that even in Sydney tourists are introduced to Aboriginal Australia with professional entertainers providing didgeridoo performances.  This would not be the last time we would see 'traditional' dancing on this trip.

 

See album See album
See album See album
See album See album

Dancing for the tourists
 

 

Interestingly, to me at least, Queen Elizabeth does not drop anchor. She holds station precisely using global positioning and her electric motors. The two stern Azipods can be turned in any direction and combined with the bow thrusters she sits perfectly still, without turning or drifting to the tide; currents; or the wind. The only concession to a high wind is a slight heel (tilt) to port or starboard.

 

See album See album

The ship didn't swing to the tide and had no moorings or anchors
 

In the afternoon Wendy and I had a practice snorkel and enjoyed it. The coral was dead and white crumble off the beach but there were some colourful fish.

 

You have no rights to post comments


    Have you read this???     -  this content changes with each opening of a menu item


Travel

Cruising to PNG

 

 

 

 

On the 17th February 2020 Wendy and I set sail on Queen Elizabeth on a two week cruise up to Papua New Guinea, returning to Sydney on 2nd March. 

Read more ...

Fiction, Recollections & News

The Book of Mormon

 

 

 

 

Back in the mid 1960's when I was at university and still living at home with my parents in Thornleigh, two dark suited, white shirted, dark tied, earnest young men, fresh from the United States, appeared at our door.

Having discovered that they weren't from IBM my mother was all for shooing them away.  But I was taking an interest in philosophy and psychology and here were two interesting examples of religious fervour.

As I often have with similar missionaries (see: Daniel, the Jehovah’s Witness in Easter on this Website), I invited them in and they were very pleased to tell me about their book.  I remember them poised on the front of our couch, not daring or willing to sit back in comfort, as they eagerly told me about their revelation.  

And so it came to pass that a week ago when we travelled to Melbourne to stay with my step-son Lachlan and his family and to see the musical: The Book of Mormon I was immediately taken back to 1964.

Read more ...

Opinions and Philosophy

Conspiracy

 

 

 

Social Media taps into that fundamental human need to gossip.  Indeed some anthropologists attribute the development of our large and complex brains to imagination, story telling and persuasion. Thus the 'Cloud' is a like a cumulonimbus in which a hail of imaginative nonsense, misinformation and 'false news' circulates before falling to earth to smash someone's window or dent their car: or ending in tears of another sort; or simply evaporating.

Among this nonsense are many conspiracy theories. 

 

For example, at the moment, we are told by some that the new 5G mobile network has, variously, caused the Coronavirus pandemic or is wilting trees, despite not yet being installed where the trees have allegedly wilted, presumably in anticipation. Of more concern is the claim by some that the Covid-19 virus was deliberately manufactured in a laboratory somewhere and released in China. 

Read more ...

Terms of Use                                           Copyright