The Hughes Zoo

After the previous two relaxing-ish days, Saturday was back to hectic insanity - packing up the hotel (leaving my favourite belt on the back of the bathroom door), checking into the ship and dragging luggage a couple of blocks to the warf. Despite everything, it went surprisingly well and we were onboard in time to grab some late lunch/early dinner before we set off from the Harbour.

I’m not entirely sure what I was expecting, but I was a little underwhelmed. I mean, the ship’s huge, our room’s nice, the staff are great, the food is constant, but there just seemed to be something missing. For one thing, not only is the alcohol not free (as I’d thought) but it’s pretty damn expensive. Not that its a big deal, but it sort of shattered my illusion of not having to worry about anything once we were on the ship.

Jeremy was in a crazy mood, overexcited and a bit scared about all the changes that were going on. But after dinner, while Ange took Will back to the cabin, we sat on a window seat and watched the light fade on the ocean. It calmed him down immensely. The boys both passed out early without even having the prerequisite bedtime stories. The motion of the boat ensured all 4 of us slept like logs.

After flicking quickly through the TV channels I was pretty sure I was going to miss the Pies game, but while wandering around after the boys were in bed I discovered they had the game on in the casino and I caught the last quarter. Needless to say, this (and the result) lifted my mood more than a little.

To wash off some of the excitement from the game I continued the exploration I’d started earlier in the night. Wandering around on the decks of a night time is a little surreal: surrounded by endless blackness, with just a few feet of water around the boat illuminated by the cabin lights. The decks are deserted due to the howling winds, so it feels almost solitary. It’s really quite relaxing.

Photos for the day

Our holiday adventure officially started on 9/9/09, the day after Will’s first birthday. It was a tingly Spring morning in Canberra, and Jeremy and I had jobbies. We walked to the bus stop, walked straight onto the bus we needed, and 20 minutes later jumped out at Braddon, where we picked up the hire care. Rather than the base model falcodore I was expecting, we were given an electric blue SV6 wagon, so things were off to a good start.

With a small amount of fiddling everything was packed into the car, and we hit the road at about 1pm. When we got to the outskirts of Sydney we decided it might be an idea to look at a map - luckily 98% of the trip was dead simple. The last 2% ended up taking us quite a while After much cursing and many temper fits (all mine), we were in the hotel. I ran off to return the hire car before the place closed, and Ange worked on unpacking and getting the boys to bed. Despite having to battle peak city traffic, the maze of one way streets around the Harbour, and the half hour walk back, I got by far the easier deal.

The walk back to the hotel instantly relaxed me - even though Sydney feels quite different to Melbourne there’s something about a city at night that I find fundamentally comforting. By the time I got back to the hotel I was dreading returning to Canberra in another 6 weeks.

In complete contrast to the day before, our first full day in Sydney was bliss. We purposefully had no plans at all for the day, so after breakfast on the Harbour we went to a park and the boys played for most of the morning. I spent the day feeling like I was reliving childhood holidays - the country hicks dragging their kids into nice restaurants. Although at least this time we weren’t all in tracksuits
After lunch we walked all over the place, and spent a good hour or so going round in circles on the monorail, much to Jeremy’s delight.  Both the boys were a bit edgy, especially in the afternoon, but it was a fantastic day.

On Friday we had some jobs to do in the morning, then had morning tea at a cafe in the Queen Victoria Building. On and off for the rest of the day we were at the Aquarium, which was awesome. Except when we were stuck in one of the underwater viewing tunnels with 2 classes of primary school kids, which overwhelmed us all, particularly Jeremy. The boys were still a bit unsettled, but were starting to get used to being out of their normal routine.

Mark came around for beer and footy on Friday night, and both the boys were ecstatic to see him again. Ange went back to have a peaceful look at the Aquarium, while we caught up on the last few years. It was a fantastic night.

Photos for the day