fair winds and following seas

My cruise ship makes stops at a few working ports not usually home to passenger cruise lines, they're far more practical and  industrial  and not at all g lammed  up for visitors like the cruise terminals are. At most of the working ports you'll see shipping containers stacked high in primary colours with speckled rust across the obnoxious corperate branding. There's a constant hum of machinery and giant cranes moving overhead that feel unsettling to walk beneath. Not the most pleasant start for  visiting  a new place. Here in New Zealand the working ports are mostly used for timber transportation and the first view sets the scene for these ports perfectly. Without stepping off the ship you can already smell the newly chopped wood and fresh mountain air, as you walk down the ramp to the dock you start to see logs stacked high at an impressive scale and variety, but still completely dwarfed by a backdrop of mountains that stretch the horizon. Trees, mountains a...

My last flight landed late at night in Nouméa, New Caledonia, to meet the ship the following day. In New Caledonia there's virtually no light pollution so I arrive to a panoramic view of the stars spreading the full width of the skyline, glowing bright and clear. You can see way off into the distance, it feels very open and everything is bordered by mountainous silhouette's. Far in the distance on one mountain there stands a luminous cross which looks very dramatic glowing alone in the dark and I can see what motivated them to stand it in this environment, it's a very striking and powerful image.  The soundscape is pretty special too, so many insects chirping in unison it creates a soft white noise effect and is very relaxing and tropical. I'm reminded of a similar experience, at night in Bali when I would take time every evening to sit outside and soak it in. I later learned these insects are called Cicadas, the males create a constant sound while the females are res...

I wasn't completely certain I would be let out of the airport during my 8 hour stop over in Hong Kong, so I was winging it all the way but trying to stay hopeful, airports really aren't that much fun regardless of how highly recommend they come. I filled out a landing card, they let me through and I headed to an ATM. From what I've heard card payment isn't widely used everywhere here, no idea of the currency exchange rate, I just put my card in and withdrew the second lowest amount it offered me, didn't want to waste time looking it up and didn't want to ask a random because I expect that's asking for trouble. Once I had some cash I headed to the ticket counter and bought a same day return to Kowloon for 105 Hong Kong dollars. This area is basically the image of Hong Kong we see in movies and postcards so it made sense to head here and tick it off. Luckily “feel at home” from my UK network works here so I have access to Google maps. I also met a lovely ...

This place is beautiful, every building is diversely shaped and creative in design and colour, for a historically conquered people i suppose it makes a lot of sense to see so much variety in influence but it's fascinating for me to see. The people living here seem to take a lot of pride in the history of the city, everyone seems to know the date the buildings come from as well as the purpose and sometimes even the date of restoration, which I don't think you'd come across so easily at home in London. This is another place that embraces botanical beauty, there's roses growing all over the place and the current major seems very keen on fountains as there's loads here and allegedly they have only just been installed, definitely gives the place extra elegance. The city is made up of a lot of open squares which reminds me of Spain and has the same laid back vibe, food and drinks served at outdoor seating well into the night and often a accompanied by a lone guitar pl...

We have salt in our blood in our sweat and in our tears, and so when we go back to the sea, we are returning to ourselves.  Having sufficiently gorged myself on all the things I'd been missing, namely Domino's Pizza, Galaxy chocolate and Ben and Jerry's ice cream (seriously if you haven't tried the birthday cake flavour you NEED to) I suppose it's about time I head out to another ship, checked in today to see my flights are ready, so now its official. I've had a long break and I'm lucky they didn't summon me back after only a month, but I'm still a little glum to be leaving, I'll be missing Christmas, New year's and my second birthday in a row. The good thing is I'll be back for my summer festivals which are a huge part of who I am and I was sad to miss that this year.  Being that it's winter right now, which is not my season at all I haven't been super social, I tend to hibernate a little bit so I haven't caught up with a...

I've mentioned before that time flows differently on ships. The venue I was first assigned to here was time travel themed which I now find very fitting, I truly believe in ship years as a concept, it feels like I've been here forever...Now that we are part way through July, September feels just round the corner. I wouldn't normally wish away my summer, back home summer is what I live for, with tech fest and all the other great festivals I get to be a part of, I tend to want it to last forever. Here the summer is going to be spent assisting 3 day cruisers which means packing everything our ship can do into a shorter space of time. We have enough activities and shows to fill a 7 day cruise so it's pretty tiring cramming it all into 3 and a lot of the set ups are in the sun, either out on the beach or on the top deck. It's funny, I managed to go through asia still pale as a ghost because I was very respectful of the dress code and being covered up, here I'm going...

There's a private island we go to every 3 days to set up a calypso band for the cruisers. I tend to go early and chill in the hammocks in the shade of the palm trees at the beach and watch what goes by. I've seen chickens running around wild with lizards, there's sharks and stingrays swimming through the waters and schools of flying fish. It's a pretty relaxed place with not too much going on apart from the beach, music and food so I like it a lot, it's being pimped out and turned into a floating theme park any day now in an attempt to attract the millennials to cruising, so I don't think I'll enjoy it quite so much then. If it wasn't changing I'd have applied to work there, the islanders have a great life, 25 days a month they have ships visit, they bring guests ashore but they're usually gone again by 6pm, after that the guys pack down and lock things up, then they set up a campfire, play some guitar and have a few drinks, they have a telesc...