Tokyo: See Mt. Fugi from Hakone National Park

Tokyo, with a population of 13 million and a meaning of Eastern Capital, is the largest city in the world with more tourist attractions than a person can see in a week. Fortunately, we did not need to decide what to do because Ken wanted to go to Mt. Fugi, where he participated in cold weather training when he was in the Marines. Unfortunately, Hakone National Park that offers great views of the mountain is usually a 2 1/2-hour drive from downtown Tokyo. And if there is an accident on the highway going east from Tokyo, it can be even longer, which is what it was for us. Fortunately, we were on a ship's tour and had a wonderful tour guide, Oka, who used simple black drawings on white paper to teach us words and numbers in Japanese and kept us entertained with the history of the dynasties, Samurai, Shoguns and emperors. In 1868, the Shoguns returned political power to the emperor, who is is symbol of the nation, much like the Queen of England. Unfortunately, if the weather is rainy or cloudy, one may never see Mt. Fugi, as our guide's travelers experienced two days before when it snowed or a fellow passenger who saw the mountain only once when she was in Tokyo for a month. Fortunately, our day was crisp and clear but chilly. We did encounter snow flurries but also a gorgeous view of the famous peak with only a few clouds at the top.

As we drove out of this very modern city in rush hour, we witnessed people scurrying to work, dressed for the cold weather, mostly wearing black or dark colored overcoats with some sporting surgical masks. Most workers commute by subways or trains rather than face the traffic jams in their automobiles. On the ride that included stop-and-go traffic due to an accident, some of us, including me, showed our tourist side because we could never obtain a good picture of Mt. Fuji that kept appearing and disappearing in between the trees and the hills. Ken was upset when I asked him to tell me again why we came on this tour. If only our tour guide had told us we could take as many photographs of Mt. Fuji as we wanted when we reached Hakone National Park. We actually saw a cherry tree in blossom. When asked if the residents ate the cherries, Oka stated that only the wild birds eat them because while they look beautiful, they cause stomachaches.

Once we reached the park, we donned every piece of winter clothing that we had packed and stood in line to board the Hakone Ropeway, that offered views of the Owakundani Crater, which spews volcanic steam and fumes, and Lake Ashi, with its crystal blue waters. This area was originally called the Valley of Hell but the name was changed in 1873 to the Valley of Great Boiling. Once we were off the ropeway, we climbed the steps and hill to the boiling springs at the top where I took photographs of Punxsutawney Phil and two cats who were enjoying the heat.

On our way to the restaurant for lunch, Oka told us about the legend of Lake Ashi. A dragon with nine heads lived in the lake and ate little girls. A monk with magical powers subdued the dragon by tying it to the bottom of the lake with an iron chain. The dragon deeply regretted what it had done and became the guardian of the lake. On July 31, the Summer Festival celebrates the dragon with nine heads. Lunch was delicious but the portions were small. The main entree would be called a Seafood Trio appetizer on the Pacific Princess. When our bus pulled away from the restaurant, Oka told us to wave good-bye. We were surprised that the staff had exited the restaurant after us to bid us farewell.

The ferry boat cruise on Lake Ashi was delightful. I snapped a photograph of two swan-shaped boats that I told everyone I would enter in the ship's photographic contest for seascapes. However, in our scurry to pack for our overland trip to Angkor Wat, I failed to do so. But I am sure that my photograph, which was more comical than serious, would not have won over the top photograph of a sunset over the ocean in a perfectly calm sea. Oka told us to make a wish at the tori gate because it would come true. So we did.

On our trip back to the ship, we stopped at a shopping mall that offered only food products. We all enjoyed the free samples and liked taking photographs of the realistic looking plastic food, which is a specialty of Japan. When cheeseburgers were introduced in the country, these plastic models helped the citizens to think that maybe cheeseburgers would be worth trying. We also enjoyed seeing the buildings in Toyko lite up at night and snapped photographs out of the bus' windows like Japanese tourists would in a major city in any other country.

As for our wish at the tori gate, we took Oka's suggestion and make this wish:
Bad fortune be driven away.
Good fortune will come to you.
Safe voyage is guaranteed.
Happy sailing to the Pacific Princess!

Tantalizing Tasmania but not Tasmania Devils

Tasmania has been on our Bucket List since we visited Australia in 2006. While some people think of Tasmania as an island off the island continent of Australia, Tasmanians see Australia as an island lost in the shadow of its most important province, which is about the size of Scotland or West Virginia.

We were met at the dock by members of Burnie's tourism office and the Mayor of Burnie, wearing a long burgundy robe with fur trim. His goal is to greet all the passengers from the average 16 cruise ships that stop in Tasmania annually. Do you think he would like to run for President of the United States? He seemed like a very nice man and a good public relations agent for his city of 20,000 people.

A free shuttle bus, manned by more tourism volunteers in colorful turquoise golf shirts, whisk us off to the Tasmania Travel and Information Center. There we spoke with a man who knew we were not natives of Florida because there are so few native Floridians. He was an American who had worked in San Francisco, traveled to Tasmania on a vacation and settled there permanently when he retired eight years ago. When I asked why he decided to retire there, he replied, "Did you breath the air here?" Tasmania has one of the best air qualities in the world and we arrived on the type to day hyped by the promotional brochures.

We were picked up at the center by Murray, our guide for a tour of Cradle Mountain-Lake St. Clair National Park that was arranged by Antonia and Curt from Cruise Critic. Murray offered a wealth of information about Australia and its island province, including the following:

* Australia's flag had only two animals, the kangaroo and the emu, both of which cannot go backwards so that Australia is always seen as going forward.
* Tasmania has no predator animals but is home to the second or third world's most deadliest snake, the tiger snake.
* The average price for a house in Tasmania is $237,000. Most houses are built of wood because Tasmania has no termites.
* Tasmania exports tulips to the Netherlands, black truffles to France, ginseng to China and Wasawbi cheese to Japan.
* Tasmanians enjoy four seasons with snow not melting until October, the end of their spring.
* Because its a 3 1/2-hour drive to Hobart, many people in Burnie have never visited the capital of the province. Instead, they prefer to take the one-hour flight to Melbourne.
* Tasmania has 3,000 lakes with most residents enjoying fishing.
* The main tree is Tasmanian is the pencil pine, very tall and thin.
* Wombat dropping are square so they will not roll away and the animal can mark its territory with them. (I am not sure you really wanted to know this but these dropping are unique, and the wombat is very territorial.)

When we arrived at the park after a 90-minute drive, we were treated to some spectacular alpine scenery and mountain trails. Through much of the park are boardwalks that make the trail easier and more accessible while preventing visitors from tramping diseases through the park. The trails that we took had no boardwalks but provided us with a great reflection of the mountain peaks on Lake St. Clair and a view of two peaks that looked like a little girl lying on her back with her hands on her stomach. We also tours a dwelling built by an early explorer of the area who wrote how he was afraid that he could be killed by the wild animals in the mountains.

Our guide Murray had told us about the echidna or spiny ant eater. When the males smell a female in heat, they all line up so that she can pick the one with which she will mate. The other males then wander away. When an echidna crossed the road and Murray volunteered to pull the van off the highway so we could take pictures, he thought we were all either male echidnas or Japanese tourists with their pointer fingers snapping way photographs on their cameras. The echidna was so adorable while posing for our cameras. Now, if only we had seen the elusive Tasmanian devil, which some of our fellow passengers saw in a small zoo near Burnie.

We stopped in a small town outside the park for lunch but most of spent our time converting US dollars into Australian dollars for an $8 dollar fee. Then we traveled along the picturesque highway on the coast of Bass Strait through lovely small towns on our return trip to Burnie. A railroad track built along the northern coast of Tasmania is no longer in use. But it was fanciful to imagine what a trip on a train must have been like with the coastline on one side and the villages on the other.

When I researched our stop in Burnie, my first choice of things to do was to tour The Nut, a volcanic plug just outside the village of Stanley, which is Tasmania's version of Uluru or Ayers Rock. Photographs make it appear that the residents must walk out their back doors and immediately encounter The Nut. The ship's tour to Stanley was canceled because of lack of interest. However, if we ever visit the northwest coast of Tasmania again, I want to see The Nut. However, our destinations were probably much better.

Cairns: Rain in the Rainforest

Having visited Cairns in 2006 and 2010, we had done the two must-dos at this tropical city of 150,000--snorkel off the Great Barrier Reef and travel on the Skyrail Rainforest Cableway to and the Kuranda Scenic Railway from the artist colony of Kuranda that was discovered by the hippies in the 1960s and 1970s who started the Kuranda Markets. We really did not make up our minds of what to do in this scenic city until the morning of our arrival when we signed up for a ship's tour of Rainforestation Nature Park, a 100-acre tourist attraction in the midst of Australia's World Heritage Rainforest that has won numerous awards from Australia's Board of Tourism. The site had been a coffee plantation until the owners lost their coffee beans after a severe frost.

As we were driving out of the city to the park about 30 minutes away, the skies opened up with one of those day-long, soaking rains. I was so glad that we were taking a tour because if we had decided to tour Cairns on our own, we probably would have called it a day and returned to the ship. Like magic, the rain stopped as we pulled into the park. If someone has only one day to spend in Cairns, this is the place to be to receive a comprehensive overview of the province of Queensland.

Our tour consisted of four parts, a ride on the amphibious WWII Army Duck (really spelled DUKW) as our guide explained the mysteries of this ancient ecosystem, a stroll along the Dreamtime Walk to listen to didgeridoo playing and see spear throwing and try our hand at throwing boomerangs, watch a performance of the Pamagirri Dancers in the Rainforestation Amphitheater, and then tour the Wildlife Park. What we did not know was included with the tour was a delicious barbecue lunch of many favorite Australian foods. Everything about this tour seemed like a bonus.

While we liked everything, our favorite was getting to see the koalas, crocodiles, kangaroos, snakes and other Australian wildlife. The koalas were so adorably cute and cuddly while the kangaroos were out in the open to welcome our petting their heads and feeding them. Unfortunately, the wombat alluded us by staying in its burrow. Now we must keep returning to New Zealand to see a Tasmanian devil and to Australia to sight a wombat. That's really not a bad goal to have.

Incredible as it may seem, the rain started again when we boarded our bus to return to Cairns. Unfortunately, the air conditioning on the bus did not start, and we were soon very hot. When our guide Gabby asked us if we wanted to drive through the botanical garden or go directly back to the ship, we naturally wanted to tour the gardens but many of our fellow travelers immediately shouted that we needed to get back to town because they were melting. We got off in downtown and looked around the souvenir shops to learn that most of the native items were designed in Australia, but "manufactured under strict Australian supervision in China." Any items produced in Australia cost more than twice as much. I think we should buy any souvenirs we want in China because they would actually be made there.

Scintillating Shanghai

Thank you to everyone who wrote to ask us why we have not submitted any entries to the blog since Hawaii. Some of your emails were actually concerned such as the one from my cousin Kim who asked if everything was fine. Others were not as nice and informed us to get busy. I am sorry that we have neglected the blog. My only excuse for not writing the entries is that we are having too much fun and are involved in too many activities. Then, I was hoping that Ken would add the photographs to the blog, and he thought that I might take the time to do it, which is very time consuming with the graphic program that we have. I think that we may need to upgrade to a new program when we return. Okay, we know that you are not feeling sorry for us. We are so lucky!

We just returned from a four-day stay in Shanghai, which is now our favorite city in China. This entry will be crafted around the itinerary that Tour—Beijing developed for us with notes in parentheses added by me. With more than three full days to explore the city and its surroundings, we saw almost everything that our port destination lecturer Debbie told us about in her presentation. We feel fortunate that Roberta and Dennis Beckman joined us for this wonderful experience.

Saturday, March 17
Upon your arrival in Shanghai, our tour guide and driver will pick you up at 9 a.m. and transfer you back to hotel, the Crown Plaza in the Old French Concession in Xuhui District. (Our tour guide Allen had majored in English Tourism at a university. She has an outstanding command of the English language and an impressive vocabulary. The only word we had trouble understanding was building, which she pronounced like it was "beauty." We are not sure that our driver Michael understood English but he did understand the traffic patterns of Shanghai, the largest city in China, its political center that is only not quite 700 years old. Allen informed us not to give any money to beggars because as Dennis put it, "If you give money to one legless man, every legless man will come running after you." Allen also told us not to make eye contact with vendors because they will follow us.)

The French Concession was established on 6 April 1849. Finally come to Xintiandi. Xin Tian Di will be something like Lan Kwai Fong in Hong Kong and Clarke Quay in Singapore. The past and the present and the East and West makes Xintiandi very charmful, making it into the most ideal site for visitors home and abroad to have a good view of the history, culture, and modern lifestyle of Shanghai.

Then take you to visit the Longtangs in Jingan District. Longtangs in Shanghai are just like Hutongs in Beijing, the lanes lined with houses where people have more chances to communicate with each other.

After lunch, first visit the Jade Buddha Temple. Jade Buddha Temple, is the most famous Buddhist temple in Shanghai. The temple was established in 1918 with the style of the Song Dynasty. It is an active temple with over 70 monks. The outside of the temple is recognized by the bright yellow walls. (Only two places can use this color, the palace and the Jade Buddha Temple. Outside are four Buddhas, the King of the East who is happy and playing music; the King of the South, who observes the whole world with his eyes and uses the sword to kill the bad people; the King of the West who controls the dragon and uses it to drown the country's enemies; and the King of the North who is the Heavenly Buddha. The gold Buddha in front in the big boss of all the Buddhas.

The three statues in the front are the same but have different titles and represent the founder of Buddhism. The middle statue was loved by all and only saw happy families. Then he left the palace and saw that some people did not have as much as he did. His father secretly sent five generals to protect him. The monkey delivered a peach while the deer delivered water so he survived. At age 35, he was enlightened and saw the way to help all people, which was Buddhism. The Buddha on the right is the medicine Buddha who can cure all diseases while the Buddha on the left is in charge of the Western Paradise.

The three Buddhas represent the Present, the Past and the Future. The two white jade Buddha statues inside are from Burma, the sitting one is the largest while the reclining one is dying but looks carefree because he believes his disciples will come to know his beliefs. The statues are beautiful for two reasons, one because the jade has no flaws and two because of the carving skills. The jade is embedded with jewels donated by the believers in Burma. We should not point at the Buddha and need to step over the threshold to avoid bad luck. While we could not photograph the reclining Buddha, we could photograph the large replica in the gift shop.)

Then drive to People's Square, covering 140,000 square meters, to visit Shanghai Museum. The museum has the selection of over 112,000 Chinese cultural relics from the Old Stone Age to modern times. Then you are arranged to enter the Shanghai City Planning Exhibition Hall. The Exhibition Hall is a six-story building, displaying Shanghai's urban planning and development. Then walk to the Nanjing Pedestrian Road. It is regarded as the first commercial street in Shanghai. It was first built in 1851. Now Nanjing Road has turned into the number one site for shopping in the city. (Crowded is the only way to describe this area. Dennis brought Roberta a black pearl pendant similar to the one that she had admired in Tahiti where they had honeymooned 28 years earlier.)

After dinner, take one hour night cruising on Huang Pu River. After the tour, transfer you back to hotel. (The buildings along both sides of the river are all lighted at night making for a beautiful sight. Allen told us that "by day, Shanghai is a handsome man. By night, it is an elegant lady." A very well phrased description!)

Sunday, March 18
Start today's tour in the new development zone in Pudong -Lujiazui, which is teemed with the futuristic, avant-garde buildings - Oriental Pearl Tower, Jin Mao Building, Bank of China Tower. Taking the elevator to the 88-story Observation Deck of Jinmao Tower to have a bird's eye view of Huangpu River. (The sun had yet to shine upon us in Shanghai. The fog permitted no view of the city. Allen described the Jinmao Tower as a "gigantic majestic high-rise tower kile a bamboo shoot in the spring. From ground level, we could not see the top of the building.)

The Bund (Waitan) is one of the most noted architectural symbols of Shanghai. Then move on to Shanghai Bazaar and Yu Yuan Garden. Yuyuan is the most famous garden in Shanghai. It is located in the heart of Shanghai's Old City (Shanghai bazaar), one of the few existent old tourist places in Shanghai. (In China, one needs four things to have a garden—water, stone, plants and buildings. The inspiration stone for the owner had been a wedding gift and is considered one of the most beautiful stones in all of China.) Shanghai bazaar is teemed with a great number of small streets and lanes where vendors sell their products and food stuffs to the tourists and local people. (Overcrowded on a Sunday afternoon.)

After dinner, you are arranged to watch Acrobatic Show. The Acrobatics at Shanghai are not to be missed. They are held each night and last for about 2 hours. The Shanghai Acrobatic Troupe, established in 1951 is one of the best in China. It frequently tours internationally and perform routinely at Shanghai and other cities in China. (China has definitely saved its best athletes for this show. Children are screened at a young age to learn if they are flexible. These acrobats seemed as if they had no bones in their body. At the end of the show, the motorcycle drivers spun around in a sphere. Until the end of last year, there were five motorcycles and drivers. This year, the show added three more.) End of the service tonight, transferred back to your hotel in Shanghai around 9:30pm.

Monday, March 19
Pick up from our your hotel in Shanghai around 8:30 a.m. Drive about 1.5 hour and get to the water town of Zhouzhuang. You will board a Chinese style gondola to cruise the waterways of the city. (The town had about 5,000 residents years ago but now has only about 3,000 because many young people have moved to the cities to make more money. I keep wondering what this area would look like in the spring when everything is in blossom. Today's weather is cold and cloudy with a high temperature of 9 degrees C. Spring officially arrives in Shanghai after five days with temperatures above 10 degrees C. It's going to be a late spring!

After lunch, visit Suzhou, known historical and cultural city, as well as a key scenic tourist one. (Known as the Garden City with more than 200 gardens, 60 of which are protected by the government, Suzhou is known for its private gardens that belong to one family. The other two types of gardens are the Imperial Gardens for royalty only and the Buddhism Gardens that are behind temples.) First visit Net Master Garden, the best and most celebrated as a model Ming Dynasty Garden in all of Suzhou. The Garden of the Master of the Nets is really a masterpiece. The good use of space is the most effective thing about this garden. Rock arrangements and beautiful fish pools match each other as do the house and garden parts. The garden also holds many structures of using lattice windows to frame views of flowers or bamboo. Then move on to the Ancient City Gate and Grand Canal. The Panmen City Gate is the oldest city gate in existence in Suzhou city. It used to be one of the eight city gates during the Spring & Autumn Annals (770-476 BC) when Suzhou was the capital of the Wu Kingdom. The Grand Canal is one of the greatest ancient projects in China and is the longest man-made canal in world.

After the tour in Zhouzhuang and Suzhou, transferred back to your midtown hotel in Shanghai. Dinner on your own. (We ate at a Western-style restaurant across the road from our hotel. While all the Asian food we had in China was delicious, it was nice to eat Western food again.)

Tuesday, 20th March
In the morning, our tour guide and driver will pick you up from hotel and transfer you to the airport, end of your tour in Shanghai. (We altered the itinerary for the morning. Allen and Michael picked us up at the hotel after we checked out at 9 a.m. Then we drove 1/2 hour to the went to the Old City where we said good-bye to our wonderful guide and driver. Then we took the Maglev (short for Magnetic Levitation) for a seven-minute trip that covered 30 kilometers at 340 kilometers per hour. What a ride! The rest of the day was like any travel day on an airplane that for the 2-hour and 45-minute flight to Hong Kong. A taxi-ride later that took us from Lantau Island through Kowloon to Hong Kong Island, we arrived at the ship after 4 p.m. While we decided to stay on board for the evening, Roberta and Dennis took the tram ride to the summit of Victoria Peak to view the city at night.)

The next day we took the ship's shuttle to Central Pier where we purchased tickets from Big Bus Tours for the three routes of the hop-on, hop-off bus that included trips on the Star Ferry to and from Hong Kong Island to Kowloon. Unfortunately, this was not a great idea because of the traffic in the Hong Kong area and the infrequency of the buses. We spent more time waiting at stop lights than we did touring Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. The only time we got off the bus was to see the Tin Hau Temple and the Jade Market. At 2:30 p.m., we got off the bus at the Peninsula Hotel. After receiving different directions from several vendors, we walked along the Avenue of Stars and took photographs at the statue of Bruce Lee. Then we took the Star Ferry to the shuttle to the ship. The best thing about the day was the champagne sailaway. Donned in hoodies, we toasted our three incredible days in Shanghai and our trip around the city with 8,000 skyscrapers. New York City has fewer than 4,000.)

IMPORTANT NOTE: We will be off the Pacific Princess from March 26 to 29 as we tour Angkor Wat. Arranging this private tour while we were on the ship also took time that I could have been working on the blog. So please do not expect to hear from us until early April. Thank you for your consideration.

American Samoa: The Only U.S. Territory in the South Pacific (LONG)

American Samoa's capital, Pago Pago--pronounced "Pango Pango," is located on Tutuila, the main island of the Eastern group of the Samoan island chain. American Samoa, in contrast to Western Samoa, became a territory of the United States in 1900. The bay where the Pacific Princess docked nearly bisects the island at its center and is considered one of the best, most-spectacular natural harbors in the South Pacific. The natives greeted us with the largest outdoor market we have ever experienced in our travels. Our ship was the third cruise ship to dock in February so they obviously had considerable practice in making us feel welcome while relieving us of some of our money. We were booked on a tour arranged by Lynn from Cruise Critic for $50 a person. When we learned that the ship's tour cost only $49 and local vendors were offering tours for $20 a person on naturally air-conditioned (open-windowed) brightly painted buses, we were sure that we had overpaid. By the end of our almost six-hour tour, we all thought we had taken the bargain of the century.

Our guide was Kiso, a liberal-arts student at American Samoa Community College who would rather be studying auto mechanics, who informed us that while Samoa is not financially rich, it is rich in nature. A sports fan, he also told us that one of the main exports of the island is American football players with #43 of the Pittsburgh Steelers being the name recognized by most of us in our air-conditioned black van--Richard, Barb, Chuck, Lorraine, Ken and me. I have no idea what that player's name is but we all recognized that most Samoan men have the build of professional football players. We later learned that physique is partly due to the opening of the first McDonald's on the island in July 2003. By November of that year, the franchise was the Number 1 in sales in the entire world and it actually ran out of hamburgers one day. The store is within walking distance of the largest high school on the island so it has a built-in clientele. Kiso, who could have been a football player, was a freshman at that high school when the McDonald's opened.

Kiso seemed to be related to everyone on the island or at least the most important people. He told us it is a tradition to call everybody brother or sister because everyone on the island knows everyone else. To eat dinner at a neighbor's house, all one has to say is "please." The biggest crime on the island is having a neighbor take another resident's banana branch.

The only major highway on the island does not go all the way around--one either has to go east and return to the bay or go west. Kiso headed east, driving us past the tuna canneries that employ 40 percent of the population. About 30 percent of the population lives off the land, a nice expression for the unemployed and 30 percent are employed in other occupations including the government and hospitality.

We traveled east to the $2 Beach, appropriately named because we each had to pay $2 to enter. There we viewed the Camel Rock. The Egyptians brought the first camel to American Samoa. Legend on the island states that items that are not native do not last so the camel is now a rock. On our way back to the city, Kiso told us that all the homes along the shore were underwater when the tsunami struck the island at 7 a.m. in the morning. The residents had only five or 10 minutes warning. He also explained that the highest roof on the house is for the chief who rules the village but the high talking chief speaks. We viewed a round house with carvings on its pillars. The village had given an invitation to local artists to each carve a pillar.

On the road west was a Tank Farm, where American Samoa stores the oil that it imports from the United States and Australia. Kiso said his ancestors lived in huts but now most people have nice homes thanks to True Value Hardware's entrance on the island. Most homes do not have air conditioning but rather use the natural breeze cooling system. However, almost everyone has cable TV. The coconuts on the road create a game of dodge ball for the drivers.

We stopped at Fatu and Fitu Flower Pot Rocks. The two names translated mean "broken heart." According to a local legend, the fisherman Fatu went out one day to fish and never came back. He was eaten by a shark and turned into a rock. Fitu, his sweetheart, went out to look for him and noticed the new rock. She swam out to it and was eaten by a shark and turned into a rock, so the two lovers were reunited in the "Shark's Villa."

Then we drove to Vila's Village for a food tasting and entertainment, where we met our fellow passengers on the Princess tour. Vila is Kiso's mother. She and her husband started to build the village in 2004, just before Kiso's father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He was treated at UCLA before he died in 2006. Vila continued with the plan to build the village. Kilo was the MC for the native dances. He said, "The good-looking guys are picked to dance but the handsome guy is the MC. Then the women appeared to dance with the princess. Peter and Dennis volunteered to dance with the princess and were immediately wrapped in sarongs by the village girls. Dennis, who had been in the Peace Corps, obviously learned his smooth moves during that time. Kiso received a foot massage on his back from the Princess. Needless to say, a good time was had by all.

Our next stop was the Ioane Viliamu, the first church on the island that was built in 1839. While the outside had been damaged by the tsunami, the inside with its beautiful inlaid wooden ceilings and stained glass windows was spared. The air being cooled by the ceiling fans created welcome relief from the steaming temperatures outside. On our drive to our next stop, the Tanese Museum, we passed a large, mansion-like house on a grassy hill overlooking a picture postcard view of the beach. When we asked who live in the house, Kiso told us the mansion was owned by Betty, the tour operator. Tourism seems to provide a good living in American Samoa.

Tavese was the first governor of Samoa who actually was a Samoan. Born on August 29, 1941, he died while governor from a heart attack he experienced on an airplane to New Zealand on March 26, 2003. His funeral lasted a week. His wife still lives in the house with his grave site beside the home. Inside the home were many items given to him by dignitaries around the world, including an autographed football from the Penn State Nittany Lions presented by Governor Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania with an invitation to visit PSU. Tavese was known for always performing a musical number at a variety of festive gatherings and was loved by the people he governed.

After the museum, we stopped to view a beach formed from lava rock and were invited by some locals who were having a picnic there to enjoy their native foods, especially breadfood. When we passed a prison, Kiso explained that people who had been released often wanted to return because of the excellent treatment. Kiso's uncle, who was a little guy, was sentenced to prison for six months because several young people were fighting and he tried to hold two of them back. The police arrested him thinking he was involved in the fight. When he was released from prison, he had been feed so well that he was a big guy.

Kiso has traveled to the United States twice, once to visit his aunt in Compton, California, and again to spend two years on his mission trip for the Mormon church in Alaska. When our tour was completed, we wished Kiso good luck with changing his major to auto mechanics. Our mission then became to mail out postcards to friends and family, and to find a shirt for Ken from the incredible number of vendors who had established a market on the dock near our ship. Both missions were successful as was our fabulous day in American Samoa.

Bay of Islands: In Search of Glowworms

Cyclone Jasmine caused our captain to cancel the ship's stop in Tonga and head to the Bay of Islands in the northern island of New Zealand. The rumors that the crew actually cheered when the decision was announced were true. Of course, Ken was happy because when he were in Bay of Islands two years ago, Ken declared New Zealand his favorite country to visit and announced that he wanted to return for at least a month-long stay. NOw we at least have another day in this geographical wonderland. Having toured the early sailors' hangout of Russell and visiting Waitangi, the place of the signing of the Waitangi Treaty between the British and the Maori, we signed up the the tour of the Puketi Kauri Forest and Glow Worm Cave. While some of our fellow travelers informed us that the Glow Worm Caves were hokey, we who had never laid eyes on a glow worm but knew every word to the song, "Glow, Little Glow Worm, Glow," decided it was time to meet one up close and personal.

The trip through the New Zealand countryside and small towns was worth the price of the tour. Just think about the scenery in Lord of the Rings. Our tour guide Doug told us that considerable reconstruction of the highway system is occuring to widen and straighten the roads in an effort to reduce fatalities in what the natives refer to as the black spot areas. Raising sheep in this part of New Zealand was not good for raising sheep because the sheep start to suffocate from the heat. In the winter, snow falls only from the the middle of the North Island southward. The popular New Zealand kiwi fruit originated in China. Scientists determined that they could raise a better strain of the Chinese gooseberries in the rich volcanic top soil and called the fruit, which grows on a vine similar to grapes, kiwi.

On our journey, we stopped to view the Stone Store, the oldest stone building in the country that was first used as a library for the missionaries, and the Kemp House, New Zealand's oldest surviving house built of wood from the kauri tree. The small village of Kerikeri, which is becoming overpopulated, has built a bypass on the highway to direct traffic away from these two buildings because their foundations were being shaken. At our bathroom stop, Lorraine bought a beautiful dress at an outlet store that spotted the label, Made in China. It seems as if travelers from the United States are not the people who go to China to let their clothes attend a homecoming. My only wish was that the shop had the dress in my size.

In Puketi Kauri Forest, we were greeted by our guide Ian, a former dairy farmer who got tired of gazing at cow's rear ends and started Puketi Kauri Forest Walks (www.forestwalks.com or +64 9 401-9095) seven years ago. Now his ecotourism business offers wedding and other parties in which cocktails are served on the boardwalk and then resume to the clearing for dining under the stars. Ian told us that to know what could be eaten in the forest, watch what the bird's eat. He also explained that kauri is pronounced cody. The 120 inches of rain annually is the key to this example of one of the best subtropical rain forests that once clothed New Zealand. The Kauris can be more than 600 years old and provide a hardwood with a beautiful grain. We noted a tree felled by lightning in the 1930s that provided enough timber for 10 houses.

Laborers used to climb the trees with spiked boots to collect the gum, when gum used to be used for many things for which we now use oil because the gum supplied was depleted. Ian also pointed out a grasshopper that lives in the downed Kauri trees. When he was a young boy, he and his three brothers collected 1,000 of these at 5 cents each for a high school that used them in biology classes. According to Ian, $50 bought a lot of ice cream. A campaign has started to bring the birds back because they drop the seeds and reforest the Kauris.

Then we continued to Kawakawa where we bought chicken and mushrooms pies for lunch and used the public toilets designed by the Austrian architect Friedensreich Hudnertwasser. He had come to Kawakawa on a cruise ship tour, fell in love with New Zealand and moved to Kawakawa after the tour ended. We saw the train that offers a tour from the city for $18 on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and holidays.

We then traveled on State Highway 1, the main interior route from the top of the North Island to the bluff at the bottom of the south island, before our turn off to the Kawati Glow Worm Caves, a family-owned business for several generations. Unfortunately, no one is allowed to take photographs inside the cave. So you will just have to go there yourself for an experience of a lifetime. After viewing the impressive livestone walls and magnificent delicate stalactites and stalagmites, we spotted our first glow worms. At first, the little blue bulb-like creatures seem to be battery-operated Christmas tree lights or stars in a galaxy. Then you learn that they spin down white strings to attract insects to feed themselves. They live in this state for 11 to 12 months before they mature and have about three days to procreate before they die. We did not want to leave this magical place but knew we had to climb us a winding set of stairs in the rain forest to return to our bus. Please put visiting a glow worm farm on your bucket list of things you must do.

After we arrived back at the port, Lorraine and I had time to purchase New Zealand T-shirts as a momentum of a fabulous day. However, being on the last tender to the ship was not an experience that we should repeat.

Auckland is as awesome as ever

Our ship arrived in Auckland on Saturday, February 18, so we knew that we would face the weekend crowd of residents enjoying the beautiful surroundings in which they lived their daily lives. In addition, I had promised to help Janie Gilkey (the true world traveler who sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe with her parents when she was 17 months old, visited Antarctica in 1970 when the continent had greeted fewer than 5,000 visitors and lived in Brunei for 21 years establishing clinics for mentally and physically handicapped children before retiring) prepare for her presentation that we had titled "The Sultan (his wives) and I."

On Saturday morning, we learned that Janie was scheduled to give this presentation at 10 a.m. on Sunday. Talk about pressure to produce quickly. Fortunately, Janie had received information from a friend of hers about what the previous sultan had done for the country, and I had found photographs on the Internet that demonstrated the fabulous wealth and lifestyle of the current sultan. His Royal Majesty had been the richest man in the world until he and his brother had squandered away $8 billion. Don't we all wish that we had that amount of money?

While we were collecting our thoughts about the presentation, we did get to see the ship's emergency drill on Deck 4. We now know just how safe we are on the Pacific Princess and how well prepared the crew is for an emergency.

At 11 a.m., Ken and I decided to debark the ship for several hours to see the one tourist attraction we have wanted to see the most this year--Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World and Antarctic Encounter. We took the complimentary van with the shark's head from downtown to museum, which reminded us of the South Florida Museum in Bradenton but on a grander scale. We saw the king and gentoo penguins through the viewing window, toured the reproductions of rooms in Scott's Hut, watched the Stingray Encounter and marveled at the delicate creatures in the Seahorse Kingdom. We rode the moving sidewalk twice around the Oceanarium and Predator Tank, where we watched the surface feeding of the fish and learned fascinating facts about sharks. The sign at the Predator Tank informed us that the sharks in the water appear only to be 3/4 of their real size and range in length from the school shark at 2 meters to the great white shark at 6 meters (no great whites were present).

However, the most fascinating exhibit for me was the Snowcat Ride that simulated a real trip through Antarctic. According to another display in the museum, scientists that work at Kelly Tarton's who had traveled to Antarctica as part of their job claim that the simulated experience is quite real. On the snowcat, we ventured through whiteout conditions that were a combination of the strong winds and ice that Scott and his team faced during their final days. We learned that penguins, which do not fly, perform all the movements of flying while in the water, lose all of their feathers once a year in a molting process that takes from four to six weeks resulting in a lost of 20 to 30 percent of their body weight and are very social animals. While the colony in the museum has 80 birds, colonies in the wild may host at many as 1 million. I liked this ride so much that I did it twice.

After we returned from the museum, our goal was to spend the remainder of our New Zealand money on wine and beer, with Ken finding a new beer to add to his Beers of the World Tour--Steinlager. Then we returned to the ship at about 5:30 p.m., choosing to dine on our balcony.

The next morning, Janie and I got together early and actually had the semblance of a real presentation by 10 a.m., thanks to Janie convincing members of the audiovisual team to come to her cabin to help us. In my introduction, I explained that Brunei is one of three countries that occupies the island of Borneo, with part of Malaysia and Indonesia being the other two, and showed photographs of the Sultan, his cars and airplanes. Then Janie told her stories of how she became involved with the Sultan and his second wife with whom she often had tea and received a donation of two buses to transport the children in her clinics. While she and her charges often swan in the pool at the palace and attended many parties there, Janie had to get almost everything for the clinics donated.

That afternoon, our room steward delivered a large floral arrangement to our cabin that Janie that worked with the head waiter to obtain. It is no surprise to anyone that Janie was an outstanding fundraiser.