With no beautiful Sydney Harbour to sail into, for the first time on a turnaround the alarm was turned OFF and we slept until nearly 6:30am. We were slow to get moving, though, and interneted and checked on things at home and paid bills while sitting on the Terrace Deck looking over the impressive Melbourne downtown skyline. I phoned Mom using Vonage (For 1 cent per minute! Get the app!!), and we chatted until she was nearly late for dinner. She mentioned that she was out of a couple of items (and with bitter cold and snow did not need to go out), so Target.com came to the rescue and I placed an order for her right from my iPhone sitting on the Terrace Deck. Since I’ve been here, I’ve also ordered her a pair of shoes from Zappos while on the upper level of a sightseeing cruise in Picton. Ain’t technology the best great?
We lingered over breakfast. The Horizon Court Buffet was starting to clear out by then, so it felt rather peaceful for a turnaround day morning. But we eventually gathered up a few things, including old cruise card, new cruise card, a completed Australian Entry Form and our passports (which we never needed today, even though we had just re-entered Australia. I’ll never get these rules straight) and walked off the Golden Princess about 9:30am. Feeling like old pros, we loaded $7 AUD each on our existing Myki cards right in the terminal, which gave us enough money to travel all day on Melbourne’s trams and buses. The walk down Station Pier, where the ship was docked, to the end of the Tram 109 route took about 10 minutes, and I used Google Maps (and that wonderful free cellular internet thanks to T-Mobile) to route us to our first stop of the day.
Near where we had stayed in the Docklands area is a giant wheel called the Melbourne Star. It was built by the same company that built the London Eye and a wheel in Las Vegas and Singapore (I think...or Hong Kong). G had wanted to ride it when we stayed in Melbourne but it was so darn hot that the thought of being enclosed in a car, even one with air conditioning, just didn’t appeal. Today was a perfect day for it, with endless visibility and a cloudless sky. While we walked through the Docklands shopping area to the giant wheel, I picked up a few small Christmas gifts for people on board, which had also been on my list for today.
We had a discount coupon for the Melbourne Eye but it was still kinda pricey- about $21 USD per person- and boarded our own enclosed car for the 30-minute ride. There was a nice narration about the history of Melbourne (which really took off during the 19th century Gold Rush), and Port Phillip Bay and the freight and cruise/ferry port areas, which we could eventually see when we got high enough. We had to look hard to see the Golden Princess but did finally make it out; I suspect we could have seen the Melbourne Star from Skywalkers.
That scalloped building again 
The Bolte Bridge
Can you see the Golden Princess?
Melbourne CBD
All day long, G was popping into 7-Elevens for their $1 Slurpees, so he wasn’t particularly hungry, and I had a nut bar that I ate, and we never stopped for lunch. Instead, we walked around the Docklands area and took a tram to the Cole’s Supermarket we went to when we stayed in Melbourne. There is a Cole’s closer to Station Pier and the ship, but we were familiar with ‘ours’ and it was easier to get to by tram, anyway. We did what I think will be our final shop of this cruise season, things that we could probably have done without if we had stretched, but, really, the prices down here are so low for us in $US that it doesn’t pay to scrimp. Like Cole’s brand makeup remover cloths for $1.60 USD for 30 (they are fantastic). And more gum, and, more Cole’s individually packaged nut bars (which we’ve been using for snacks in ports) and, of course, potato chips for G. They even had (but he didn’t buy) lamb and mint flavored potato chips. Crazy!
We left Cole’s and walked down Spencer St. a couple of blocks past the Southern Cross Railway Station (which we went into just to see it. It’s not Chicago’s Union Station but it’s big) to where we could get Tram 109 and take it back to the ship. We arrived at Station Pier with about 45 minutes to spare before we had to be on board, and decided, even laden with two shopping bags, to walk down the beautiful boardwalk along the long stretch of beach on either side of the pier. We arrived back on board at 3:25pm- seldom early, never late- and used the muster drill announcement to take showers and get cleaned up for the evening.
Sail away from Melbourne, even on a beautifully sunny day, can’t compare with Sydney. It just can’t. However, it is unique in that the ship is in Port Phillip Bay for nearly three hours after it leaves Melbourne (Google Map it- it’s huge!), and there is land on either side of the ship that entire time. We saw lots of sailboats while we were at dinner, and an endless stretch of beach along the bay’s eastern side, and finished dinner just in time to be on the Promenade Deck as we sailed past the Heads. As we were walking there, we passed yet another familiar face from the Pacific Princess (and two years on the Emerald Princess)...pianist Manny from the ship’s orchestra/ showband. Sometimes it takes us a minute to place when and which ship we know someone from, but not with Manny. We knew and he even remembered that we had done the Emerald Princess two different seasons together.
We saw Manny again almost immediately afterward when we went to the Welcome Aboard show in the Princess Theater at 7:45pm, kicked off by the production show cast accompanied by the Golden Princess orchestra (including Manny!) and then the Blue Brothers tribute duo performed a short show. It was wonderful to again leave the Princess Theater to see daylight outside; we should have that most of our remaining days on the ship.
I was feeling so much better today, after just one dose of meds, but we were starting to wear down, and called it a day at that point. Tomorrow is another of my favorite days, where we are basically at sea but with scenic cruising in Wineglass and Oyster Bays for four hours in the afternoon. No alarm, no docking noise, a leisurely morning and the scenery comes to us all afternoon. What a concept!