We boarded the Grand Princess on January 5th in Adelaide, Australia for a 19 day cruise to 4 Australian ports and about 9, maybe, I can’t exactly remember, ports around New Zealand. The embarkation process was the smoothest we have even gone through and start to finish took under 1/2 hour including our room being ready before noon. Kudos to the port of Adelaide! It is the end of the first evening and things are going wonderfully. We have had two great meals in the Club Class section of the main dining room. Both meals were served at a good pace by extraordinary staff. The trip is beginning great.

After sailing all night, we reached Kangaroo Island in South Australia. We had an all day excursion, seeing much of the island. First we went to a Eucalyptus Oil Farm where they also make emu oil and apple cider. After tasting several hard ciders, we were all in a very good mood to move on. We stopped at a honey farm and toured the process of getting the honey, and then had a honey tasting. We went to a lavender farm where we had lunch, stopped at overlooks for panoramic views, and stopped in the town of Kingscote, and then to top it off we went to a wine tasting on the way back to the ship.

The next day we landed at Port Lincoln in South Australia. Here we only had a half day excursion which worked out well since we were invited to the Chef’s Table Dinner that night. More on this later. On our excursion we went to a sheep searing museum where we also had fresh scones, clotted cream, homemade jam, and tea, to Farm Beach where part of the movie Gallipoli was filmed, and to a beautiful overlook.

On the way back to our room, we stopped at Alfredo’s Pizza and split a pizza. We learned in Alaska one each was way too much. After a quiet afternoon, we left to meet for the Chef’s Table. It was held in the Crown Grill in a separate area, and there were nine people attending. It was a remarkable meal with amazing wines and worth every cent we paid extra for it. We are including a couple of pictures and the menu, but the pictures don’t come close to how wonderful it was.

Today has been a sea day. We went to a cooking demonstration, then a lecture about meteorites, then to listen to some chamber music, and then back to the room to write the blog. We both love sea days because there are so many activities to chose from. We had to retest for Covid this morning since we need to leave the ship tomorrow morning and stay away until 11 AM. Apparently we are on a back-to-back sailing and tomorrow when the ship lands in Melbourne about 700 people will get off after a seven day trip from Melbourne to South Australia and 700 more will get on to go to New Zealand. By Australian law, since the rest of our voyage is considered a second voyage, we had to test. There are no excursions in Melbourne, so we shall see what we are going to do. We dock again in Melbourne towards the end of our cruise so if we do nothing now, we can explore Melbourne then. Tonight we have a specialty dining reservation back at the Crown Grill. I made the reservation months ago, and the reservation just happened to be right after the Chef’s Table.