Advertisement
Published: October 21st 2007
Hello, all: As we write this entry we are already home. This was indeed, a frosting on the cake, Lord Howe Island was a dream vacation come true. We left Perth on Tuseday, leaving behing great memories of days with Linda, David and the girls.
We spend a delightful evening wandering through Sydney and dined in a tropical fish restaruant at the Rocks. Thanks to David's good knowledge of the capitol, he arranged for us to stay at a great place and location, Hotel Rocks, where the ghost of Erick is still wondering in search of his only love. Apparently we slept through the ghost's nocturnal wandering....
The next morning we took off on a small plane to Lord Howe Island. Although we had some information from the web, we really were not prepared... Blue-green shades surrounding the main island, and small rocks marking the surf at the entrance to the lagoon. We landed on a small runway, and were met by Bill, a quiet and pleasant man who took our suitcases and helped us into the van. For the next 8-10 minutes as we drove, he indicated the places along the road: School (for a total of 36
kids, ages 4-12, then they go to Sydney), Museum (operated by a cafe owner), Police (one policeman who is also a harbor master and the airport controller, to have something to do), and a Hospital (a small house with one doctor, has been there for 9 years), and so on. He was frequently interrupted by a boistrous voice of a very elegant lady who with a big smile was commenintg on a "great place to eat", "great beach" etc. As we learned later, a large family was coming for a wedding and she was the mother of the bride and was enjoying her return to Lord Howe after many years.
Every bend of the road offered a new spectacular vew of the island. We have to thank our friends who gave us the information on the marine and land sanctuary. It was declared a Heritage Island the same year as Galapagos. Without knowing it in advance, we visited both in less than 2 years!
For the next six days...glorious days....we drank deeply of this south Pacific paradise....snorkeling on gorgeous reefs, fishing among clouds of trooical fish (not at the sanctuary beaches!), hiking up rocky trails through giant palm
and fig forests, sun gathering on long beaches wherewe were the only folks, tandem biking the length and breadth of Lord Howe - which is only about 10km long and 1.5 km wide... We discovered that Lyuba is a powerhouse on the back seat... AND a gorgeous panoply of birds of different specials, fish and rare mammal. There are no unofficial cars. dogs, cats and other mammals other than max of 500-600 people on the entire island...
Arajilla, the place we stayed was heavenly. The staff was unbelievable. Bill was, indeed, the owner, and a passionate sailor, his 65-feet catamaran was the glorious site off the beach. The food was a real surprize and delight, competing with best of many star restaurants. The accomodations were beautiful and tranquil. under the palm trees and the smell of lavander... and .....we were ex officion at the wedding, officio with the host and his family...and made some nice friends for the future. Hey, we were event invited to sail from Lord Howe to Sydney (2 days away) in his catamaran....alas our schedule did not give us the time so we put it on the front burner for NEXT TIME!
and so
with a few teary eyes, we left Lord Howe and flew to Sydney where we were greated by our friends, Matt and Syvi Harris and their lovely almost one year old Elias. Matt was a Fellow in Win's lab a few years ago and now is creating a private company. Syvi is a lovely lawyer...YES, there are such people. We stayed with then in their small house and enjoyed the reunion, two great evenings and a day of Elias-playing, Sydney touring and trinket buying.
AND THEN....almost as soon as it began, the vacation was over...and we climbed into UNITED/QUANTAS Busines claqss (Lyuba's doing) and we were comfortable to LA and then DC....and....so to bed.
Love to you all
Win and Lyuba
Advertisement
Tot: 0.097s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.056s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
