Geo: 21.4272, -71.1467The first day out of Miami was all at sea heading for Grand Turk Is, the capital of the British colony Turks and Caicos. Wi-fi is a bit scratchy in our room but satisfactory in the public areas. I'm able to download The Australian each day, which I enjoy reading.The cruise is going exceptionally well. There's a large variety of countries and ages represented among the 750 passengers, and we've managed to strike up plenty of good conversations. There are several excursion options at each port. Robyn went horse riding in the surf and I went on a open bus tour on Grand Turk.... read more

Geo: 28.3748, -81.5492Walt Disney used shell companies to buy up huge areas of cheap Orlando land in the 60's. He opened his first park in 1971 and I think this was the catalyst for the incredible tourist developments that have sprung up since.It's a bit of a challenge gaining an understanding of Orlando's theme parks. Disney and Universal are the big boys in town, plus a host of smaller others. Disney has four main parks: Epcot, Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. Each of these is a stand-alone park in its own right with a pricey daily entrance fee of USD 100 or so. Universal is similar (four main parks) except their 'Islands of Adventure' park contains seven sub-parks. Mind-boggling!Many of the visitors we spoke to were Disney regulars who knew the rides and therefore ... read more

Geo: 28.3903, -81.4711Great to be back in warm sunshine and wearing shorts again! Came through Atlanta which is now the world's busiest airport by passenger movements. Incredible place with so many people moving about efficiently! Incidentally, Memphis (home of FedEx) is the second busiest cargo airport in the world.Our 2BR WorldMark apartment is very spacious and well located on International Dr, one of the arterial streets in tourist Orlando, a broad strip about 20km long south of the CBD.We bought a trolley 24-hour ticket that allows anytime hop-on hop-off on the couple of loops between Universal Studios in the north and Walt Disney World further south. There's an App that shows you where the next trolley is and estimates how long before it reaches your stop. Very useful! Orlando seems to be mostly about resorts and ... read more

Geo: 35.1515, -90.0499Visited Sam Phillips' Sun Studio, the Memphis Rock 'n Soul Museum and the outdoor store Bass Pro. A cold, overcast day, pity.Early departure in the morning to Orlando via Atlanta.... read more

Geo: 33.3985, -91.0379A short look around the decaying delta town of Greenville today. Another lovely day.The catastrophic flood of 1927 was highlighted, along with the appallingly racist treatment of displaced AfAms (it's tough worrying about PC in a personal travel blog, but it is publicly available). Had an interesting visit to a long-standing Jewish Temple. Unfortunately the Arts and Cultural Centre was unexpectedly closed, denying us the chance to interact with an historic merry-go-round.Interesting talk about river control this afternoon by our resident "Riverlorian". As a result of levee construction, the bed of the river has risen by 16ft in some sections. Especially in New Orleans where the river boat paddle wheels are above the roofs of many houses. In the 1950s engineers thought it likely that the Mississippi River was ready to jump its bed ... read more