Wednesday, February 20, 2013
— My Alphabe-Thursday (2nd), the letter "N" / Thursday Two Questions —
Here we have some pictures to honor Alphabe-Thursday letter "N"
For a larger picture, click on what you want.
Click again and it should get larger still.
(The BACK BUTTON gets you back here.)
My "N" is for the National Maritime Museum in Sidney, Australia. Docked on the left is the HMAS Vampire and to our right the HMAS Onslow. The Onslow is a vintage submarine and this was the closest to a sub I have been yet. The picture on the right is another view of the area outside the museum.
We did not go inside the ships or the museum because for the two hours we would spend the price for admission was atrocious. There was a senior price, very low, for which we would have paid and then gone inside. But this museum only allowed citizens of Australia to have that. In the U.S. and most countries we visit, if a person is the appropriate age then there is no discrimination based on citizenship. For some goodies in Sydney we did pay only the senior price.
That's all the "N" word pictures I have but I did want to finish up, or almost finish posting my New Zealand and Australia holiday pictures. You can see all I have so far here, (Our 2012-2013 New Zealand and Australia).
Above is a little kids' park along the way to the museum. This boat looks like fun. On the is Mrs. Jim coming out of China Town.
Fruit and vegetable market was about like the ones in our grocery stores except this on was in the Market building. On Saturday night we went to a concert in the park. The park was full of people out for the evening's nice weather.
Mrs. Jim is ready a Sarsaparilla at the oldest bar in Sydney. I would rather be back on the ferry, riding around in the harbor. And we did, pictures follow.
My last post last week was about an "M" word, More.
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==> My post is for Amanda at her Thursday Two Questions blog, Self Sagacity.
==>Be sure to check out all of my posted New Zealand and Australia pictures. You can do that by clicking here (Our 2012-2013 New Zealand and Australia).
Labels: Alphabe-Thursday-[2nd], Aus-NZ, Thursday-Two-Questions, Travel
Thursday, January 31, 2013
— My Alphabe-Thursday (2nd), the letter "K" / Thursday Two Questions —
Here we have some pictures to honor Alphabe-Thursday letter "K"
My last post last week was about a "J" word couple. "J" was for Junk mail.
1. What are you feelings about petting wild animals in captivity such as my Kangaroo find?
2. How much government money do you feel should be used in support of keeping our wild animals from becoming extinct?
The Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary here is private. I feel that in the U.S. it would receive tax free charitable status. I do not know about Australia.
Bonus Question: What is your favorite "K" word?
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==> My Thursday Two Questions post is for Amanda at her blog, Self Sagacity.
Labels: Alphabe-Thursday-[2nd], Animals, Aus-NZ, Thursday-Two-Questions, Travel
Thursday, February 14, 2013
— My Alphabe-Thursday (2nd), the letter "M" / Thursday Two Questions —
Here we have some pictures to honor Alphabe-Thursday letter "M"
For a larger picture, click on what you want.
Click again and it should get larger still.
(The BACK BUTTON gets you back here.)
So here are some More of my New Zealand pictures. This will probably NOT be my last posting of them.
First I will show this one of the Sydney, Australia, City Hall. The outside of the building, including the clock tower, are being renovated and cleaned.
So that the Sydney residents don't forget (why else do this??) what their City Hall should look like, the contractor has build this colorful four sided frame with the tower's picture on each side.
We did not go into the City Hall. But is was in our line of sight from our hotel room, a couple of blocks away.
- - - - - -
Our plane arrived in Auckland, New Zealand, at 6:00 in the morning but our ship would not be ready for boarding until the afternoon. So for such happenings Princess has made hotel arrangements for a permanent hospitality room. They had tea, coffee, and snacks for us. Princess also had a bus tour of Auckland which we could purchase.
Mrs. Jim and I opted to not do either, the bus tour or wait in the hospitality room, but rather go for our own sight-seeing walk. Auckland is New Zealand's largest city with a population of about 3.5 million people while the whole of New Zealand's population is only 4.5 million. Auckland's skyline is very impressive.
We walked about a mile down Queen Street to the harbor. My cameras have taken a lot of Burger King and MacDonald's restaurants and we passed these two on the way to the harbor.
When we reached Australia there were no Burger Kings. Instead we found Jack's Burgers all over the place. Burger King owns Jack's.
"[The] Britomart Transport Centre is the CBD public transport hub of Auckland, New Zealand, and the northern terminus of the North Island Main Trunk line. It combines a bus interchange with a railway station in a former Edwardian post office, extended with expansive post-modernist architectural elements. It is located at the foot of Queen Street, the main commercial thoroughfare of Auckland CBD, with the main ferry terminal just across Quay Street." (Wikipedia, Auckland Britomart, for more)
And it is just around the corner from the Burger King. We didn't stop at the BK, instead we caught the ferry over to Devonport. That was about a 40 minute ride, one way. We had a very nice view of the Auckland skyline from the boat. At the right in the picture is our ship, the Diamond Princess.
Devonport is a pretty little town. Its most prominent feature is a hill named Mount Victoria pictured below on the left. Of course mountains are meant to be climbed and Mrs. Jim and I did that. On the right, above, I am standing at the top. Up there are a weather radar and an old bunker left there from WWII.
While we were up there an older man and his dog arrived, both having climbed the hill. The man told us that he had originally lived in Scotland, quite a few years back had come to New Zealand to visit his sister, and then just stayed. He was a sheep shearer in Scotland and also did that in NZ. But he had to learn to shear them the New Zealand way. We talked with him for about half an hour and must have picked his brain dry.
What is a Ute? A ute is a pickup truck that uses a car body (Ford example). The green one above is a modern Volkswagen Golf vehicle with a ute body. In the states the Chevy El Camino and the Ford Ranchero pickups (New Zealand and Australia called those utes) are U.S. models that you might remember.
My last post last week was about a "L" word, Laugh (also smile).
With my artificial knee joint I have slowed down on the climbs but I still like and can do most of them.
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==> My post is for Amanda at her Thursday Two Questions blog, Self Sagacity.
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Labels: Alphabe-Thursday-[2nd], Aus-NZ, Thursday-Two-Questions, Travel
Friday, January 01, 2016
Friday’s Hunt v1.1 -- "A" is for
Mrs. Jim and I had this 'discussion' about the comic strip in Saturday's Houston Chronicle (Friday, January 1, 2016).
Old people don't have too many worldly things to worry about, like ISIS, Mexican immigrants, who will be our next president, etc. Except that neither of us are for Trump or Cruz. We think either would ruin our country.
Our discussion about the comic strip was about the creatures in the strip. I called them Aardvarks, Mrs. Jim knew the weren't, just merely Anteaters. My position was that they were the same creature by another name.
I was wrong. Read on. Sorry I have no personal pictures.
BTW, January 1 is Mrs. Jim's Birthday. We have had a nice day.
Anteaters -- They are cute (?) smallish creatures originally from Mexico, Central America, and South America. [picture from today.com, Feb 21, 2014](Anteater Wikipedia link)
A distinguishing feature they have is a long tongue which can wrap around an ant or termite.
Other species are commonly confused with the anteater, including the common aardvark featured below.
The aardvark doesn't have the pointy nose like the anteater but does have a long tong to catch the insects. (See the baby's long tongue in the picture above.)
Aardvarks originated in Africa. They are often confused with the other similar animals with anteater characteristics. [picture from Wikipedia, a commons release (link)]

This chart from Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anteater_(disambiguation) , helps distinguish the various animals similar but not related to the African Anteater.
Australia is a nice place to visit. One of my favorites was the wildlife animal rescue and reserve that we visited in Tasmania, Australia in 2003. I blogged about this, click here. I am sure that they had a Numbat or two there but I can't find a picture of any of them. By going to the 'disambiguation' link above and clicking on the Numbat link you could see one.
Below is Mrs. Jim feeding a kangaroo on our Australia visit to the state of Tasmania.
- The Mr. Linky address here has others who are participating if you would to read what these folk are doing for the Friday post.
Labels: Alphabet Words, Animals, Friday’s Hunt 2016, Travel
Saturday, February 23, 2013
New Zealand and Australia pictures — Six Word Saturday —
my Six Words:
Describe your life (or something) in a phrase using just six words for Six Word Saturday. Click the box at right to visit Cate's blog with Mr. Linky showing all the other blogs participating this week. Cate is the boss at Six Word Saturday. She would like for you to participate.Labels: Aus-NZ, Jim Does, Six Word Saturday, Travel
Friday, January 06, 2023
Letter "A" -- Friday's Weekend Roundup 10 / Reflections and-or Street/Candid Captures
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| [Click the picture for larger size viewing. Awesome!! Click again for larger still.] |

"This trail can be customized for the distance that you prefer to walk. There are many parts that combine to make the 13+ miles. Most of these trails are single trails totaling approximately 1.5 to 2 miles each. I normally add 2 or 3 of these together. The only downfall to this place is the lack of trail markings. You could easily miss a turn and accidentally extend your hike if (you're) not familiar with the area. All walkways are paved."
| Read about our 2013 Tasmania cruise stop's morning at the wildlife refuge here. |
- I am linked with Tom of "Backwoods Travel" (click here, Link, for Tom's Weekend Reviews)
- I am also linking again this week with James of "Weekend Reflections/Street Photos" (click here for his Street Folk and Reflections Photos).
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Labels: Amber, Aus-NZ, Friday's Weekend Roundup 10, Reflections, Walk pictures








