Another Stop in Northwest Australia, Then On To Indonesia's Island of Bali

We left Geraldton and traveled overnight to our next destination, Port Hedland. At 15,000 persons, Port Hedland is even smaller than Geraldton, but a very busy commercial port due to its natural deep anchorage harbor.

Many ore ships waiting for cargo

Founded in 1863 by Captain Peter Heland, the area was settled with the vision of a major port development for the shipping of mining ores.

A tug guiding us into port

Today a modern port facility services numerous shipping interests and is Australia’s largest tonnage port. Coming into port, and Capt. Larry counted no fewer than 25 anchored ore ships waiting to be filled.

Ore ships taking on ore

We learned from the captain that we would be taking on fuel at this port and figured that that was the major reason for our stopping there. But in spite of its diminutive size, the city rolls out the red carpet to visiting cruisers.

Tugs taking a ship back to sea

Unlike many other cities where cruises have to pay rather stiff rates to get to major attractions and shopping areas, Port Hedland rolled out complimentary shuttles with stops at the visitor’s center and its open air market, and an indoor mall. The only downside to our visit was the very high temperature and humidity, which seemed to affect the unconditioned Australians a lot more than us who are accustomed to Louisiana in August.

From Port Hedland we headed to Indonesia’s island of Bali.

Sunrise over Bali

We hadn’t really given it much thought, but technically our landing in Bali would mean crossing the Asian continent off our bucket list as Bali is in Southeast Asia, leaving only Africa to go.

A naval ship greets us

We’ll take that even though we have plans to visit other parts of Asia in the future. In any event we had a sea day ahead of us so Jane searched the calendar for activities we could participate in to pass the time. She found another watercolor painting class and encouraged Capt. Larry to come along, “there are lots of other men in the class.”

Benoa Harbor (or the Tickfaw on the 4th)

So off we went to paint some tropical flower that would eventually take 3 tedious sessions to complete. We also reintroduced ourselves to our exercise program that we had gotten away from us most cruise days, after Jane found a scale in the gym and was crazy enough to weigh herself. In the evenings, we amused ourselves getting to better know our new Australian dinner mates- Bob and Manita, Stephen and Karen, and Gary and Nancy, plus the two Louisianan holdovers from the last cruise, Jackie and Sylvia.

Lots of harbor activity

The Aussies were traveling as a group and were friends and travel partners for quite some time. Collectively, we had a rather lively dinner group with all indications that our evening meals were going to be fun.

Speaking of Australians, which comprise the major nationality of our cruises, it’s time to make a few observations about the country and its people. In both respects we find the country and the people to be very similar to America.

Some harbor wrecks

As mentioned previously, the country is roughly the size of the U.S. with a similarly diverse geography and climate. And we found the people to hold similar values, though generally less ethnically diverse, as their American counterparts.

The Balinese "grid"

High taxes, homeland security, immigration, unnecessary political correctness, burgeoning entitlement programs, and climate change (Australia is very dry and there are concerns about the impacts of climate change) are representative political issues that Australians frequently discussed and wanted our American comparisons on these topics.

A hotel in Bali

We contributed some views, but generally tried to avoid discussing politics as we have usually found that politics rarely add substantially to good dinner conversation. And we could never adequately explain Donald Trump, who, judging from the number of inquiries we received, seems to have captured the imaginations of the Aussies and generated a similar popularity wave down under.

Bali Garden hotel lobby

Overall, Australians seem to be much more exposed to American news than vice versa.

Hindu alter

Australians are not without their peculiarities. One of the things that we found amusing was their perhaps subconscious correction of our American pronunciation of common English words. We understand that words of Australian origin such as the names of places or things unique to the country will certainly have a unique pronunciation, but there is little tolerance for non-Australian pronunciation of words common to all users of the English language and we found our pronunciations constantly being corrected. And Jane could never overcome the barrage of “chips” that followed her desire to have some French fries!

Hindu offerings (the gods like Ritz crackers!)

Gates to the beachwalk

Beautiful Kuta Beach

Walking on sidewalks with Australians is also challenging when one comes from a country where cars are driven on the left side of the road. Australians walk like they drive (probably like everyone else) and we were always running into them as we migrated to the right side of the sidewalk, sometimes with murmurs of “Americans” uttered within earshot. Jane became frustrated with Capt. Larry’s constant haranguing to keep left and out of trouble.

Scooters everywhere!

In general, we found Australian palates to almost universally shun any food that suggested anything spicier than seasoned salt. The menus of eating establishments we passed in port reflected this aversion with only an occasional dish described as being “hot” or “spicy.” And when it came to barbecue which seems to be the national Australian cooking method, sauces and marinades seemed to be almost universally ketchup (which they call toe-MAH-toe sauce) based with little seasoning adjustment from bottle to plate.

Enjoying Bing Tang on the beach

They would certainly be suffering with Cajun cooking! One of the things we really liked about Australia was their money system. The smallest paper bill is $5 AU with $2, $1, 50C, 20C, 10C, and 5C coins used for anything smaller. We noticed that all retail transactions were rounded to the nearest nickel, so no pennies were involved. At least until we made one purchase for $14.95, gave the clerk $15 and the register showing change due to be $0.00. After a slight hesitation trying to digest this, the clerk reached in the till and gave us 10C change. This happened on another occasion, so we’ve never quite understood Aussie making-change math. But the money was easy to use.
Finally, the Australians we met were generally our age and had suffered through an English to metric weights and measures conversion during their lifetime (similar to that in Canada). The problem we encountered was that they seldom would arrive at the correct answer when converting back from the metric system in an effort to assist us.

Hindus and burgers?!?!?

They had shortcuts for converting distances, temperatures, weights, and volumes, but Capt. Larry’s calculations (remember as a pharmacist he was fluent in both systems) were usually different, sometimes substantially, from theirs. We realize, however, that their intentions were well placed.

The equatorial latitudes brought light winds and flat seas along with a substantial increase in temperature and humidity. We arrived in Bali, known as the “Island of the Gods.” Bali owes much of its culture to the ancient Hindus which arrived from Java in a 15^th century mass exodus, making it a colony of artists, intellectuals, priests, and musicians.

Good balance!

Today, Bali is about 97% Hindu with Christians, Buddhists, and Muslims making up the remainder. For our visit the ship anchored in the the port harbor of Benoa from which we would tender over to the island. We decided to purchase a shore excursion for this port as we wanted to visit the beach and beachfront community of Kuta and there was no other public transportation that would take us there except negotiating with a local taxi driver.

Burning offerings at Hindu alter

Since we didn’t know the distance, travel time, and a reasonable cost, the excursion seemed to be a hassle-free choice.

As we tendered to Benoa, we were amazed by the amount of activity on the harbor’s waters. Parasailing, fishing, and excursion boats all made for a very active harbor. We disembarked our tender, walked up a rather shaky (10-12 persons at a time for safety!) gangway and into a parking lot where we found our bus. The ride to Kuta was shorter than expected and we were dropped off in the heart of the business district with about 4 hours on our own.

Balinese market

Map in hand, we decided to head to the beach with stops at stores Jane wanted to check out. We were told that price negotiation was the Balinese way, but the brick and mortar store clerks just looked at us and pointed to the price on the sticker. As we walked down the street we noticed little baskets of rice, nuts, foods, and flowers that are placed in various locations as offerings to certain deities. At some locations these offerings made a rather large pile in the middle of the street that we assume could not be driven over.

Balinese beauty and Jane

Another thing we noticed was that over half of the vehicles on the road were small motorcycles and scooters. We got to the beach and were immediately met with a barrage of street vendors hawking t-shirts, sarongs, scarves, jewelry, hats, and just about anything one might desire. And these folks meant to sell you something. Capt. Larry got a vendor down from $40 to $15 for two t-shirts, only to have another vendor announce a 2 for $10 deal after he had made his purchase. Jane got a silver necklace she says she “needed” for $25 down from an initial $42. And we found the whole process to be like feeding sea gulls on the beach- feed one and all the others start to flock for their piece of the pie. We were overwhelmed in short order and had to literally flee the scene. We walked a little further along the beach and decided to get a seat and a couple of beers from a beer vendor. What a great way to relax and enjoy the scenery. We enjoyed watching the surfers who had a reasonably good sized surf to attempt. We started to make our way back to the bus, stopped at an open air market, and had two more beers in a street bar before arriving at the bus and returning to the harbor. It was a great day ashore and one of those special places we will always remember.