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A Personal Note: Harriet (my wife) and I jointly share a spirit of adventure. As we have no mortgage, we are free to travel the world financially. We built a handmade house in 1981 on five acres of land 35 kms. out of Brisbane, Australia for minimal money.
See the house / land posts:
OUR HOUSE …. An Overview
OUR HOUSE ….The Actual Garden See the photos of the house and garden and the history of how we obtained rejected materials like from the Supreme Courthouse stone (where the Law Courts are now in Brisbane) …. two loads for nothing in 1980. They dumped 100’s of cubic metres as fill and built a school over the top. The stone was cut out of the Kangaroo Points Cliffs in 1877.
See these travel posts:
- Ken and Harriet’s Travel posts from 2003 to 2018. I wrote this in April 2020 even though this New Zealand Travel Blog May 2010.
- An International Perspective ….. Ken and Harriet’s Travel post from 2003 to 2018.
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Fortunately we went to the USA with my brother Gerald and his wife Helene who have been to New York 17 times. They have held very high-up managerial jobs in Sydney until they retired. They held bought into the USA Wyndam WorldMark holiday share service several years ago which gives them virtually free accommodation in assigned places. We followed on their coat tails (2nd bedroom in a nice hotel …. sometimes on the 14th floor … free of cost for a week) till we came home on the 8th November. Gerald loves driving on USA roads. He is trained in electronics and had a GPS which told him verbally where you needed to go …. you really needed this on American roads !! Sometimes it was four lanes on one side of the highway.
We did these things over six weeks :
- We flew to New York and stayed one night when we had arrived
- We picked up a hire car and drove to Philadelphia and stayed for three days (Wyndam)
- We then went to Washington for four days … looked extensively through Capitol Hill … see the Plan A Visit | U.S. Capitol Visitor Center
- We then drove to New York and stayed five days. New York is like the CBD of Sydney 10 times over …. see Best New York attractions from Freedom Tower to Central Park
- We then flew to Quebec in Canada, stayed overnight then went on the cruise ship …. the Zuiderdam with Holland America for twelve days ….. We experienced the following:
- We stopped off at Saguenay … See Discover – Saguenay – Cruise Quebec & Canada New England
- Sea day
- Charlotte town on Prince Edward Island (Anne of Green Gables territory) …. we couldn’t go there as Hurricane Matthew was here … A Hurricane is a cyclone in the Northern Hemisphere that spins in the opposite direction of a cyclone in the Southern Hemisphere. We had been there on our May 2008 trip in Canada. See 19. CANADIAN HOLIDAY in May 2008: PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND – Anne of Green Gables: Post 19 …. so we didn’t need to see it
- Sydney, Novia Scotia ….. we couldn’t go here as Hurricane Matthew was here as well so we kept sailing
- Halifax, Novia Scotia …. see Destination Halifax
- Bar Harbour, Maine …. see Visit Portland Maine | Travel Planning | Official Tourism Website
- Boston, Massachusetts …. see Images for Boston, Massachusetts … we spent a morning looking around Harvard University as it well known as a worldwide university in its intellectual influence
- Two Sea days
- Port Canaveral, Florida …. see Port Canaveral – Wikipedia
- Fort Lauderdale… disembark … see Images for Fort Lauderdale, Florida
- Daytona Beach Florida for five days (Wyndam) … see Images for Daytona Beach. Daytona Beach is a city on Florida’s Atlantic coast. It’s known for Daytona International Speedway, which hosts February’s iconic Daytona 500 NASCAR race. The beach has hard-packed sand where driving is permitted in designated areas. Near the boardwalk’s rides and arcades, Daytona Beach Bandshell stages free summer concerts. Steps from the beach, Daytona Lagoon water park offers go-karts, laser tag and waterslides. …. a bit like the Gold Coast
- Orlando: (Wyndam) Orlando, a city in central Florida, is home to more than a dozen theme parks. Chief among its claims to fame is Walt Disney World, comprised of parks like the Magic Kingdom and Epcot, as well as water parks. Another major destination, Universal Orlando, offers Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure, with the Wizarding World of Harry Potter straddling both. We went to Walt Disney World for four days running. Gerald and Helene had been before and knew it inside out. We did four days of walking.
- New Orleans for four days (Wyndam) …. We went out to see two recreations of the slave plantations before slavery was banished in the USA in the mid 1860’s. One plantation we went to see was the Whitney Plantation. Particularly see the Photo Gallery. I was often in tears as to see how one group of powerful people could treat other people as THEIR Property …. making them like machines vs. treating them as other human beings
- 6th November we flew to Los Angeles four hours
- Flight to Brisbane …. = 14 hours around the world !!
I came back with 4,200 ++ photos plus a portable USB Hard Disk with all Gerald’s, Helene’s and Harriet’s photos on it as well …… I have a lot of filing and selected Personal Experience Website posting in the future !!
Regards,
Ken Aitken
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