Traveling with Ray Owens

Australia Day “marks the 1788 landing of the first fleet and raising of the Union Flag of Great Britain by Arthur Phillip at Sydney Cove, a small bay on the southern shore of Sydney Harbor.

In the present, the government and Australia Day Council organizes events that seek to recognize the contributions of Australians to the nation, while also encouraging reflection on past wrongs including towards Indigenous Australians and also giving respect and celebrating the diversity and achievements of Australian society past and present. The presentation of community awards and citizenship ceremonies are also commonly held on the day.”

Frank and I went to hear the lecture of our Resident Astronomy professor. He expertly provided a lecture on the history of astronomy. It was very interesting.

We were told the universe is stretching as opposed to expanding. Seems to be a distinction without a difference.

I kind of pride myself to believe I am not a complete moron when it comes to the science of astronomy and astronomy physics. But even though I have had it explained to me a few times, I still can’t understand the Big Bang. I get that all matter came originally from an infinitely small and dense point. But where did that point come from? How does nothing produce something that was the origin of our universe.

The second thing I cannot wrap my head around is if our universe is expanding into what is it expanding?

Oh well, the history of our planet stargazing is remarkable. And that the early history of understanding the sky was made by people who were not idiots to believe that the solar system is geocentric. The sun and planets revolve around the earth. He challenged us to imagine trying to explain how the earth is not the center of the solar system. It is not easy to dismiss the notion that the sun circles the earth. It certainly appears to.

We took a tour of the kitchens. It was amazing that the kitchen workers do everything from scratch, no prepackaged foods are ever served.

They feed three meals a day to both the 900+ passengers and the 450+ crew.

We had dinner at the Chef’s Table restaurant. Tonight’s menu was the food of Great Britain. Having lived in England on two different occasions I can confirm the cuisine was pretty much spot on.

We had 5 courses. The appetizer was a Scottish egg. This is a soft boiled quail egg wrapped in a breaded wrapper and deep fried.

The first course was traditional fish and chip. I had only 3 chips. But they were all delicious. Of course it was served with smear of mushy green peas. The peas were amazingly tasty compared with the multiple servings I have had over the years. Often the peas are just bland.

The palate cleanser was a gin and tonic icee. Mostly an icee.

The main course was Yorkshire pudding and brisket. Pudding always throws Americans for a loop as they are expecting a pudding and get a small baked bread (eggs, flour and milk) served with roasted beef and gravy.

The dessert course called a Whim-Wham. It was a traditional English trifle and was very good.

Tonight we are sitting and waiting for the 9:00 show by the singers and dancers.

The show was very good. They performed a number of songs from the late 1960’s and from the 1970’s. They knew their audience. Many of the guests are from that era. I really enjoyed songs from my teen years.

A good day at sea.