Broome

Thursday march 11, 2010 Broome
Last night an elderly gentleman had a stroke. The captain made an announcement that there was a medical emergency but the person had stabilized but he was speeding up so that we could get to Broome to get him to a hospital. Around midnight, a pilot boat came along side and they off loaded the patient. It is so sad that this happened on a vacation. This morning we awoke to clear skies and extreme heat. We docked around 7 am and do to government regulations we are not allowed to walk off the ship along the jetty. All passengers must take a shuttle bus into town and they are supplied complimentary by the ship. We can only disembark at 9:30. Dun went to pickup our shuttle tickets and we are on shuttle # 27. Figure this out. They have 7 shuttle buses that hold appx 46 passengers each and it is 20 minutes into town and there are 2000 passengers that are getting off the ship. We were told that our wait would be about an hour which didn’t add up. Our first tour is scheduled at 1 pm with pick up time at 12 :15. Our chances were slim. At 11 am I went to the pursers’ desk to ask them to call a taxi, but was told that the port does not allow taxi’s onto the jetty unless they are booked several days in advance. I was starting to get really disappointed. Finally, we were ashore at 12:45 and at the visitors centre at 1 pm. I spoke to a wonderful lady and asked her to call the tour company of our situation and guess what...they held the tour for us to arrive and the manager of the visitors centre took us to the location. Is this service or what!!!!This was a hovercraft tour and it was truly an awesome experience. It took off from the sand out into Roebuck Bay. We followed the coast until we came to a small inlet where we went ashore and were shown dinosaur tracks in the rocks. The coastline is a sight to behold...red cliffs with mango trees growing up through the white sand. After the tour, they delivered us back to the ship just in time to take our next tour which was an orientation tour of the city. Broome is a small city of about 20,000 people and it is the gateway to the Kimberlies and the outback. The prime industry is pearling followed by cattle industry and then tourism. Our first stop was to the Japanese cemetery which is the final resting place for many thousand pearlers who perished. Our next stop was Cable Beach with it’s 20 miles of pure white sand. It is listed as one of the top 10 beaches in the world. As it is late in the day we head back to the ship. We are supposed to go now for the camel ride but the skies have suddenly turned black and we are seeing the most amazing lightening show I have ever seen. The sky has opened and the rains are pouring down. I am disappointed about not riding the camels but I did see them and they looked ugly but wonderful. Maybe I’ll get to ride them on some other vacation. We are worn out tonight. The heat has been oppressive and it zaps what strength we have. Tomorrow is a sea day which will give us time to regroup again. We skipped the diningroom tonight and just went to the buffet for supper. Bedtime will come early