Somerset Apartments Lord Howe Island

HALFWAY DOWN MOUNT GOWER Greetings from Lord Howe Island! This morning, India and I got up early and left the kids with a sitter from the hotel.  At 7 o'clock, we met our guide for the day, Dean Hiscox.  Under cloudy skies we started the 10-kilometer trek up Mount Gower, the 875-meter peak that towers over the west end of Lord Howe Island.   It turned out to be one of the great adventures ...

... cute and not afraid of humans, it seems. The coral is all different colors - blue, neon green, yellow, purple, red - so many colors and it was fun to search for fish in the coral. I loved snorkeling! When we finished snorkeling, we rode our bikes to Ned's Beach. Because the island is so small, they gave us bikes to ride everywhere. This is great because I have not been able to ride a bike in a very long time, since the Beaverkill, and I love ...

My last blog was about The Wall, I don't think anyone has even read it yet because I didn't get any comments but today I want to tell you about Lord Howe Island, a favourite honeymoon destination. This place is very beautiful, it is world heritage listed. It is easy to get to and a very economical holiday from Sydney. Lord Howe Island is on the same latitude or longitude (?) as Port Macquarie so the weather is heavenly, warm and wonderful. It is a ...

... the wonderful first experience but if anything it was better. One didn't feel obliged to thrash about and see everything but instead was content to just float where the waves took one and watch all the busy fish going about their business. They are actually much more interesting to watch than birds because they are quite unafraid of people. Some are a little curious and look at you beadily, and today one ...

... with the shed doors open to the beach - it was clear that today was a "goer." G: We did manage to walk down to Environmental Tours in time for the glass bottom boat trip. There were a couple of people going snorkelling, and that would have been good, but what to do about being salty and sticky for the rest of the day. We left our shoes and backpacks in the shed before clambering aboard a boat that looks ...

... more alert than previous mornings. The day was lovely so we tested out the wetsuits, which fitted (thank God for stretchy neoprene!) and trotted down to Ned's Beach. The water was like glass. There was a woman at the hut who we asked to take a memorial photo and off we went to wrestle our flippers on in the shallows. Cold at first but not unbearable (water temperature was 17 deg) and in fact I ...

... be a mirage. But it remained in place through several changes of light, so perhaps it was the real thing - in which case it is HUGE!! We also watched one of the many seabirds just playing on the wind. Jonathan Livingstone Booby or something. When we were walking back and I wasn't as cold and miserable, and the light was nice, I could really enjoy the magnificent banyan trees in the forest. They are ...

... from quite a downpour. Very picturesque! G: The rain squalled in, but that wasn't sufficient to stop a couple of the old folk who had joined us, from donning wet suits and heading out into the water. M: When it eased, the fish feeders went back to their buckets, the snorkellers went into the water and we set off up the track. Of course it started raining again but we were pretty well sheltered once we were in ...

Wednesday 4 July 2007 G: Spent a couple of hours between 2am and 4am awake. There is no door to the living room so I couldn't even read - just sat up in bed trying not to cough. When we both woke at 7am, Mandi had a very sore throat and has decided to stay quiet for the day. M: Woke up this morning feeling shocking - I had been so sure I was only going to get the outskirts of Gray's cold but maybe not. Or maybe it was Young ...

... thought, everything is covered with forest and the beaches and water are the colours of postcards. We were lucky that the plane needed to land from the far side of the airstrip (which is only as long as the width of the island at its narrowest part, where it's flat) so it did a long lazy clockwise loop (we were on the right side) giving us a magnificent view. G: The plane had to break sharpish so as not ...