Day 43 – February 27, 2011 – Townsville, Australia

Today we are docked in Townsville, a city that is larger than Cairns though must people outside of Australia have never heard of it.  Fred’s feet were a bit swollen the night before so he decided to enjoy staying on the ship with his fee up.

Jan took the shuttle bus into town, a short 10 minute ride.  It was Sunday and they had a farmer’s market event in the downtown area with the main street closed off for a couple of blocks.  Most of the booths were of handcrafts; a lot of children’s clothes, homemade sauce/jellies, some fresh foods, and lots of other miscellaneous stuff.

After walking around that area, Jan checked at the local tourist office and found that the Reef Headquarters/Museum was within walking distance.  It is actually located relatively close to the ship but there is a waterway between the ship and that area with no walking bridge across it.   After a 10 minute walk, Jan arrived at the Reef Headquarters and Museum.  Luckily it was just before noon and noon was when the talk about the turtle hospital was given plus the ability to visit the turtle hospital was included.

We walked outside and around to the side of the museum and into the small area where they are caring for sick and injured turtles.  They had six turtles they were taking care of.  The worst was a younger turtle that had been hit by a boat and had gashes in his shell.  He was very sick and they said in pain so they had him pretty sedated.  The tank where he was had just a bit of water, not enough for him to float.  They did that so that he would not try and move or swim.  They are still worried about him and don’t know whether he will survive.  The other turtles had aliments ranging from a fish hook caught in its throat, one sick with pneumonia and the others with various turtle ailments.   They were more upbeat about the chances of the other turtles.  Once the turtle has recovered and is getting close to being ready to release, it is moved into the dangerous fish tank with the sharks.  They have to be careful about putting the turtle in there because the turtles bite the sharks!

After spending about 30 minutes, we walked back into the reef exhibits.  It is a very nice aquarium that focuses on the corals and their neighbors.  You could really see the bright colors and amazing shapes that define many of the corals of this area.  It was well worth the short walk and back to visit it.

Jan walked back to the shuttle and back to the ship.  Fred had already had lunch so Jan went up and got a quick bit.  It was hot!

We joined the LCT group (escorted tour with our travel agent) in Observation Lounge for cocktails and then joined Peggy, Jerry and Olivia for dinner in the Compass Rose. 

Unfortunately we missed the fact that the show with Darren Williams was at 6:00pm so we missed it.