Michael Rentiers

You don’t have to go to the ends of the Earth, but it helps.

The whole video blogging hasn’t worked out like I had hoped.  It’s not because we didn’t shoot any, it’s that I haven’t been able to get a strong enough signal or time to upload even a 60 second video.  However, I am sitting in the galley of our ship miles off the coast of northern Australia and the darn thing has WiFi.  Sweet!

Thus far, the trip has been nothing short of amazing.  After a total of 20 hours in the air and a leap through the space/time continuum (Monday the 7th never existed) we made it to Australia.  The folks are very cool and Australia is something to behold.  We spent the first night having drinks with a couple of regular blokes we happened across, and besides being a riot, they are very up on our politics and engaging with Yanks.  I’d gather most blue-collar Aussies are common sense type conservatives.  Very reassuring to find.

So today was the first day of three living aboard a boat with 25 or so divers from around the world.  We have Aussies, Brits, Danes, Fins, Indians, Germans, Hollanders and of course us Yanks.  Not surprisingly they re all skipping out on on the cold European winter.  The diving and the people are just amazing and it has been exactly what I needed to refocus my self.  No, I am not thinking about work or politics while I’m down under, but when you take on new adventures and take the time to get far away from your everyday life; things have a way of getting put back in order.  It is worth every expense.

So enough of all that, I really just wanted to put up a couple of snapshots for everyone to check out.  I’ll try again with the video tomorrow.

Oh, and we got to see the Southern Cross, a constellation only visible in the Southern Hemisphere (also depicted in the Aussie flag pictured above).