Today's Endeavours were well rewarded

Our Darling Bay hotel is so centrally located that it only took us 5 minutes to our first tourist destination of the day--the Australian Maritime Museum. The museum has interesting exhibits covering two main themes: navigation and maritime war. Plenty of astrolabes, quadrants, octants, and sextants to peruse, and more on the Aussie naval battles from Papua New Guinea to the campaign at Gallipoli. There's also a fun, interactive room with stations to explore hovercraft technology, sailing, and photovoltaics to power mini-aircraft. 

The museum has several naval vessels that one can tour: a replica of the HMB Endeavour (no worries, I didn't know what the "B" in HMB stood for either, so I asked--it's His Majesty's Barque); the Vampire destroyer, and the HMAS Onslow submarine. The original Endeavour's captain was James Cook, the British explorer, navigator, and cartographer, who commanded Endeavour on his first voyage of discovery to Australia between 1769 to 1771. Cook first mapped the east coast of Australia in 1770. The replica Endeavour, a tall ship, was commissioned to be built in 1988 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the founding of Australia under British rule in 1788. It's the most authentic replica of a  tall ship in existence, and has circumnavigated the earth twice. There are 81 miles of rope on this sailing ship; everywhere you go on the ship, there are heaps of ropes.

Yi and David visiting the HMB Endeavour, Darling Bay, Sydney

The submarine we visited, the HMAS Onslow, was built in Sydney in the 1960s. Australia has no nuclear subs, nor does it have any aircraft carriers. Although Australia is a high-income economy, it's population is only about 23 million, so it's naval fleet is not huge. Moreover, the ANZUS treaty binds Australia and New Zealand in a defense pact, and separately, the USA and Australia.

Wei in the HMAS Onslow engine room. Warp speed, Scotty!

Next stop: the Sydney Fish Market. This is a ginormous fish market, with dozens of fishmongers who are all happy to show you their live crabs which they will turn into a nice meal for you in minutes. We chose a mud crab, weighing in at 750g; we had it prepared with black bean soy bean). It was delicious! The fish market is a major tourist destination, so it was wall-to-wall diners there for lunch.

Fresh Oysters and crabs on offer at the fish market

The day's tourism was a mere prelude to the evening dinner plans of visiting relatives in a Sydney suburb. First and second cousins were full force, and the celebration also included a birthday cake for Grace, one of the cousins. There were some authentic traditional Fijian delicacies such as dalo, palusami, tavioka (cassava), and vakalolo. Try Googling these foods and see what you come up with. But trust me, it was tasty (perhaps the coconut milk is not the most healthy, though).

Wei, YI, Adrienne, and Cynthia

It's now Saturday morning, so we'll be leaving soon on the first day of our 3 day drive to Melbourne on the Prince's coastal highway.