Thursday, February 23, 2012

Quilting Cruise Report


Our Australian Quilt Cruise was a great success. With my great organiser, Lorelle and wonderful helper, Laraine we enjoyed the company of 34 wonderful ladies on our cruise of the South Pacific. The ladies (and some husbands) came from Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. We visited Noumea, Vila, Lifou and The Isle of Pines.
On the cruising days we conducted three workshops, These being a watercolour wall hanging with tropical fish, a landscape quilt that I designed for the cruise and a quilt as you go table runner designed by Sharon Pederson. I would like to thank Sharon for allowing me to share this table runner with the ladies.
We cruised on the beautiful Royal Caribbean 'Rhapsody of the Seas' This ship had a large conference room with was able to cater for all our sewing machines.
A pre cruise challenge titled 'Tropical Delight' was well received with voting for this challenge judged by the many other cruisers that visited us during the time spent onboard. We had two equal first place and two equal second winners.
On port days several of the ladies went on optional tours, both in the sea and on land.
Others stayed behind and with the tireless help of Laraine worked on their projects. In Noumea we had an overnight stay due to Cyclone Jasmine (we did not have any rough seas thanks to the Captain of the ship keeping us away from Jasmine). On the first day fabric shops were located and mapped. The next morning I took several of the ladies on a fabric shopping spree. We actualy contributed to the local economy.
In all it was a great cruise. I met many wonderful fellow quilters and have many fond memories. We will be running another cruise next year and after consulting the cruise company we have secured a booking on the new ship to the Australian cruising scene the 'Voyager of the Seas'. This cruise of 14 nights duration will sail to Noumea, Fiji and New Zealand commencing on the 13th January 2013 departing from Sydney and retruning to Sydney. I am hoping to organise visits to a quilt shop in Auckland and Wellington that are not far from where the ship docks.
I will keep you posted on this cruise.
Happu quilting
Dorothy

Friday, February 3, 2012

The time has come

After 12 months of planning and organising the time has come for our Australian Quilting Cruise next week. There are 34 ladies attending this curise. They are from Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. It has been a challenge for me to organise the classes and pack all the kits. It has been a great learning curve.
We leave Monday on the beautiful Royal Caribbean ship 'The Rhapsody of the Seas'. This ship has a great conference room which we are using for our classes. In all there will be four classes with lots of additional kits available for those who want to keep quilting.
As well as the quilting there are also ports of call and a host of activities on board the ship. When we get back I shall put up a full report.
Russellee BnB is also having a Scrapbooking Retreat the first weekend in March and two quilting retreats. One is the second weekend in March and the other is the first weekend in May. There is also a group of quilters from Canberra coming in a couple of weeks orgainising their own retreat.
have a great week and until next time
Dorothy