Celebrationg our fortieth wedding anniversary

On the 6th October 1973 Peter and I were married in Upper Hutt in New Zealand.  What a lot of experiences we have shared together since that time.  Without taking into account the most important events in our lives, like the births of our children and the wonderful time we have had as a family, and the sad occasions along the way which have sometimes had a silver lining as well, we have loved to travel.  From the outset we planned on an overseas holiday at least every two years and at times this was quite difficult balancing one income, small children, work commitments and the like.  But I am pleased to say we have more than achieved our travel goal.

So these past two years have just added to our experiences and as we were in Sydney we decided that was a great place to celebrate although we were three days in advance of the actual date (we will have only just arrived in Melbourne and settling on after the drive from Sydney on the actual date).

Another love we share is musicals and live performances so a check of "what's on in Sydney" and we decided to book for the production of "South Pacific" starring Lisa McClune as Ensign Nellie Forbush and Teddy Tahu Rhodes as Emile De Becque.  To our delight this performance was in the Joan Sutherland Theatre in the Sydney Opera House.  We have never been to an actual show in the Opera House previously, have often visited, but this was a first.

Of course, after two weeks of beautiful weather in Sydney it poured with rain all day.  We had thought we would go into the city early to see some of the ships in the harbour for the International Fleet Review.  The four day event had just commenced and over fifty tall ships and warships were due into Sydney.  However, with heavy rain and wind, and low temperatures, we decided sadly to give it a miss.

Fortunately late in the day the rain eased and we made our way into the city by train and then walked around the harbour at Circular Quay and chose a restaurant to eat dinner prior to the show.  There are many restaurants in the area and they were crowded.  We had a lovely pre-theatre dinner and then went to the show which was great.  It was really interesting to see Lisa McClune playing live theatre as we have only seen her performing previously in television shows.

It was a lovely evening out and a great way for us to celebrate our forty year wedding anniversary.