When I started planning the Australian marathon, I wanted to do one in the Australian summer and not be there in the winter when 90% of the Australian Marathons occur.

I searched for a long time to find a marathon that would allow us to take a cruise and also get off to run a marathon in Australia and still see New Zealand. I finally found one that started in Australia, stopped in Tasmania, and ended in New Zealand. There was a marathon that would allow us to miss the 3-day crossing on the ship from Tasmania to New Zealand.

We worked with our cruise consultant and he arranged with Regent Cruise Lines to allow us to get off the ship in Burnie, Australia (Tasmania) and rejoin the ship in Dundin, New Zealand. Maria and our cruise consultant filed all the paperwork for the visas and documents required at the time.

So here we are on the ship and a few days before we are supposed to get off I check with the Purser on the ship to confirm that we will be able to get off the ship and hopefully be the first ones off the ship. We had a driver waiting at the dock for us to take us on the four-hour drive to Hobart.

I was told that the Purser would contact me in the next day. I heard nothing so the day before I made a pest of my self and asked about a confirmation about debarking in Burnie. I was told the same thing as before.

This morning we finally got a call and it was not good news. Apparently, the authorities had changed the laws the day before and people were not allowed to get on and off cruise ships anymore.   Supposedly this is a quarantine and not an immigration issue. They are more concerned about seeds stuck to your shoes and fruit than they are about the guns I may be carrying. (Now that I think about it, they asked if we had any fruits and vegetables but never asked if we had guns or bombs…)

We met with the authorities and tried to show them my registration for the marathon, the plane tickets home and anything else we could think of…to no avail. They could not authorize us to leave the ship.   This was the day before the marathon and 18 hours from gun time!

My swift thinking wife asked about medical reasons for getting off the ship. She explained that she only agreed to go on this cruise because she was getting off for three days because of the marathon. She could not spend three days at sea and was already sick and dehydrated. (I was thinking “man is she good!”). They said they would have to look into it and get back to us.

We went and met our driver at the agreed upon location and pleaded with him to give us a few hours to try to straighten this out. He agreed and went to lunch. Maria and I went back to the ship to wait for the authorities to make some kind of decision. After waiting two hours we were escorted into the a room for what they called a “quarantine interview.” They explained that they could not get approval or even put in the paperwork until Monday since all the government offices were closed. They said, however, that for Maria since this was a medical situation, they also could not physically make her stay on the ship.

That was all I need to hear! We politely finished the interview, took our bags and literally jumped ship!   Justin our driver was still waiting for us. We hoped in the car and started our 4-hour drive to Hobart.

I was going to miss the cut-off of 4:00 PM in Hobart to pick up my race number and my timing chip so I texted the race director and asked if I could pick up may race number the next morning. Within minutes he responded in the affirmative.

So, we are off to run a Marathon on my 7^th continent as an “illegal alien” and will let you know if we are let out of the country.

For the record…the being sick idea was Maria’s!