Guam, one of the Marina Islands, is our destination today, here in the middle of the Philippines ocean on the way to Japan. With six days at sea beforehand we were glad to be on land again.

The island is USA military based and Queen Mary docked at the naval base, but interestingly we didn't see any sailors! Guam is like a mini Miami, it has all the shops and restaurants that we know from back in Orlando and the high rise hotel chains along the seafront. It was just like being back in USA, Macy's, McDonald's, Hyatt, Hard Rock, all the names are here and everything is duty free, so a quick trip to Macy's was on our list, two new jackets later we caught the tour bus for a trip to the beach.

The Chamaross, the name for local Guam folks, were very friendly and they were very interested in our adventures and where we had been and where we were heading.

We went to the Two Lovers Point beach, a beautiful white sandy beach and the sea was very clear and shallow but the current was strong, Stuart did some skinny dipping and the fish swam away! It was arranged for us to use the 5 star Hyatt facilities and it was right on the beach with a great pool and sunbeds.

Although our day in Guam was short, we had a great time at this wonderful bit of USA in the sea and it was fun to say that we were in the place where America wakes up first!

Our adventures take us on to Osaka and Nagaski in Japan on Thursday and Saturday, there will be no internet while we are in Japanese waters so we'll update as soon as we can.

On the ship we took advantage of the hot and humid weather for our last chance for sunbathing before we hit the cooler temperatures in Japan.