Last Full Day in Australia

 It is with mixed feelings I am writing this blog.  What a wonderful trip this has been, we have met friends and family we have not seen for over three years and made new friends, all of whom we will treasure. Our thoughts are turning to home and being reunited with friends and family there, and of course Freo! In some ways this eight weeks has flown by and in others we seem to have been here for longer than that.  As  usual we have had a mixture of hectic and restful times.  We have seen new places in Western Australia and revisited places we have grown to love.

Tomorrow will be especially hard when we say goodbye to Gavin, but if all goes well he hopes to come to the U.K. late summer this year, so we will wait and see.  It is always hard to say goodbye to our distant cousins as we are all that much older and Frank in particular has become very frail but again we hold them all close in our hearts.

We had our final sunbathe and swim at CY O’Connor this morning and the sea was crystal clear, calm and very refreshing.  We enjoyed people watching and the antics of their various dogs.  One Labrador in particular could hardly walk but paddled in the sea and was lying in the shallows and still had the energy to come and see me when I opened a packet of crisps!

Views of CY O’Connor beach this morning





We came back to the house and I put all the swim wear and beach towels on to wash and we walked to The Local pub just around the corner for a cool drink.  It was absolutely packed as The Fremantle Dockers were playing St. Kitts, unfortunately, The Dockers lost.

Gavin went home and we came back to the house and I sorted some washing and ironing before getting ready for our farewell meal at Ruocco’s Pizzeria with Gavin, Camila, Gigi, Oscar, Felipe and Paulita.  It was a really lovely evening and despite language barriers we all communicated well.  We were so touched that Felipe and Paulita gave us a beautiful home made card with warm wishes inside and their dog Padang’s paw prints on the front, something else to treasure from a beautiful warm couple.  There was lots of laughter with the chatter and a really lovely way to spend our final evening.  As always, the goodbyes were hard, but as the South Americans are so warm and demonstrative there were lots and lots of hugs and kisses and promises to meet again when we can, Oscar even invited us to Chile to visit them there.

Card front page

Left to right, Gigi, Paulita, Felipe, Richard, Yvonne, Gavin, Camila and Oscar

Front and back of card 

Another photo of us all


We are checked in online and tomorrow we will tackle the packing.  Gavin is coming to the airport with us and we are so pleased he can say goodby there.



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