Leaving Seacliff

A thousand apologies for no recent posts - as our time in Adelaide is coming to an end our free time is disappearing.

Mum & George have been here so we've had a crazy time trying to keep up with the oldies..yet more wine tasting and the challenge of finding a beer that George liked. He ended up blending his own!

I finished work 3 weeks ago and had a really nice send off. It's been great working at Flinders but all good things must come to an end. I left Flinders on Friday. The next day we went to the Barossa to see Tanunda Town Band play the Last Night of the Proms in a winery - what a hoot!

I then flew to Sydney for 11 days to teach on the MOET/GIC/MOET courses (as you see yet another reference to wine). The teaching was hard work but fun & we have given MOET a good solid start in Australia. The teaching was interspersed with nice meals overlooking the Opera House & cocktails in the Shangri-La. Definitely a great gig.

Eventually I got back to Seacliff with the hopes of a nice restful week at the seaside haha..

As I've finished work we're no longer eligible to stay on the work visa so have had to convert to a tourist visa. Yet more red tape, form filling, a trip to the immigration office and $1000 later we were granted visas to stay in Oz until early January. Lucy, bless her cotton socks, was hoping that the visas would be refused so we could go home sooner. Slight problem with that - we would miss out on our big trip around Oz.

Oh I nearly forgot - the girls did have a school closure day on Monday so we went swimming with the dolphins. It was fantastic & we have some brilliant photos to show. We went out on a catamaran, got dressed in wetsuits & then every so often jumped in the sea & were dragged along by ropes. The sea was quite choppy but the dolphins were interested in coming to play -excellent.

Anyway, back to the big trip.

On Sunday we're getting on the train to Darwin. It's called the Ghan. We're travelling Gold Class which means we get fed (useful on a 3 day train trip). Whilst we're eating breakfast
they put the bed away & get it out again at teatime. We thought we could show the girls the desert & how big Australia is. We will get to stop at Alice Springs & Katharine. When we get to Darwin there are various trips planned to Kakadu & Litchfield Falls.

We'll leave Darwin on 5th December & fly to Broome - the pearling centre of the world. Apparently it's beautiful - white sand, blue sky and blue sea. On 8th December we fly to Perth for a week. We'll then fly north again (it was the only way I could get the flights sorted - got a few frequent flyer points though) to the Ningaloo Reef to take the girls snorkelling. After a week on the reef we'll fly to Perth again & back to Adelaide for Christmas.

Our week in Adelaide is already packed with parties. On 30th December we fly to Sydney for New Year - should be fun as we've booked a boat on the harbour for New Year's Eve. Eventually we fly back to Manchester arriving on 6th January 2010.

I'm really sad to be leaving Seacliff - it's a great place to be even when the sea's wild (like it is at the moment). The beach is coming alive now. The yacht club is open so people are sailing every weekend. The beach is full of children doing Surf Life Saving - definitely something I would have had the girls doing if they had been here for longer. The kids start when they're about 4 - they look so sweet doing their life saving drills.

Take care everybody - I'm sad to leave here but am looking forward to seeing you all in January. Internet access permitting I'll post on the blog more often

Lots of love
Missing you all

Geraldine xxxx

Masters Basketball Sydney

Well folks - all that time spent on the basketball court hasn't been wasted. Gary's team made it to the finals. They played against the Russians & lost. So they got a silver medal - very lovely.