Sydney and Home

Kristen writes;

We're back in the States!
But let me back up.

Erika and Jewel took an afternoon and took a surfing lesson, a fun and thrilling event to be sure. Just not as 'successful' as you might hope. They had a great time and did get up on the board a couple of times. I decided not to participate in this as we had been swimming a couple of days before and it was freezing! Not to mention the idea of being slapped in the face by the ocean isn't always my favorite. I acted as paparazzi instead and enjoyed watching the two of them attempting something that requires a lot of coordination.

We camped our last two nights, once at a loud and obnoxious rest stop on the side of the road. Free camping on the coast is not the same as free camping in the center where people stop driving at about sun down and there aren't many of them anyway. Our very last night we were at a beautiful lake front spot in the national park and had a very relaxing goodbye to life in the tent.
Of course, one of our motto's through all this 'cheap living' is to never eat a meal that made us lose the will to live. Our last night camping we came very close, using up all the remains of our food items. Thankfully after a soup that had us groaning we had chocolate to wash it down, topping up our desire to live.

Getting back to our friend Karla's place in the northern beaches of Sydney was great! It was so good to catch up with her and tell her all about our trip and talk about our trips coming up. (She left the day after we did to visit her family in New York so we all had a long trip coming up.)
We spent our last few days eating our way through Sydney. Enjoying the culinary delights that have been brought in by the immigrants; Thai, Chinese, and Greek. And the chocolate of the country that made a very big impression on us, Haigh's- a local, free trade organization that we toured in Adelaide, and an awesome chocolate bar that served up pudding as though it were hot chocolate.
We visited the water front, taking in the opera house and street fairs, went to the Art Gallery of NSW and enjoyed the speakers corner set up in the park outside the museum, attended service at the Anglican Cathedral and enjoyed their choir and visited almost every op shop (thrift store) that we passed in an effort to find Erika a dress to wear in our sisters wedding coming up soon.

Leaving each other in the airport to go to different destinations was one of the harder things we've had to do. We've become accustomed to having all three of us less than an arms length away at almost all times. Erika and I left at about two p.m. Wednesday afternoon, she got on the plane, ate, took her sleeping pills, put on her eye mask and went to sleep. I got on, ate, watched a couple of movies and proceeded to throw up the rest of the trip. We got in to Los Angeles at ten a.m. Wednesday morning. Hello international dateline! Wacky!
The good news about being ridiculously sick is that you get through customs quickly and easily.
Our next flight went well and we got in to Denver at about four.
Jewel threw through San Francisco and spent her eight hour lay over sick as well, but we weren't there to comfort her which was hard.

Now we're back with the family, working in the garden, hearing all about the wedding plans, unpacking and all the rest that comes with coming home.