And we’re home.
On the way to Melbourne Airport, we noticed a few people in crazy costumes. It’s the weekend of Melbourne Comic Con. We left home during the weekend of Manchester Comic Con. What are the chances of that?
We saw some pandas, an unexpected bonus. No, not real ones. To celebrate 2017 Australia-China Year of Tourism, there are about twenty pandas at Melbourne’s Tullamarine Airport.
The first laugh of the day was provided by Etihad’s poster – we all know about tolerance in middle eastern countries.
It was a long flight from Melbourne to Manchester, lots of hanging around and sitting and not much sleep. Plenty of time to read, watch films and TV programmes, play games, eat the meals, enjoy some of them but mainly to reminisce and think about the last ten months’ adventures.
Jenny met us at Manchester Airport with Martha and William and it was lovely to see and to spend most of the day with them all! Best of all, though, were the spontaneous hugs from a couple of children who haven’t seen us in the flesh for a significant portion of their lives. Jenny and Liam have done a brilliant job keeping us in their lives, thank you very much!
We went for a walk to a local place for breakfast, the idea partly being for Liesel and me to stay awake until a reasonable bedtime. Martha is a very competent scooter user.
We watched Martha and William swimming in the afternoon, both very happy and very competent in the water.
The Welcome Home evening meal was Pie and Roast potatoes. Gorgeous! We should go away for ten months at a time more often…
Now we have a tonne of boring but necessary admin tasks to perform, household appliances to kick into action, medical appointments to keep and, when we have a moment, many boxes to unpack from last year’s house move!
Mick and Liesel's Antics 
Welcome back to exotic Manchester – must be a relief after all that boring travelling around uninspiring places. I have painstakingly and reluctantly followed your travels, and I am not envious in the slightest, so there. At least now, you are reasonably close to tropical Liverpool and, as far as I know, you still don’t need a visa to visit there.
Thanks for sharing your fantastic journey, in doing so, you weren’t the only ones to enjoy it! We’ll be off to Portugal soon, with a possible diversion to Monfalcone in Italy, to look at a sailing boat that’s for, er sail, and also for sale. If it’s decent enough, we’ll be sailing down the Adriatic and across the Med to Portugal. If you feel like having an adventure, instead of gadding about the as you have been doing, let us know and we’ll reserve a good cabin for you 😉
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