Episode Seventeen - 'All good things...'

Hello and welcome to the final installment of Matt & Sharon's travel blog, coming to you from sunny ol' Melbourne town. Indulge us as we describe the last days of our trip and look back on some of the unforgettable experiences.

The last time that we spoke Sharon and I were killing time before our flight back home. After finishing up at the internet cafe we wandered across the road for a bite to eat before playing pool for an hour or so. Given the Tube's propensity to be chock-a-block full at all hours of day and night, we decided to head over to Heathrow at around 3:30pm, giving us around six hours before our flight was scheduled to depart. We read newspapers, checked our emails and generally just wasted time before grabbing some dinner at one of the many restaurants littered around the place. We spent our entire time in terminal three which, on it's own, would have to be bigger than Tullamarine in it's entirety. Add to that the fact that there are four more terminals, with terminal six in the pipeline, and you have one truly massive airport. In fact, to call Heathrow an airport is probably a little bit misleading - sure planes depart and arrive there, but essentially it is one great big city in it's own right.
When the flight's check-in desk opened four hours before departure we headed staight there and got rid of our bags. Incidentally, the two bags totalled 38kg between them - no wonder they felt like they were snapping our spines in half everytime we hauled them on.
After plenty more time wasting and a couple of uneventful security checks we proceeded through to the departure lounges where we, you guessed it, wasted some more time. Eventually, finally, it was time to board the flight. Despite all the waiting around, the build up to the flight was quite exciting and despite having had an amazing two months, we were looking forward to catching up with friends and family upon our return.
We were lucky enough to be on one of the new Airbus A380s with it's split level, 500 passenger capacity. It was certainly a lot roomier and more comfortable than previous flights that we had been on during the trip, and the video entertainment system that included a widescreen monitor in the seat in front, was truly mindblowing. From your seat you could plug in a USB key and access/modify/create Word documents and spreadsheets, view photos by plugging in a digital camera, or watch/listen to any media on a portable media device such as an iPod. All of this was on top of the 100s of movies, TV shows, games, music albums and radio stations that could also be accessed through the system. It truly is amazing technology and it certainly made the flight go faster.
Before boarding the plane we had decided that we would try to stay awake for the entirety of the 12 hours and 40 minutes flight to Singapore, sleeping on the way from Singapore to Melbourne in order to adjust our body clocks back to Melbourne time as quickly as possible. Sharon lasted around half the flight and I lasted around two hours longer before dozing off, the time being around 6am at our departure city.
During our two hour stop-over in Singapore I grabbed a shower and we both did a little bit of window shopping before checking in for the final leg of the homeward journey. While we had both planned to sleep for the duration of the flight, it didn't really work out that way. After we had been fed the flight was already two hours old and getting to sleep was proving difficult. Our attempts to sleep were made even more difficult due to the extremely limited room that we had to move, our seats being the furthest back in the plane - against a wall - meaning that when the people in the seats in front of us hit the 'recline' button and their seats lurched violently backwards, our faces and legs were inches from being squashed. We must have dozed for a couple of hours and we arrived at Tullamarine very relieved and more than a little tired.
After collecting our bags, passing through customs and a brief quarantine check it was out into the terminal where we were met by our dedicated families. It was such a wonderful feeling to have people there as we arrived, and we would like to give a great big 'thank you' to our welcoming party all of which had risen before 6am in order to meet us.

It has been an amazing couple of months, and we have many memories that we will not easily forget.
We saw some awesome scenery, from the incomparable Greek Peloponnese and the ancient mountain-village of Delphi, to the rolling green hills and country lanes of rural Scotland. We indulged in local cuisine, from Yorkshire pudding in Halifax to souvlakis in Athens and from haggis in Edinburgh to local beers in Brussels. We met some amazing people, from the lovely folks on the Greek Classical Tour to our marvellous hosts in Rotterdam, Halifax and Rochdale. We experienced the very best of travelling - hiring a car and having the freedom to travel wherever we pleased - and the very worst of travelling - walking the streets of Piraeus and Rome for two hours in search of pre-booked accommodation, on successive days.

By way of a conclusion to this blog, let us share with you a couple of the funny experiences that we had along the way and that didn't quite make it to the blog.
Imagine a half-asleep Matt waking up in the middle of the night in Freiburg, the 11 bed 'double room' empty besides Sharon and myself. Having forgotten to lock my iPod in our locker before falling asleep, I woke at 3am to try and find a suitable hiding place. I stumbled around the room, eyes half closed, and, deciding that it would be too much effort to get the keys so that I may put my iPod in the locker, I hid it in the next best place - on top of a pile of clothes which just happened to be in plain sight of anyone that decided to enter the room. My object hiding skills would become a standard joke for the rest of the trip.
Or take the saga of Sharon's watch. Having refused to change her watch to local time for the duration of the trip, she insisted upon leaving it on Melbourne time and adding one or two hours to reach the local time. In the blog entry that covered our stay in Carlisle I mentioned the fact that we woke an hour early than planned. This was in fact due to Sharon's watch. Being so used to adding an hour to everything to get to local time, Sharon looked at our alarm clock (in local time) and without thinking added an hour and as a result we hurriedly got ready. It was only when we saw the clock at the bottom of the TV screen during breakfast that we realised what had happened.
In Paris we were walking along the footpath back to our hotel when Sharon spotted a pile of fresh, steaming dog turd. It just so happened that it's location corresponded exactly to where my next footstep would be and so, fearing the worst, Sharon yelled out 'DDDOOOGGGSSSHHHIIITTT!'. I got the message and, as if in slow motion, pushed my foot an extra five centimetres through the air, narrowly missing the offending pile. It must have been quite a sight for the other people on the street, some crazy tourists yelling at each other and doing some sort of interpretive dance, and we certainly laughed about it for a long while after.
We had our fair share of funny hoteliers as well, for one reason or another. In London the Egyptian hotel owners took delight in giving us a flat-out 'No' everytime that we asked for the key, giving us the keys to different rooms or instructing us how to get into our room without the key, such as via the window.
The hotel receptionist in Cologne must have thought it quite amusing when I asked him for our room key in German. Rather than just handing it over he proceeded to ask me a series of questions in German that left me shrugging my shoulders and exposing me for the try-hard that I was.
Our landlady in Rome made us laugh without even trying when it came time to book the room for another night. Knowing that she spoke very little English (i.e. none) I whipped out my Italian phrasebook and spent the next ten minutes practicing the relevant line - 'voglio fermarmi un' altra notte'. I recited the phrase to her, proud of myself for trying, and she just stood there, not understanding a word of my would-be Italian. I tried again - nothing. I simplified to 'un' altra notte' - 'another night' - and after a couple of tries she got the message. Sitting in our room afterwards Sharon and I burst out laughing and it became the defining moment in our occasional struggles with the language barrier.
While speaking of languages it would be remiss of us not to mention the various English accents that we encountered along the way. In Halifax we asked a gentleman for directions to the top of a hill and, after initially struggling to understand Sharon's accent, he proceeded in an insanely thick Yorkshire accent to explain how one might climb the hill. As we walked away I turned to Sharon and asked her if she understood a word - she hadn't either and so we just took a guess at which way he had meant.
In Rome we took the Leonardo da Vinci express train from the airport to the centre of town and sitting in the seats opposite us were the most prim and proper couple we had ever seen or heard. For the rest of our trip Sharon and I would laugh whenever the other brought up about the husband saying to the wife, in the snootiest accent you could ever imagine, 'I just received a message from Rebecca. Apparently she won't be attending the party'.

Well I'm sad to say it, but we have reached the end. I am sitting here wearing shorts, trying to escape from the insane and unforgiving heat. Melbourne is in the second of four consecutive days of 41 degrees and on top of the jet lag, the adjustment hasn't been all that easy. To think that we were walking through the snow in Berlin less than three weeks ago. It was -10 degrees then.

I know I have said it on numerous occasions but it is worth repeating one final time - thank you so much to everyone that has taken the time to read this blog over the last two months. Without the interest, support and kind words of so many people this blog might not have made it past the first couple entries, so thank you. It has been a joy to write and knowing that people are both reading and enjoying what we have written, the many hours spent in internet cafes around Europe have been time well spent.

Until we meet again,

Matt & Sharon

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