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Published: December 16th 2009
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Day 229 - Karrinyup, Perth
On one of the last Fridays in the run up to Christmas, what better activity could we find than to fill our day with a trip into the city for a bit of shopping! We must be ever so slightly deranged I think but we weren’t quite mad enough to do the trip in the car, we were at least taking the train.
We both needed a hot shower this morning and then I remembered to extend our booking with the caravan park as we’d only paid up til last night! No dramas though, we booked in for another three days and will definitely, definitely leave Perth first thing on Monday morning after the Christmas party on Sunday night with the old travelling gang.
Before we left however I needed to do a few checks on the laptop and got the best of best surprises when I found an email from two very special friends, Emma and Lynne. Great to hear from both of you ladies, it gives us a nice warm feeling when we get mail regardless of what type. Lynne’s email contained a very special e-card put together by son Josh,
it’s so brilliant it’s inspired us to create a separate 'Christmas Wishes' page which we will upload in a few days with all our daft Christmas photos we’ve been taking and of course it will be headlined with Josh’s video message. Thank you so much Josh, it’s so ace and although I did have a few tears they were very proud, very happy tears.
Off we sped to the railway station, we’d toyed with the idea of cycling as it’s not far but there’s a few large highways to negotiate so we decided to drive and hoped we’d find a free spot in the car park. We think we got the very last one, gosh it’s a popular thing this park and ride!
All that was left for us to do was purchase our tickets and then get on the right train. Like every other train station in every other country in the world, the ticket’s are dispensed via a machine that doesn’t talk and doesn’t answer questions so we had to work it out for ourselves but when the machine wouldn’t take our card as payment method we had to enlist the help of a human! As
it was the ticket we were intending to purchase was a bit over the top so the lovely human helped us get a cheaper one and turned the credit card around so it would work. Doh! All this time in the outback has done nothing to sharpen my brain.
We sat on platform one patiently waiting for the next train to the Perth. It was pretty busy when we climbed aboard and although we had seats to begin with we both gave them up for older passengers, as you do. The journey took less that 20 minutes and we were soon wandering up the steps into the centre of Perth and straight into the city throng. From the visitors centre, which is conveniently positioned right outside the train station, we grabbed a map and then set off looking firstly for the Emirates building as today was the day we intended to sort out our flights home. The DHL Surf Rescue crew were out and about raising money for charity this morning and had enlisted the assistance of three celebrities who were positioned high on life saving chairs and not allowed down until they’d each raised $1000. The TV crews
were there but we managed to sneak by without being interviewed this time!
It took a while for us to navigate our way to the Emirates building, we were at the wrong end of a very long street to begin with by a mailman pointed us in the right direction. We were seen straight away so explained the changes we wanted to make and pleaded for them to be as cheap as possible! We had booked our flights with every intention of returning to the UK from New Zealand but we’ve run out of money to do that part of the trip. We’ve levelled our disappointment at this fact but positively thinking that it makes more sense for us to spend another month here in Australia plus we won’t have to spend money on accommodation or transport because we already have the car and the caravan. Unfortunately has helpful as the chap behind the desk was there was no way we were going to get away with making the change without some sort of charge and it was reasonable hefty unfortunately. Nevermind, we’ve at least been able to do it and can now focus on making plans for that
additional month as we land in the UK from the Melbourne flight on April 26th 2010 before returning to work on May 3rd which gives us six days to get used to living in a house again … although we do have a camper van at home so we might just sleep in that for a while!
Next up was a bit of necessary retail therapy. After all the disasters of late with the cameras we’ve had to purchase one to get us through the rest of the holiday as only one of us taking photos from here on in would be a bit tragic. After parting with the money for the flight update we had to lower our budget somewhat and so spent a bit of time going from store to store and trying to get the best deal possible. The atmosphere in the centre of town is buzzing and despite being a normal working today there are a lot of people milling about with plenty of buskers to entertain us. After some too-ing and fro-ing between different electrical stores we finally got our new camera, nothing too flash but if it does what it says on the
tin it should be as good as the old one with any luck.
We grabbed a quick bite to eat under a shady tree near to Swan Bells which we heard chime today, a first for any of our trips to Perth. Like most cities in the world, Perth now has a huge ‘Millennium’ Wheel giving great views over the Swan river and beyond.
Secret Santa presents were our next challenge and we found the perfect one then managed to have it gift wrapped for charity to make sure it’s identify remained hidden until Sunday!
There was a bit of Christmas shopping for each other going on too, we’ve set ourselves a limit of $25 each and decided that any items purchased shouldn’t be much over $5 each and they should also be something we can use on the trip! We’ve got ourselves a huge stocking too so it should be fun on Christmas morning when we start to unwrap them all!
The journey back on the train with our goodies was a laugh but totally straight forward and neither of us felt too exhausted after our hard day in the city.
We managed a
quick Skype chat with Mum and Dad K who had Barb & Tony visiting them. They were on their way to see Aunty Enid in Stanley and Moira is a good place for a stop off! Glad to hear all is well back home and everyone is ready for Christmas.
That rounded off another great day in Australia, dinner was of course gorgeous - it always is when Mr Howells is at the controls!
Love to all
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