We made it safely back to Sydney on Saturday morning. Our departure wasn’t without dramas – our plane was delayed over six hours on the tarmac on Thursday night and we didn’t fly out until Friday night. More on this in another post… but on the positive side, I got my upgrade to business class, thanks to my wonderful family donating their Qantas Frequent Flyer points to me. This was a huge lifesaver as it meant I actually slept on the plane and felt quite chipper when I arrived. I don’t know if it’s related but the jet lag hasn’t been too bad at all.
I didn’t manage any more novel writing in my remaining time in California, but I did produce a feature on space medicine (as in outer space) for The Australian. It was extremely interesting to research – for example, did you know that NASA was called into help with the healthcare of the trapped Chilean miners?
Most of my time was consumed with packing, selling furniture on Craigslist, and giving away stuff on Freecycle. However, there were a few other highlights. Firstly, I got to ride in a zeppelin for a sunset flight over San Francisco – what a great way to farewell the city! (You can also ride in a zeppelin if you buy a raffle ticket through Passports with Purpose by midnight US Pacific time on Monday December 13 – it’s just $10 and it will help build a village in India for 25 families from the Dalit.
Secondly, our friends Morgan and Thu hosted a farewell party for us at their pad in San Francisco. It was bucketing down with rain but a good crowd still turned out and it was lovely to see everyone one last time. We had stacks of good food, including banana cream pie from Mission Pie.
Thirdly, I made it up to the city the day before our flight was due to leave and hung out with my friend Emma (who is also pregnant). We had tea at Samovar, saw the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibition at the SFMOMA art gallery (which was fabulous) and then did some maternity shopping at Pea in the Pod. It’s an expensive shop generally but the summer selection was all on sale – perfect for me since I was heading to the southern hemisphere and an Aussie summer!
Since landing in Sydney, we’ve spent the last few days catching up with friends and family but we’re taking it all at a very relaxed pace. The nice thing about being home for good is that we don’t need to rush to fit all our socialising into a week or two.
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