Final Day - Goodbye

As a rule, I prefer my flights to be in the morning (not too early, mind). Around 10 or 11am, so that you can get up, have breakfast, get to the airport, take your flight and get on with the things. The issue I have with afternoon and evening flights, particularly when on holiday, is that the last day can become all about leaving. I’d much rather have my final day on holiday without care, get up the next morning and fly home.
With that in mind, we were determined that it being the last day of our holiday shouldn’t be dominated by our evening departure tonight. It was therefore handy that the other day we had gone to the “wronga” zoo, because going to the right zoo would give this morning a focus.
That wasn’t to ignore the logistics of leaving tonight. With a morning departure from our apartment it meant that we are in effect in transit for about 40 hours. Luckily we had been able to arrange to leave our bags in the apartment until 1.30pm, because a broken zip on one of the cases meant that an emergency suitcase purchase was in order and a bag swap.
But, ahead of that we headed off to the Sydney Zoo on Darling Harbour. Having entered it with the prime purpose of having the Koala experience that we missed out on before, we didn’t really have high expectations. We’d done a zoo a couple of days ago and didn’t really have a huge desire to see anymore. But this Zoo, very new to Sydney, was much better than Taronga, much more interactive, easier to navigate and to see the animals, insects and wildlife.
The highlight was of course meeting the Koalas. Sammi was the Koala we were lucky enough to meet, and she was adorable.
Having finished at the Zoo, we headed out to get a new suitcase and handily the main department store in Sydney was running a 50% off sale on luggage. Suitably purchased we headed back to the apartment, swapped over the contents and then loaded our bags into the car of a grumpy Uber driver and headed to Angela Higgins’ place for the afternoon.

Our first day had seen us enjoy at terrific BBQ at Angela and Richard’s, so it was appropriate that this was the final stop on our last day. Angela is my best Australian friend, so it was great to have the opportunity to spend a few more hours with her.

Then, we couldn’t put it off anymore and we loaded our bags into the back of a much friendlier Uber driver’s car and headed to the airport.

And now we are here in the lounge, waiting to leave at what has been the end of a very special holiday. Flying out of Sydney won’t be quite goodbye to Australia as we have an irritating 90 min stopover in Canberra (yes, it is bizarre - but it was cheaper) and then after that it is the long flight home via Singapore. On top of the 21 hours or so flying time, we are about to spend over 8 hours in airports in the next day or so.

We’ve had a wonderful time, created a lot of memories and, whilst it sad to come to an end, special times have to come to an end in order for them to be special, otherwise they just become ordinary. So we head home with our hearts full of happiness and looking forward to the next adventures........RH