We’re sitting at the Sydney airport now, awaiting our 10:10 a.m. flight to Los Angeles. I will arrive yesterday.
We have loved Australia but even more have loved the Aussies. I love how friendly and grounded they are. I love that even a breakfast order is “lovely” or that when they like something or are in agreement, they don’t say “Yes,” they say, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
We spent the last three nights of our Australian tour in Sydney. We met friends from last year’s golf trip—Storm, Sharron, and Les—at Sydney’s oldest pub, Fortune of War.
The Fortune of War would’ve been in Sydney when my dad was here during WWII.
In a photo album my dad kept during his war years, I found pictures of him with someone named Norma. It doesn’t take much more than a photo for my family to invent suppositions. My mom, never one to allow evidence to override her intuition, told us all that we were probably related to Elle Macpherson.
You’ll need to pay close attention to follow this math: Norma was Australian + Elle Macpherson is Australian + Elle Macpherson has a face + the Pierman girls have a face = Elle Macpherson is my half-sister. This is an established fact. It is of no consequence to my mom that Elle has no one in her lineage named Norma or Ralph.
My dad had scribbled “Manly Beach” on the photos, so The Husband and I took a short ferry ride to Manly Beach to find the exact spot where he and Norma had posed. We immediately saw similar stone columns. AI said there was a 90% probability that they were the same columns! With more information, AI changed that to 75%, then 40%, then “Meh.”
On our group’s first morning here, we took a backstage tour of the Sydney Opera House (originally Design 218). We learned why they say “Break a leg” and “Pull out all the stops.” We learned that only Aussies say “Chookas” for good luck. Our group was so inspired by the tour that we went back on our last night for a show.
The whole trip was…lovely.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
More photos from Sydney:
These two are special to travel with. They go along with the flow. Pick up all the bills like good parents or grandparents. Look at the world differently than I do. Anytime, anywhere, I would tag along with the blogger and husband.
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I read this post tomorrow, and it was very good. I think you look like the Grinch who stole Christmas. I love that photo of the opera house. Did you guys get to the opera house early, or do Australians hate classical music? Looks like you had a good time down under, though. Welcome back to the top of the earth. Sorry my welcome back is a little late, but I didn’t know until tomorrow that you’d be back yesterday.
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