We had a lovely two-night stay in Melbourne, with Jim and Karen’s colleagues Anne & Graeme from the Outback. Jim was able to take his boys to dinner for the first time in two years, and the rest of us enjoyed a fantastic Thai dinner with Lucy, her brother John, and his girlfriend Simone, who came to Melbourne with Marty to celebrate the finish of our Tour d’GOR.

The highlight of our day in Melbourne was visiting Moorabbin, training home of the Aussie Rules footy club (team) Jim ‘barracks’ (roots) for – the Saints (Saint Kilda), to watch a training session – their first game of the pre-season is next week. Jim has been going on about this game and these guys for years, and FORCED me to watch some tapes when I went to Serbia!! (Just kidding!) I got to see my favorite footballer – Robert Harvey (#35), historically one of the club’s top players (and still is), and who is probably retiring this year. That was fun – sure wish we could have seen a game. Anwar is playing this year too, and what a blast that would have been, to see him play! We ended the day with delicious take out Vietnamese dinner with the whole crowd.

Then Jim and Irena took us to the airport the next morning – Karen also met us for a last quick goodbye – and we were off to the Great Barrier Reef; wow, how time flies…