October 20th - Jim returns to the USA

Photos:
1. Lara dressed for work. She remains behind for a few days to finish up her project.
2. Telstra Tower from the other side of the Lake


For Jim’s last night in Australia, we went to dinner at the Telstra Tower on Black Mountain overlooking Canberra. This tower has a rotating restaurant (1 full rotation every 90 minutes). The locals affectionately (?) refer to the tower as the “Hypodermic on the Hill.” From the photo, you can see why.

The slow movement of the world around us made Lara a little queasy but she still managed to make her way through the rack of lamb without incident.

This has been a wonderful trip to a truly fantastic country. We somehow managed to avoid all of the “horrible ways to die down under” and came away with a fervent desire to come back when we can spend more time exploring all that Australia has to offer.

It has been a little embarrassing to realize how little we know about Australia. While it may be a small country, it is one of the seven continents on this planet and we really do not pay any attention to it. We hope to remedy that so when we come back we’ll be better “ambassadors” for our own country.

Headscratcher of the Day Number1. While watching the news this morning, the reporter was discussing the government’s response to some riots last summer at a beach and she described the response as “shambolic.” I’m not sure what that is, but it certainly doesn’t sound very good!
Headscratcher of the Day Number 2: Jim's flight leaves Sydney 1:45pm on Friday. After nearly 14 hours of travel he arrives before he left at 10:10am on Friday in LA! Whoa Dude, how does that work???