Checked e-mails one final time before heading off. It was still dark, cool but not as cold as when I arrived. Kylie gave me a lift to the bus station (it was only a couple of minutes away by car), and saw me off. She was either going to go back home for a bit of a jog, or go back to bed. I think we both knew which one was more likely!

The journey back to Ballarat wasn't too bad actually, seemed to go by quite quick (and I didn't feel too emotional about leaving, simply more tired!). The first few km actually retraced our steps from Wednesday a bit as the coach passed through Dunkeld, but then diverged east (on Wednesday we'd gone north), but it didn't take the short-cut to Dunkeld that Kylie did! :P I saw the countryside that I'd missed on the way out here, but since I'd seen a bit of the area now anyway (the drive to Colac was just a bit further south), so it wasn't anything really new.

Had about a 45min wait in Ballarat station, read a newspaper. Then came the hour and a half train ride to Melbourne. I ended up sharing a bank of seats with two young boys and two adults, whose relationship to the kids; indeed to each other; I was unable to fathom out! I'd automatically assumed they were married but from the things they said and the way they were talking, it would appear not! Oh well.

From Melbourne (a fairly nice day) I transferred to the skybus coach to the airport. Again fairly swift, highway all the way, no problems at all.

Had a brief brain fart at the airport though; I didn't read the travel screens correctly at first and got into a complete fuddle cos I couldn't find what check-in desk I needed!! Meh, a bit of careful reading later and I was 7th in the queue! I had arrived at the airport just over 3hrs before the flight was due to depart, and they hadn't opened the check-in desks anyway!

The check-in lady sorted out my ticket problem with the minimum of fuss. After a brief phone call to her supervisor, all she needed to do was take the white customer portion of my ticket, which she kindly photocopied for my records, which was nice of her. She even gave me an aisle seat without me needing to request one! Cool!!

Pottered around in the departure lounge for a bit - bought some macadamia nuts as an edible present for people back home (Kylie having given me lots of vegemite to take back which may not be classified as edible by the people I'm giving them to!), and a packet of mints for the journey, and that was about that. While waiting at the gate early on, I got accosted by a customer satisfaction feedback lady and got to answer a few questions!

The flight to Singapore took about 8hrs. It was a little confusing to calculate since I believed on the way out, Singapore was 3 hours behind where I was in Australia, whereas on the way back it seemed to only be 2 ... Watched the Q-Comedy channel (including "Everybody loves Raymond, Kath & Kim, and My Family), and then listened to the comedy radio recording, including an extract from "Radio Active", gosh I remember that being on Radio 4! And the TV spin-off (KYTV) too! Oh happy days! :|

At Singapore we actually had to change planes (which was different to last time). We had maybe an hour to waste, so I wasted it, just stood around (been sitting for 8hrs, fancied a change!) watching the world go by. I spent 15 mins or so waiting in a queue for free Internet access - checked my mail but there wasn't any. Damn you, friends reunited personals advert posters!! The connection to the net there felt really slow; I'd have expected it to have been quicker.

There were a couple of problems with the new plane when we boarded (after spending what felt like an extraordinary amount of time after going through the gate, waiting to be allowed on the plane). A couple of the small engines that powered the internal systems weren't working, so while the plane was on the ground, things like the inflight entertainment system and the air conditioning weren't working, so it was getting very warm on board. Once the plane was airborne though, the main engines did their job and everything was normal.

This second section of the flight was to take over 12 hours, much longer than on the way over. Presume it was because of the predominant winds. I passed the first couple of hours by watching the whole run-though of the Q-tv documentary channel (something about what can go wrong when making films in Hollywood, and an edited version of Michael Palin's Sahara), and then had a bit of a snooze for a total of maybe 5 hours. When I wasn't sleeping I was heavily involved in writing my story (Louise); I think I've got as far as starting section 5 but not having typed up any for ages I don't know if sections 3 and 4 are really long enough! Of course their length is going to be skewed a bit since there's a lot more dialogue in them then in either sections 1 or 2.

Apparently we were racing against another plane over Germany, a BA plane which was also presumably from Singapore, to try to reach Heathrow first! No plane's allowed to land before 5am so it's always nice to be the first plane in each day! Of course we have no idea if we were or not!!

Landed at Heathrow. Took an age for my bag to come through the baggage carousel, probably 20 minutes after the first bag appeared. Mine was one of the last few to appear - maybe the earlier you check-in the deeper into the plane your bag is so the longer it takes to get it out?! Also the baggage handlers were a bit overworked since apparently a couple of planes had arrived earlier than scheduled.

Actually, on the flight, it was interesting glancing out of the windows and on the flightplan viewscreen. We were always on the daytime side of dawn, but only just, all the way from central Asia. We were following the dawn very closely, almost riding on it, and we were seemingly never far off it!

Eventually found the right bus stop at Terminal 4 to catch the free shuttle to Terminal 3 and the railair coach to Reading. Reached Reading only about 5mins before a train to Liverpool (via Birmingham and Oxford - thus linking three candidates for European City of Culture 2008) was due to depart so that was convenient! Very few people in it, was very relaxing and pleasant ride. Nice morning, sun was out, smooth ride ... and we were 7 mins early arriving in Banbury!! Honestly, I go away for two weeks and Virgin decide to run a rail service!! Surprisingly, it arrived in Birmingham on time too!

Lovely day in Birmingham, pleasant and warm. Got bus back home, via the local shop, nothing had changed, car hadn't moved, I had lots of mail and a couple of answerphone messages. Did a bit of admin online, and then had a snooze. I arrived home just after 10am; pretty much exactly 36 hours after leaving Hamilton. I'd made it!

Not that I really want to be here, England holds no appeal for me any more. I could live in Victoria I think; it's similar to England but so much different as well. But of course that'll never happen. Oh well. Here's to the next holiday; though three trips of a lifetime in nine months is a tad excessive, don't you think?