Our last Greyhound ride wasn’t
the best, as the heater had been set on full blast, in contrast to the US
Greyhounds whereby they cranked up the AC to keep us all frozen. However, we
had made it to Melbourne and the last leg of our trip through Australia. We
were to be staying two nights with my friends Harriet and Liam, who live
slightly south of Melbourne in a suburb called Sandringham. It was only a short train ride to get there
and we couldn’t help but feel that the place had a look of Leeds/Manchester
about it, mainly due to the chilly weather and overcast sky.
We found the house with no
problem at all, but our hosts were both still at work but had left a key out
for us to make ourselves at home. We let ourselves in and were greeted with a
beautiful home with lots of space, and a small brown face looking in at us
through the patio doors. The face belonged to Otis, their puppy, who had only
been with them for 5 days. We had been given instructions to look after him and
the two cats, who were yet to show their faces, and to relax in the house until
later in the day when they would be arriving. The first thing we did was
obvious – put the kettle on. With a cup of hot brown in our hands we slouched
onto the couches and had a perusal of the telly box. As The Sopranos was on we
happily sat back and watched an early episode, followed by a few minutes of the
MLS football game. It was soon time for lunch so we grabbed a quick bite and
set about trying to get the internet working. As it wasn’t happening for some
reason we decided to say hello to the bundle of joy that had been watching us
from outside.
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| Otis |
As we opened the patio doors a
brown shape rushed in and began licking at James’s face. Otis was clearly very
pleased to see us. We spent quite some time outside in the sunshine with him,
chasing, throwing and playing tug-o-war trying to tire him out a little so he
would settle down and go to sleep. We tried leaving him outside for a while as
we couldn’t leave him inside unsupervised, but the whimpers that came through
the windows were just too distressing to ignore. So we let him and played with
him some more, until he peed on a rug that he really shouldn’t have done. It
was like having to look after a toddler, always looking out for him to make
sure he wasn’t chewing something he shouldn’t be or knocking something over.
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| Finding out "Who Is Liam Foulkes" |
At half 5 I saw the red mini
cooper pull up into the driveway and Harry and Liam get out. It had felt very
strange hanging around in their house waiting for them to turn up, and now they
were finally here, ready to meet and greet the Gray brothers that were just
over halfway through their travels. We said our hello’s and it was a weird
feeling to be seeing them in Australia, something that I had thought might
never ever happen. But it was like we had not been apart for all those years
and easily slipped back into the casual chats and reminiscing about university
life and beyond. Otis was still running round like a lunatic and the cats were
keeping their distance, probably still a little bit too soon for them to understand
what exactly was going on. Harry made a fantastic curry for us and we relaxed
with a few bottles of beer and wine and caught up til late into the night.
Pretty soon we were all starting to flag so we called it a night and went to
sleep in a nice comfy bed for a change.
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