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Well, here I am, on the other side of my Masters Degree barely able to remember the pain of the last 6 weeks.  They say that's what giving birth is like... once it's over... you have the achievement and the hard work seems to be less hard than it was.

Well, mostly.

I'm shattered, of course, and relieved.  And today, after a domestic blitz unparalleled in 2009 my house is feeling the effects of finally having my full attention.  The cat is shipped off to friends to spend a couple of weeks entertaining them and tomorrow morning I'll be boarding a plane for Aotearoa and the world's most adorable (seriously) bunch of nieces and nephews on the planet.  (in the known universe, actually... ) oh, and yours are too...

Of course.

By some strange quirk of determination I managed to convince my internal deadline monitor switch off long enough to achieve the last two essays, both of them, a week ahead of their ACTUAL deadlines and as such had the final week of college to finish this http://www.deeleea.com/blog/flashdemo/index.html  You'll recognize the header if you've been following this blog for any length of time, I submitted that in the first half of the year, but the calendar panels are new and rather fun and just in time for this advent season!!  Oh... and SURPRISE! you can't open them till their appointed day - so bookmark the page 'k?!

I presented the unlocked version of the calendar to my lecturers for assessment and duly handed in all my assignments and as of Tuesday can happily say that I'm done.  Of course, now I'm thinking about Honours, you know, coz I'll need something to keep up the pace next year *facepalms*

I celebrated the end of the degree dining at Chez Maurice et Linda with some of my favourite women. The restaurant is a Northern Beaches landmark with the most delicious French menu - utterly wonderful and well priced ($51.50 for a 3 course meal!) Linda the hostess is amazing to watch as she served the whole room, Maurice is a bit abrupt and told us off for having one of our party not eating... space is at a  premium and the whole layout would have been different if there were only 5 instead of 6- they'd clearly have charged us if it hadn't been our first visit...HOWEVER, the food was AMAZING, we had a brilliant time and I'm glad I remembered to book 6 weeks ago as it's very difficult to find a table there at short notice!!!  I had French Onion Soup to start, Beef Wellington and finished with Crepes Suzette - yes, the were on fire... brilliant!!

Anyway, it's late and I should be doing those last fiddly tidy ups before I clamber into bed, and so I at least get SOME sleep before the shuttle arrives in the morning... I doubt I'll be bloggin in NZ - internet access will be sketchy... but until I get back, play nice ok??

Another gratuitous post about the inherent conflict of the expatriate’s condition.

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve gone across the Tasman in the 9 years I’ve lived in Sydney (it might just about have got to double figures) and even in having done it so many times I still find myself scoping out the atmosphere when I arrive as if to test the waters before leaping in.

It has been hard to define how to describe the nature of that inquiry. Is it just a scan for a homing signal that’s starting to ping a lot louder saying, please come back?

I hadn’t been able to qualify it until a friend neatly summed it up last week at lunch.

She said that after 6 years of living in the UK she only moved back to New Zealand when she stopped feeling like a visitor on Kiwi soil; it wasn’t until then that she knew that it was time to move home.

Here’s me, 9 years later and I still feel like a visitor. Not, I’m quick to point out in the midst of my family, we’re still as connected as ever we were, even more so now with video conferencing and the like… but in terms of having a life here… there’s a part of me that wonders if, having lived in Oz now for so long, I haven’t passed the point of no return.

Is that wrong? I was born here, did the best part of my growing up here, I identify so strongly with the Kiwi identity, my blood still runs black for my rugby heroes. Kiwi is the greatest part of my national identity, even though I have a cast iron association with Australia in the form of a naturalization certificate… It really does feel as though you can take the girl out of New Zealand but you can’t take New Zealand out of the girl.

I’ve never ruled out the possibility of moving back some time. Truth to tell I wish I could feel a definite ease on the state of play in Australia, a winding down, a tailing off that would release me to come back to NZ feeling as though my time there was done. Skeet has got it. Her feeling is moving her on to the UK, but me?

I’m resolutely still in Sydney even though right now I’m physically in New Zealand; and on Tuesday, as I was driving away from Sis’ place watching one of her little tackers cry as I was leaving (more because he wasn’t getting to come too than because I was on my way) I wished it was an easy decision to drop everything and come back to NZ.

Because bloody hell, the constant leaving is really (really, really) hard.

And so this travelogue comes to a close.

Day Eight, which was Thursday January 3rd was the highlight for me. A trip to see the iconic sandstone monoliths, 'The 12 Apostles' just out of Port Campbell at the most eastern end of the Great Ocean Road.

Of course, we didn't go straight there. There's no point being in a new part of the country (IMHO) unless you're prepared to do a bit of exploring... So, we.did.

We actually left fairly late in the afternoon with a hope of catching pretty views of the Apostles with a sunset feel about them... or behind them. But as I wasn't keen to waste the whole day away waiting for sunset we left a little earlier in anticipation of finding other things to see on the way.

The most notable diversionwas the Cape Otway Lightstation (actually this links to a quite comprehensive website all about it so I won't bore you too much...)

Apart from the fact we had another close koala encounter on the way down to Cape Otway there was at the end of the road quite a delightful attraction which is focused around the Lightstation and the Radar Station based there in WW2. Cape Otway actually marks the point where Bass Straight (the body of water between the Australian mainland and Tasmania) meet and which was significant in the development of communication between Tassie and the mainland in the early years of the telegraph. It was a great spot to spend an hour or so, and would have only been improved by the café being open and serving lattes...

You may not be surprised to learn that this is the Cape Otway Lighthouse...

This is looking back at the Lightstationmaster's house right up on the cliff top. Incredible views!

Here we are... another new year under way! After the previous day's 40+ temperatures the weather settled down a little and we decided it was time to do a bit of exploring.

I'd had the happy accident of a conversation with Mal Austin, a well respected photographer from the area, and had cheekily asked for the inside track on where to go to find good pictures off and on the Great Ocean Road. Mal sent us on a little side tour to the Sequoia park on the (gravel!) road that winds from the GOR cross country to Beech Forest

It was quite some time before we got there... and while the drive was picturesque we were beginning to wonder if we'd missed it before we finally went around the corner find it well signposted and well patronized by picnickers and campers.

It was a lovely (and thankfully cool) half an hour under these majestic trees. They're still young by comparison with the redwood forests in California where you can find trees that are ENORMOUS and many years old. But this was a lovely diversion and very restful. I was wishing I had all sorts of wide angle gear to be able to fit the trees in...

We'd gone so far up the gravel road that we figured it was prudent to keep going up the short end so that we didn't have to drive it all the way back to the main road and ended up coming out the other end very near the Otway Fly, an aerial walk through the Otway rainforest.

We went in and paid our entry fee and followed the bush path down to the walkway structure. In typical tourist provider fashion there were 'prehistoric' attractions for the kids and a dinosaur path that one 'shouldn't miss'... hmmm... but the bush walk was lovely and would only have been bettered if we'd seen a few wallabies or possums on the way down!

We went got to the aerial walk and followed it's paths through the tree tops. It was a lovely way to see the area and get a close up on the gums. Again, a bit more action from the wild life would have made it 'magic' but it was a great way to spend a couple of hours and I thoroughly recommend it!

The shadow cast by the tower at the top of the Fly a walk up a narrow spiral staircase... my poor out of condition legs got a bit wobbly... not to self get back on the treadmill...

You'd think I'd have more pictures of what we'd seen there!! They were unremarkable... more because of poor skills than what was available to shoot... you'll just have to go there and check them out for yourselves...

The next day was another exploring day and we made our way down to Kennett River because we'd heard there was a wild koala colony (is that the right collective noun?) down there. It was a short trip along the GOR which was lovely in itself, we parked the car at the Kennett River store (which was basically the sum total of Kennett River's commercial district) and wandered up the road - darn, can't remember what it's called - to see the koalas.

Sure enough the brown sleeping lumps in the trees were easy enough to spot.

Koalas are well known for the amount of sleeping they do... 22 hours a day.

So, they were pretty high in the trees and not especially active so we walked along spotted as many as we could (5 or so) jumped in the car and headed back toward Apollo Bay.

But not far out of Kennett River we spotted a number of cars lined up just off the road obviously having a sticky at something interesting.

Not ones to buck a trend we pulled up too and got out with our cameras... sure enough there were more koalas only this time there was one putting on a bit of a show...

I don't know how many times I've seen koalas in a zoo... seriously!! But I have to say there's something magic about seeing them do their thing in the wild... It was a trip highlighted... eclipsed only by a similar sight the next day at a different colony.

We drove home and stopped for a Devonshire tea at a guest house which has an incredible view of the GOR and the ocean, got into a loooong conversation with the proprietress who obviously enjoys a good chat!!! It was beautifully accompanied by homemade scones and jam... A fitting end to another great couple of days!

Looking along the road heading east.

Looking west back towards Apollo Bay.