"Best Of" Awards

 
 
One of the great things about our trip was that we overviewed thousands of years of world history, culture and human achievement. So what were the highlights? Here are some quick awards...
1. Best Landmark - The Statue of Liberty, in a close playoff with the Eiffel Tower. They're both grand achievements of the nineteenth century, and both are structurally engineered by Gustav Eiffel. What a genius. The design of Lady Liberty herself is art on a grand scale.
2. Best airline flight - After 10 flights over seven weeks, we became used to cramped conditions. But as I mentioned in a previous post, the V-Australia flight from LA to Brisbane was the best of our trip. Spacious plane, fast service, good entertainment system and good meals made the time pass quickly.
3. Best Church Service - It might be for sentimental reasons, but after visiting some of the great evangelical churches of the world, the church family we felt most connected with was at Arborfield with Piers and Carolyn Bickersteth. There are low key but exciting things happening there, and everyone loves to be part of it. Tim Keller's sermon at Redeemer New York was excellent too.

It's over!

 
 
Susie and Rohan met us on schedule at Brisbane airport, and Jo and Maddie were waiting at the door when we got home. It's great to be back, but sad to end our seven short weeks of adventure. Thanks to all those who have followed our blog, and even bigger thanks to those on our travels who made us so lavishly welcome. It was great to see the sights of the world, but even better to catch up with old friends!

Foretaste of Home

 
To kill some time in our seven hour layover at LA, we caught a cab to the new Westfield Mall at Culver City... a little bit of Australiana in a far off land. The shopping was disappointing, except for the thousand calorie chocolate thickshake. Back to the airport with hours to spare... VA008 took off around midnight. We were impreesed with everything about the flight home. V Australia looked after us V well. And so...

Summing up...

 
Today we (are hoping to) fly from Vancouver to LA, sit in the airport for seven hours, then catch the V-Australia midnight flight back to Brisbane. That means our adventure has come to an end. In the last seven weeks we've visited Kuala Lumpur, Rome, Florence, Geneva, Paris, Amiens, Arborfield, Port Isaac, London, Toronto, Niagara (Buffalo), New York, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Atlanta, Chicago and Vancouver. It's been educational, fun and a bit tiring. People have been immensely kind to us along the way, and catching up with old friends has been a highlight... but it will be good to get home!

Vancouver vagabonds

 
 
 
 
It's been nice taking things easy around Vancouver the last couple of days. Yesterday we visited Granville Island markets and ate at Earls, and today we headed out to Steveston for a fish and chip lunch before shopping at Kerrisdale and walking home to Ruth and Rod's. Tomorrow... we head home. The seven short weeks of adventure are drawing to a close.

Fringe Benefits

 
 
 
Getting stuck in Chicago had an upside. We spent the night in the Radisson hotel at a discount rate, and were upgraded to first class for the flight from Chicago to Vancouver. For a while though, we thought we'd miss the connecting flight, as the security clearance queue at Chicago airport took almost an hour. Things were getting tense!

Goodbye Atlanta

 
 
We were sad to say goodbye to the Lowe family, but happy to finally fly out of Atlanta airport after a six hour delay due to the cancellation of our flight to Vancouver via Denver due to high winds. We were finally booked on a flight to Chicago, where we stayed the night at the Radisson Hotel... our first proper hotel room in the whole journey! The bonus - we fly from here to Vancouver first class thanks to the guy at the United Airlines desk.