It wasn't quite as big as the Findly Park meeting last weekend, but very fun nonetheless
Gini's itinerary with Trafalgar Tours had her in Melbourne for three days. I'm not sure what constitutes a day in Trafalgar Tour Meridian Time but she arrived at about 10.00pm Saturday night and had to be ready to leave on the bus at 6.30am Monday morning. Maybe they've invented some sort of time accelerator so people get the most out of their holidays!
I got a call Saturday night from Gini, who had just finished making a voodoo doll of the tour guide who wasn't letting anyone off the bus until they ticked the boxes for their tours the next day. The afternoon's tour was a nine hour bus trip to see the penguin parade. I let Gini know that the penguins don't waddle around for long and most of that nine hours was going to be spent on a bus - we decided to meet at the Westin Hotel's martini bar instead, far better choice! For anyone going to Gini's barbecue in July, never, ever mention the word 'bus' again ...
Captain and I tried to co-ordinate but unfortunately Michelle didn't receive my message until too late. We have learned from this and are now organised to the minute for any visitors in the future that you don't even have to tell us you're coming
So after downing a very refreshing martini, we went for a stroll around the city and had dinner. Shane and I walked Gini back to her hotel and were still talking, talking, talking. She is such an interesting person and we learned about her life in LA, Rascal and her porch kitties, different types of martinis, the girl on the holiday who has a very clean horse (you can ask Gini about that) and so many other things. The time flew by and afterwards it felt like a surreal experience. I wish we had enough time to bring her home to meet the kitties, but we are too far from the city to make this possible - NEXT TIME!
She's now on a bus to the airport, a plane to Sydney, a connecting plane to Cairns, a plane back to Sydney and a plane to LA (with a few days of relaxation squeezed in there somewhere!) I estimate that she'll have spent about 38 hours in the air (and I daren't guess how many on a bus) in the two weeks so I'm sure she'll see the latest movies a few times!
Gini, thanks for spending so much of your time here with us. We feel honoured. And thank you so much for dinner and the armful of cat toys - they love them!
(see, I didn't write all the stuff that REALLY happened )
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