Thursday, 23-10-2014. Day 64.

Just Like Coming Home

The day started much like any other on the farm: with roosters going at it from 2:30 a.m. on through to sunrise. We woke with the sun and Frankie got one last turn milking Rosie before the call for breakfast came.

After breakfast, we packed quickly. As we mentioned before, the room we were staying in was pretty compact, so we didn't have a lot of room to spread out. Once all our goods were in their proper places, Frankie said goodbye to Dina, our favorite chook.

Jackie was happy to learn that one of the chooks she’d been tending all week had chickens (what we call chicks) that morning. She’d been concerned that she wasn’t going to be able to see them hatch, but the first had popped out just in time for her to see it. The others would probably hatch later that day.

We had no jobs today, we just waited as the time ticked by. Right after tea (remember, there was no tea; this was a snack break) we took some photos and said our goodbyes before one of our hosts drove us to the town of Northam, about 45 minutes away, to catch a train.

We stopped off for a brief, early lunch at one of the bakeries in town, where I had my first coffee in eight days. It wasn't very good coffee, but I was happy to have it.

We got over to the train station and checked in shortly before the Prospector (that's the name of the train) pulled into the station. We jumped on (it was a pretty nice train, complete with in-seat entertainment consoles) and zipped down the rails right into East Perth and the same station we'd left from last Thursday.

After a little scuffle in the taxi queue when a woman tried to cut to the front of the line and a kindly old gent yelled at her to get to the back of the line, we got ourselves a taxi and headed back to the welcoming arms of the Murray Hotel. Walking in the front door felt just like coming home.

We all showered, which was quite a luxury, then went out to get some proper coffee. Our target was a place called Lowdown, but we weren't going to get there before they closed, so we stopped in at a place called Grass (now closed), which was a juice and coffee place just up the road from the Murray. At that exact moment, in that city, clean, with my family and a good cup of coffee, I couldn't have been happier.

Then we picked up a few groceries for a light dinner and walked back to the hotel where we watched some television (we're going to miss those re-runs of Spicks and Specks), did a little planning for the Southeast Asian portion of the trip, and stayed up late — because we could.

Notable Statistics

• Hours in cars: 1.5

• Hours on a train: 1.5

• Taxis hired: 1

• Showers taken: 4

Header image: Northam Station, Northam, Western Australia