For once, Devon did not farewell
me with blue skies and fluffy white clouds and fluffier white sheep scattered
on a carpet of rolling green. Darkness and wind and menacing cloudbursts
accompanied the passage of dawn along the A38 and onto the M5. My final
footsteps on English soil, for now, were along the sodden tarmac of Bristol
airport, urging the cattle onto the plane and out of the rain and towards Geneva.
In the tumult I dropped my passport – no, even scarier, passports – without
knowing about it. Somewhere between aisle 2 and 3 I reckon, recovered by the
air stewards and pronounced out loud. Call button pressed, gratitude expressed.
Geneva and its French environs were more bronze in grey lake cloud,
a backdrop to stock up on cheese and cake and final family time. A bright and
brisk Saturday morning was fine for some neutral ambling in the stylishly
rustic Swiss countryside, dodging blade runners and cross country concrete
skiers and tractors and little boys fleeing on scooters. Dinner was
tartiflette, but then dinner usually is tartiflette!
The Sunday was a lazy Sunday French
style, involving hours of food grazing and gorging on cheese in various states,
matching with wines from different parts of the country and conversation from
different parts of the planet. From very young cousins to the more
senior-oriented, a splendid afternoon and a fine way to say goodbye, even if such
times make that even harder.
Not quite the end for me and my exploring
however as my very last day in Europe involved spending a lot of time on a bus
which should have been a train to propel me to the visual feasts of Annecy. Wandering the lanes and streets
as a grey cold gradually lifted, soaking up a very different ambience, a very
different backdrop to where I would soon be heading. From Rue des Chateaus to
Quiche aux lardons et fromage, past outdoor stalls selling musty old sausages
and caravans of unpasteurised cheese, alongside riverside paths lined with
shuttered houses and glowing red leaves, this was the time to soak it all up.
It was also the time to marvel in
the landscape of this part of the world which is unlike any I would soon
encounter. Escaping the town proved something of an uphill challenge but soon
enough I entered the absolute golden delight of the Foret du Cret du Maure. Now
sunny and warming up, strenuous work ensued in an effort to find an overview of
Lac d’Annecy and not get lost. Thanks to my phone and maps I didn’t get lost,
but apart from a few snatches through the trees, a lake view escaped me. Still,
having really enjoyed the subtle, colourful transition from summer to winter
over the past few months it was quite wonderful to end it in such a dense explosion
of green and yellow and red and brown.
Back down at lake level the water was much more visible
and, now in the latter part of these shortening days, glowing in the clear
afternoon air. This is not a landscape I will see for a while, the lake as
clear as a coral sea, the mountains snow-capped white as a pristine beach. An
aspect warmly regarded with coats and scarves and hats strolling along a
genteel, contented promenade...
...the local time is 5:30pm and the temperature is 35
degrees. So said someone several many hours later in a different hemisphere and
season. Welcome to Perth, where the
international terminal currently leaves much to be desired. Still, it is
Australia and I can be welcomed in with my Australian passport that so nearly
went astray. There is a new government but, apart from being significantly
warmer, much appears the same as I left it. Taxi drivers still wittle on
aimlessly about the toll road or monarchy or carbon tax, everything is still
ridiculously expensive, and Perth is still some urban lifestyle paradise
masquerading as a city.
And so to the beach, or to several beaches, or
stretches of one long beach over the course of the next two weeks. With a
coffee or book or a huge plate of calamari, accompanying a stroll along the
waterline, never far from the mind and just fifteen minutes from the body in a
car. Goodness me, these Perthites are blessed with their ocean frontage. What
is great about it mind is that it is rarely built up; no graffitied Gold Coast
hotels casting morning shadows, no regimented wooden loungers and parasols for
hire and cheap fake watches for sale, and plenty of space for dunes and
parkland between the sea and the expensive show off homes.
With baking days and arid winds it seems I have missed Spring
completely. There is little sign of the much heralded wildflowers of WA on
sight around the city’s parks and reserves; even Kings Park, which remains a
delight whatever time of day and year, seems fairly subdued as it accepts its
fate of another hot, dry summer. However, there are remnants of suburban Jacaranda
lining the streets; having spent springs past in Canberra I had totally
forgotten about Jacaranda, and how its elegant green leaves burst into purple
flower, transforming quiet streets into a flurry of colour and giving them the
smell of a new age essential oils and pointless candles shop.
Not every day has involved
lolloping on the beach or sniffing trees, as I gradually reorient myself with
the more mundane Australia – from work interludes to soulless shopping malls,
from slower internet speeds to expensive, but lush, mangoes. A sign that I have
been away a long time is in currency, where I say to myself...oh gosh...that Heston Blumenthal Christmas
Pudding is twenty-five quid...blimey...oh wait twenty five dollars, that makes
it, well, still quite expensive, but, you know, when shopping for essentials
for a trip back across Australia you need a Heston Blumenthal Christmas Pudding
with you, along with Marmite, Hellman’s Mayonnaise and Heinz English Recipe
Baked Beans. Adjusted much?
And yes indeed part of my time has
involved planning the next steps of this journey through life, at least the
next few weeks or so. There is an excitement about returning east, tinged with
melancholy of letting go of this isolated idyll of the west. Perth and I have
become good friends this year and I feel like we will see each other again
sometime in due course. And here I leave even better friends who introduced me
to my good mate and nurtured and shared and entertained and sledged and made
the whole Perth experience easy to fall in love with. So I prefer to think it’s
not farewell old chap nor au revoir, but a very Australian see ya later.
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