Well here we are. After much wandering we have arrived in Adelaide and are installed in St Oswald's Rectory complete with Rupert the Rectory Dog who is of the opinion that we have travelled all this way just to play ball with him.

 The flights were long but everything went well - Singapore Airlines certainly lived up to  their excellent reputation. Good leg room and super food.  Our day in Singapore was an experience - it was 27 degrees when we landed there at 7:30am and it got hotter and hotter as the day went on. We travelled into town on the train and did the tourist bus thing... it had air con so we were reluctant to get off!

We had breakfast at Raffles just so we could say that we had breakfast at Raffles - but as it was so early e gave the Singapore Sling a miss. We visited the Botanical Gardens but by the afternoon it was soooo hot and humid and we were exhausted so we didn't wander too much. We visited the Cathedral but were unimpressed.(Graham says to add that is putting it mildly!) We ended up back at the airport by about 5pm - lovely and cool in there! We left there at about 11pm and arrived in Adelaide at 8am, there had been so many time changes during the journey that we have no idea really how long it all took!  We were met by the church wardens, Kathy and Tony. Tony was brought up in Bedfordshire and knew Elstow Abbey, my first parish, well - that's some co-incidence!  David and Deborah have welcomed us into their home and are so disappointed that they've has to cancel their plans to visit UK.  David has been really ill but is beginning to recover - they leave on Monday for their Beach House.  The Rectory is lovely - big and old with really high ceilings and Rupert and his ball are keeping us occupied.  We have walked into the city looking for coffee shops (Karen and Kathyrn we've found plenty!) and Graham has found the local store so we know were to go for provisions.  We went and found the sea this afternoon at Glenelg - looks like a place we'll want to go back to.  In the morning we will go to church and will be able to sit in a pew which will be a nice change - then they are having a parish lunch to welcome us.  I have already noticed their 'children should be seen and heard' policy and the activity tables at the FRONT of the church and it will be good to see how that work tomorrow.  It's been a lovely day and so far no probs with jet lag - we are just about to have a BBQ, I expect the first of many. Then we will have to decide whether to stay up til 00:30 to watch the coverage of the Cup Final........as if there is a choice
For St Cuthberts folk ....our hosts were delighted with the slate cross which arrived in one piece.