Sydney

Good flight Chrsitchurch to Sydney but awful to leave Spook behind. We have never gone through that before. but the children absorb things well. Finn did try the 'trouble teenager of single mum' routine. I had to nip that in the bud pretty quick, but the customs must have thought I was a hippy single mum with colourful clothing and bedraggled look as I got a thorough search and drug 'wipe' - not of anything too personal, you understand.
WE have about 3 hours to kill here and the kids would love to be able to get outside and feel Australia, but that is not an option. We had a horrible thought that we had to go via Bankok as well as Dubai, but that was just a continuation of the flight that we left in Sydney. We just have a 14.5 hour flight to Dubai, so suddenly that seems a breeze. We have the chill pills, so fingers crossed we will wake up in time for breakfast. It does feel uncomfortable to be putting more and more distance between us and Spook but once we all settle where we are meant to be just now, it will be fine. He got back to Wanaka around 8.15pm his time, so that wasn't too bad after a 6.30am start. Not to mention the 2am awakening. He has 2 days to recover now and get out running and cycling as well as packing all the things we couldn't take. In a magnificent gesture of selflessness, Meg handed over her bag of 'teenage girl' things as we were 7kg over. By the time we get on this next flight, it will be about 1am. The children will do well to be civil by that stage.
They are so ready to be home now, though it was very painful driving out of Wanaka.