It is the 26th of December and time to say goodbye to Western Australia and return to the East Coast.

Check out time in all Australian residencies is 10am. You would think that packing up after just two days will be easy peasy, but unfortunately, it never is. We are flying from Perth to Brisbane at 5.15pm and each airline has its own rules and regulations about how much luggage you can take, how much extra luggage costs and how much each piece of luggage may weigh. Today we are flying with Virgin and every piece of luggage may only weigh 23 kilos. So, we are spending a good 60-90 minutes scavenging around our hotel room and redistributing stuff until everything is within airline limits. Oh, and we still had to dent out the car. But, everything is done by 9.30, so time to spare, a.k.a. check out an extra winery on our way to Perth!

Our wine guide has one more winery left in Margaret River we didn’t get to check out on the 24th, so we make our way to Cullen winery. According to their website they should open the day after Christmas, so good for us.

Unfortunately, it is not. Even tough the sign says so. The only thing we find there are a couple of Germans trying out their drone. We decide to wait for a couple of minutes to see if anything happens, but it doesn’t. Since we still have an unopened bottle left in our luggage to ensure we won’t get thirsty tonight, we take our loss and drive on to Perth.

In Perth we meet up with mr. Scientist’s aunt and uncle for lunch (and to return their GPS we thankfully got to borrow). It is good to see them again! It has only been a couple of days since we met them and last saw them, but already feels like a warm return! Thankfully this sentiment goes both ways. We are overloaded with salads and sweets and after a good hour, I again feel like that Christmas cracker ready to pop. I tell them of my plans to visit them again next year and they don’t even seem to mind!

After that our next stop is the airport, from where we fly to Brisbane.

Upon arrival we take an Uber to our booked apartment. The reception is closed, but there is a safe in which our key should be. In order to obtain it, all we have to do is call a number to get the code to the safe. Some discussion evolves between mr. Scientist and the phone operator about whether or not we actually have a reservation, but the other end eventually caves in, we put in the code and there is our key. Good, because by that time it is after 12 o’clock and not the best time to look for alternative options. The apartment is huge, modern, has a swimming pool, washing machine (which excites me even more at this stage) and a large kitchen. Great starting point to hit the East Coast, but this time up instead of down.