Today was the day we met Claire's family! It had all been very last minute and quite out of the blue - since we weren't even sure if the lady we had been asked to locate would still be in Perth or not, and so to have her arrange a whole day out for us was brilliant! With the help of a family tree, we worked out that Aunt Lena, now 88 years old, was the sister of Claire's great-grandmother, so Claire's great great Aunt.

Like the day out with Liam's family, we arranged to be picked up from Cockburn Central train station, which is quite far out from Perth. Jackie (Lena's daughter) had told us on the phone that they lived on a 5 acre plot away from the nearest bus route - but we weren't prepared for how self-sufficient and remote their home actually was! Jackie and Colin, like Susan and Liam's family, were incredibly friendly and really welcoming. They berated us for not ringing sooner and stopping for longer, but we were soon told all about Jackie's daughter Celeste's new born baby Findlay... phew! Lots of family to meet, as well as Mark, Celeste's husband. Mark builds boats for a living and Liam was taken outside and shown his workshop, as well as the skeleton of a half finished project in the making. Soon we were ushered back into the car and taken back to Jackie's own house, complete with a tour around their huge allotment (think banana trees, limes, oranges, lemons, pears, vegetables... everything), their pool and finally their boat!!! Turned out Colin was a bit of a dab hand at making things - he built much of the house and too had his own workshop in the back.

Because we'd never been fishing before, Jackie decided it would be a wise idea just to go out on the boat for a tour, rather than a whole day at sea. We were taken around the seal islands, right up close to the shore where they were sunbathing, then had a picnic bobbing around Garden island (near Rottnest). From the sea, we saw some dolphins of the coast, as well as Cormorants, fish and loads of jellies! Jackie and Colin were absolutely lovely - we got on really well and they made us promise to ring in advance whenever we wanted to come back!

On the afternoon it was time to go and see Aunt Lena. Claire was really excited as her Grandma back home had been so hopeful to find her. She was waiting for us by the door when we got there, and to our surprise had been rooting through old family photos to show us! We saw some absolute corkers - ones we'd never seen, of Graeme and his sisters when he was a teenager and younger, of Pop and even Blackie the dog! We were especially excited to see tiny photos of George, a cousin who lived in America, when he'd come over to the UK years and years ago. Lena looked really well, despite being 88 (something in the air I'm sure) - she actually ran to the bus stop to drop us off faster than we ran! It was a really great day, bizarre, but wonderful.