After three months, I’ve finally left Port Douglas.

I’ve had to say goodbye to a lot of great people and places during my travels in Australia, but this was by far the hardest, because it wasn’t just a person or place.

It was home.

My time in the tropical village definitely had it’s ups and downs, but included more laughter than tears and sun than rain.

With Alex and big brother Joe at a secret beach we found on a road trip to Mossman Gorge.

As with most things in my life, it was a “sign” that brought me to Port Douglas. I ran into an acquaintance on the street in Cairns who offered me work. Short on cash and at the end of my two-month blogging journey up the east coast with The Word, I took up the opportunity without hesitation.

It was extremely hard saying goodbye to my other half, Bobbi-Jo, but at that point we were both kind of clueless as to what we should do next and sitting in a desolate Cairns became more and more unappealing by the minute.

There were some opportunities for me elsewhere, but I decided to follow what seemed to be the easiest place to make quick cash. I came to the town looking to do only that. After two months of dealing with, “what’s your name” and “where are you from” on the reg, I was a bit tired of introductions and just wanted to not be new or meet anyone new for awhile.

This mentality led to a disastrous first month in my new home in regards to both work and relationships. By the end of June I was starting to doubt my belief in “signs,” which has pretty much guided me through most of my life. I regretted following my pockets instead of my heart and I was even thinking of packing my things and leaving.

An easy thought when you’re on the road, I laid in bed a few nights planning out the logistics of where would be easiest place to escape to next. Determined not to leave the town uttering the word “mistake,” I decided to stick it out until my originally planned departure date, which was August 16.

Things got better, then they got worse. I couldn’t figure out how to make everything right  again and go back to being my normal happy self.

During a conversation with a friend on the couch at Iron Bar, he said, “Bobbi, you have to simplify things.”

I started to think about everything on my shoulders at that point. The unusual dramas of my new life magnified by the fact that I was miles and miles away from the place where I feel safest and most at ease. Then I took things apart.

The major issue in my unhappiness there was the thing that led me there to begin with, a job. A job I didn’t even care about, nor was right for. Once that was out of the picture it was as if everything was right in the world again. I found new work, waitressing at restaurant on Macrossan Street and freelancing at the local newspaper.

Throughout all my struggles, it was strangers that came to my aid without hesitation or complaint. Strangers that became friends and friends that became family.

My Dorcey horey and James acting tough.

After all the drama dissipated, I saw Port Douglas for what it was, paradise, and the people in it for what they were, perfect. It’s hard to believe that 20-somethings could manage to live in such a spectacular place, but we did. Leaving it for a big city, something I was eager to do a month in, was not easy.

In a modern art class I took in college I learned about Ernst Kirchner’s painting “Street, Dresden.” The colorful painting depicts a busy city street, full of action and people. Yet there’s something unsettling and cold about it. According to the MOMA website, Kirchner painted the people’s faces to look like masks with vacant eyes to show the alienation and loneliness of modernization in the city at that time.

When I first learned about the painting, I understood his thought behind it, but I couldn’t relate. Living only 20 minutes from Philadelphia, in the busy suburbs of also New York City and Washington D.C., I always felt at home in the city and at ease surrounded by people.

After leaving Port Douglas and arriving in Brisbane earlier this week, I finally understand Kirchner’s feelings about Dresden.

To say Port Douglas is a small town is an understatement. There is one main street (Macrossan) where I could find not everything I wanted, but everything I needed (Tim Tams, pizza and chai), I couldn’t walk down the street without bumping into someone I knew and I had a coffee shop where the owners knew me by name and drink. The town is safe enough to leave a purse on the counter and run to the toilets and clean enough to never have to wear shoes.

Brisbane isn’t the biggest city by any standards, yet I feel completely lost here. Seeing me the first day here, people would never guess I came from the northeast America. It took me three times circling the same block to find the street I’m staying on. I almost got hit by at least four cars. I even got lost in a mall, which is shocking considering I’ve spent the majority of the last 20 years of my life in various malls.

I can’t think of Port Douglas as a place anymore, but rather a time. One that is definitely in the top greatest of my life and one that I’ll never be able to recreate. Everyone in the town is so friendly and welcoming. Everyone in my hostel was so caring and open. We shared some wonderful moments together and while I know I’ll share more with those people individually, it will never be everyone and it will never be like what I just left. That’s one of the worst aspects of living abroad. The groups that form include people from all parts of the world, making it hard to reunite that same group again.

Life in Port Douglas was like a crazy camp where there were no wake up calls, booze was encouraged and people could get away with sneaking into the opposite sex’s tent.

I complained about it being too small. I complained about it being too loud. I complained about being sick of Iron Bar. But sitting in my own room, in a large city with tons of different bars filled with tons of different people, I miss home.

In fact, I’m feeling really homesick for the first time in about three years and for the first time ever about a place other than my normal home.

My love for the town and the people in it has led me to book a return flight in September. It won’t be as long a stay and it won’t be the same Port Douglas as a lot of people are scheduled to leave before then, but a lot of the reasons that made the town special to me will still be there.

And I know that will make me feel like I’m coming home for the first time in a long time.