Prince William flew out of Melbourne, Australia,
after a draining five-day visit to New Zealand and Australia.
One of the Prince's aides said he had found the trip incredibly moving and "emotionally
raw".
"He has been very touched and humbled by what he has seen because these
communities have lost everything and the way they have stuck together and
looked after one another is genuinely a lesson to all of us," he said.
"But everywhere he's gone he has seen a lot of resilience and good
humour.
"He's very pleased and honoured to have been able to come and meet so
many people in some quite hard to reach communities."
At his final stop of the tour, in the rural town of Murrabit that fell victim
to the massive floods that swept across the south eastern state of Victoria
in January, the cumulative affect of all the misery on the Prince was
evident.
While being shown photographs of the severe flooding by residents of the
region, the Prince said he wished he was visiting in happier times.
As he listened to the story of the Griffiths family, whose pig farm was
inundated for by six foot-deep water for weeks, he said the images were
awful.
"It's so sad you're having to show me pictures of your houses in the
water, rather than happy family snaps," he said to Rod Griffiths, 43.
Asked by Lindsay Shultz, the region's chief flood warden, if he was enjoying
his visit to the small rural town he said he had "seen a lot of water
in a lot of places in the last few days."
"It's nice to see everyone and try to raise some smiles," he said.
"I wanted to let you know that you've not been forgotten about, onwards
and upwards, you've got a great community spirit."
In Kerang, he stopped to talk to Sid Hutchinson, 55, whose house was badly
flooded.
"I told him we were evacuated for a week. The scary part was being close
to your home but not able to get to it," he said.
The Prince sympathised.
"They showed me pictures of the water in Kerang, it was incredible,"
he said.
"Let's hope it doesn't come back again, I hope we can keep the sun
shining for you."
The day in rural Victoria came after he met the family of Jordan Rice, the boy
who was swept to his death as flash floods hit the town of Grantham in
Queensland. Earlier in the trip he visited tourist towns in far north
Queensland which had been hit by the category five Cyclone Yasi.
The start of the tour was Christchurch in New Zealand, where the Prince made a
speech at a memorial for the more than 160 people who died when an
earthquake struck the city last month.
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