PERTH, Australia – Forget long-winded foreign policy sessions, White House meetings, traveling the globe and talks with world leaders. What Condoleezza Rice really wants to do is shop.

In western Australia on Friday, the secretary of state told a group of teenage girls that she couldn't wait to get back to the boutiques of northern California once she leaves office at the end of President Bush's second term in January.

“I love to shop ... but now I don't have much time,” she told an audience at the all-girls Mercedes College in Perth, where she is visiting the hometown of Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith whose daughter attends the private high school.

“I'm looking forward to getting back to shopping,” Rice said, recalling how fondly she and her mother “hit the stores” every Sunday morning after church when she was a child.

“It's a great pastime, shopping. I love it, even if I don't buy anything. I just love going to the stores to look,” she said, noting with mock dismay that her apartment near Stanford University is just five minutes from a local mall.

Her comments came during a question-and-answer session with Smith at which Rice also offered advice on life and career to the girls, telling them to explore the world to find their passion and follow it. “Your horizons should be limitless at this point,” she said.