After leaving New Zealand and the cold and the wet we headed for the South Pacific and the Islands of Fiji. Our first stop was to the main island Viti Levu and the main tourist city Nadi, we were met at the airport with the traditional welcome (lots of singing and people shouting bula, bula) and given a beautiful shell lei. Trying to get money was a bit of a nightmare as none of the cash machines at the airport were working and as we had to pay for the hotel we were starting to panic. After a quick transfer and stop at a cash machine in the city that worked we were taken to our hotel.

We spent a couple of days lounging by the pool and soaking up the sun, even though the hotel was called "The Beachside" the beach was quite a trek and was sludgy sand with brown water! So not very appetizing

We met an interesting lady here called Sarah, who is from in the California she was staying in Fiji getting her teeth fixed. A very brave woman who was forever trying to stop her new teeth falling out! As we were the only three people staying in the property we spent a lot of the time together. She drove us into the city so we could go shopping which was fun and we needed more eczema cream as the stuff we had bought in New Zealand had been confiscated by customs.

From NadI we travelled down to the South Cost and had a great few days. The beach here was better with great snorkelling and had great food and pool so we were like pigs in mud.

We then travelled to Latouka and spent and interesting time. After moving rooms three times, we eventually got a good room and a free night to make up for the hassle we had. Luckily the food here was really poor, not a good thing on the surface but with what was to come it gave us the practice we were going to need. The pool here was huge and there was a bit of a beach with kayaking, which we did try but for safety reasons we only stayed in the shallow.

We then caught the ferry to travel away from the main island and to a little island called Nacula. Approaching the island was jaw dropping. It truly looked like something out of a shipwreck movie. In fact we felt shipwrecked at times!

We stayed at The Oarsman which was a resort owned by a local tribal village. The rooms were basic and dirty, the food terrible, so bad that most of the guests and some staff all got food poisoning. This was the only place on the islands to eat and it had no shops or anything that most people would need. They ran out of water and we had to wait two days for them to get a delivery, this wasn't good as it was over 40C everyday and all they had to offer was beer and diet coke. The staff were so lazy all they seemed interested in was getting completely stoned in the evenings. Meal times were set and you were summonsed by a bell and if you didn't get there within a few minutes there would be no food. The only up side was the other people staying there who were great. On the upside we had a week of being by the most gorgeous beach in the world whilst having the chance to visit the local village to learn more about the local customs. The tales we could tell about how bad the place was, would run on page after page.

Every night was cards night, organised by the guests as again the staff were to lazy to move there backsides into doing anything even though it was advertised that there was evening entertainment. The teams were made up of countries competing for rubicub champion. We won one night for Team UK, so well done us.

Andy B spent a great afternoon at the school prize giving. It was great to see the village chief handing out the awards to the children. There was a lot of celebrating and the children put on great performances. Whilst Andy B was out having fun, Andrew D was stuck at the shed losing his stomach lining as I was one of the lucky ones with food poisoning.

Fiji was great fun and generally the people were great and were pleased tourists were going to their country as there had been a military cue a few weeks earlier and a lot of international tourists were staying away.

It was onwards and another flight was calling and we had to continue our trip round the globe. Our next stop was California and Disneyland in the rain. We stayed in a rough motel with a mad man in the room next door shouting at all hours. The motel was thankfully really close to the main Disney entrance and as we didn't have a car it was just suitable. We spent a really fun 10days in and out of Disneyland and Universal Studios

It was then time to hit the road and head off for San Diego. San Diego is a great city but unfortunately in an effort to save money we stayed in a city outside of San Diego near the border of Mexico. It was the sort of place you didn't venture out after dark! Luckily we could run to our car and explore San Diego. Sea World was fun and the Zoo was good.

We then headed for Palm Springs and stayed at a great Travel Lodge enjoying the balmy sunshine and swimming pools. Palm Springs felt a lot safer after Chula Visa (where we stayed near San Diego) so it was good to be able to go out after dark as Palm Springs main street is great. The city is the playground for the rich and famous and it has price tags to match. Being the careful travellers we are, we found a really good restaurant that wasn't a Pizza Hut so we didn't starve.

Leaving Palm Springs it was time to head to Vegas for Christmas. Las Vegas is the best fun and certainly the city of sin. Christmas kind of came and went and we didn't really notice. Las Vegas carried on the same. We spent hours going up and down the strip stopping at all the casinos. Luckily we kept our shirts, in fact we did gamble a little money and actually left Vegas ahead. We viewed all the main hotels in both downtown and the main strip. We decided we wanted to go and see some shows as this is what the city is famous for. In an effort to save money we went on a time share presentation to get some free tickets for Phantom. These tickets were the hardest things we had ever earned and I would never go to a timeshare event again no matter what they were offering.

We then headed to LA city for New Years. We decided to travel by bus which took forever! LA was great fun and it was awesome to see Hollywood, Rodeo Drive and Venice Beach.

We have spent the last two weeks in Florida thinking we could soak up the sun. Unfortunately Florida has had freezing temperatures which is a first.

We come home on Thursday and we are both looking forward to catching up with family and friends. Can't believe it is almost at an end but at the same time feel totally satisfied with out trip and looking forward to Summer in the good old UK!

Thanks for reading these updates over the last 12 months, sorry this one is short and a bit vague. We have both experienced some very big ups and a couple of monster downs.

Overall things have been better than we ever thought they could be. We have seen things that we could only dream about, the dolphins at Byron Bay, the mountains in New Zealand, the temples in Asia, F1 in KL, the list goes on and if we could turn the clock back and do it all again we both agree that we would say a massive yes, BRING IT ON!!!!!