Melbourne, Australia

Monday 14th January

Sleep was limited last night, thanks to what I first thought to be the kid in the tent next door with respiratory issues. At 4am I woke to the most obscure snoring I'd ever heard & it kept up for at least 20 minutes without changing, so I shimmied out of bed to look out the window & saw 4 kangaroos sleeping within 10 feet of our van. As I wiped the condensation away from the window it made a squeaking sound on the glass & the snoring culprit was startled enough to move away from the van thankfully!!!

As I didn't sleep well I showered early & cooked up some egg & bacon before Carly was even considering waking up. It worked out well though because we were on the road nice & early, heading North to Melbourne.

The drive was a nice one, very windy ocean front roads with low speed limits so we could take in the sights easily enough. I was feeling some pain in my right foot yesterday evening & it was worse today so driving was a little uncomfortable & walking was plain difficult but it eased the more I used it throughout the day.

By late afternoon we had driven beyond Melbourne CBD thanks to Carlys map reading skills, avoiding all toll roads & not making a single wrong turn along the way. We popped into Chadstone Shopping Centre, Carlys place of work on our last visit, to see if we could find any footwear (we need some desperately) & maybe a house warming gift for Ry & Steph. Neither went well but we did get a Hungry Jacks for lunch! From here it was a familiar drive past my place of work from our last visit, through the town we lived in with Arlene & up to Emerald where Ryan & Steph live with their Labrador puppy, Darcy.

We grabbed 60 bottles of beer from the bottle shop & headed along the only main road in town which led straight to their house. Somehow we travelled 15km in the wrong direction & ended up in the Yarra mountain ranges! We turned around & arrived at their house 20 minutes later. We were welcomed by an unsteady, bounding Darcy & Ryan.

A quick tour of their amazing house before crashing on the sofa & taking in some of the Australian Open which is currently on right here in Melbourne (we should be going to the Rod Laver Arena next week to watch it, see Andy Murray maybe). When Steph arrived home we had a massive catch up & crashed early after a long day & a huge spag bol courtesy of chef Ryan!

Tuesday 15th January

Today my foot was agony. It stiffened up last night & the other 3 were laughing at my stupid limp! We decided that it was bad enough for a trip to the hospital & Ry very kindly drove us & waited for 4 hours while they poked, prodded, xrayed & then sent me on my way with the diagnosis that I half expected - tendinitis. At least he had the tennis & Carly to keep him entertained. While we were at the hospital, Darcy had escaped the laundry room & proceeded to chew all the cables he could get his teeth into. This included their Ipad charger & our laptop charger! He's too cute to be angry at though!

Steph picked up some crutches for me from her parents house & we went out in the town for dinner. We had the best food we've had since coming away, I had the kangaroo steak, of course & Carly went for a pizza. It was amazing!!

Wednesday 16th January

Today it was as though my foot had been replaced. I could walk almost freely & the swelling was gone, happy days. We went to Fountain Gate which is a huge shopping Centre quite close to where we are staying. We were after a new laptop charger & some footwear again.

We left with neither again because we figured it'd be cheaper to do it online so we came home & did that instead.

We also prepped the car for sale, gave him a wash & cleaned the inside up before taking photos & posting them online. Fingers crossed we get some interest.

We were treated by our hosts, to home delivered pizza & ciders on the deck this evening which went down a treat!