Having sauntered through Asia with nary a disaster or calamity, our defences were definitely lowered by the time we breezily checked in at Denpasar airport for our flight to civilisation. Perhaps that's why we were mildly shocked to find our entry to the departure gates impeded by the fact we appeared to have forgotten to get a visa for Australia.

Gulp. What an oversight. Brian immediately launched into his colonial defensive approach by pointing out regally that he had, in fact, visited Australia previously and had, at no time, been asked for a visa, perhaps the young woman would care to re-check her facts in light of the fact that we were ENGLISH? Meanwhile I was standing next to him thinking, 'Visa? We need a visa? That rings a bell….. perhaps she has a point, I do vaguely remember something about visas when I've been there before, now what was it?' Slowly it dawned on us that she might actually have a point. Indeed, and incredibly for Brian to comprehend, she was right. Sweetly she offered some advice, we could go out of the airport, find an internet café and maybe, just maybe, get an instant visa online. The only drawback was it was 9p.m. and we had less than two hours before our flight left, with little chance of getting on another one this side of Christmas and equally little chance of getting a decent hotel room. On top of which we had already booked and pre-paid our hotel room in Sydney over New Year at the cost of hundreds of pounds, none of which was refundable. Imagine the anguish.

We scurried out grim-faced, and after a few wrong turns found the internet café and logged onto the less than helpful immigration site to find that a visa 'could take up to two weeks to be approved' and that the first thing they wanted was our credit card details. Obviously we didn't have two hours, never mind two weeks so, as a last resort I rang Trailfinders in London (luckily still open as they were 8 or 9 hours behind us) to see if we could change our flights to go straight to New Zealand and only transit in Sydney if we couldn't arrange our visas. To my surprise they authorised our visas straightaway for about 18 quid and gratefully throwing our last wads of Indonesian rupiahs at the very happy internet staff we galloped along to the now deserted check in desk where they were not only holding the gate open for us but already knew about our visa success. What a system!

Laughing and sobbing with relief we ran through security and customs and onto the plane and were almost tempted to order a celebratory bottle of champagne before we came to our senses and toasted our immense good fortune by eating half a kit-kat, watching Ratatouille and falling asleep half-way through the film.

In Sydney we first stayed in Avalon with the lovely Neela and Pete and their daughter, Maya, and twin sons Rishi and Jai. Bri got on particularly well with the boys and even participated in that most primeval of male rituals, the aussie beach barby, without stuffing it up. Within the first few minutes of our arrival Neela provided us with what we have been seeking for the past 3 months - not only a nice cup of tea but also the official Best Biscuit in the World; a TimTam. So good I had to have two and would have made it three if Brian had not whipped the packet away while my hands were still full of chocolate crumbs.

We spent the last few days in central Sydney to catch the famous New Years Eve firework display - it was fantastic, but quite a few other people had had the same idea so it was a trifle busy. 1 million people watched the display of which apparently a third were from the UK. The rest appeared to be Japanese. Allegedly there were a couple of aussies there, but they got lost in the crush. Great display though - fireworks were going off all around us - at many points, it was hard to know where to look next.

On our last day in Sydney we went ring shopping. We started in Tiffany's, which I was very taken with especially as they weren't vulgar enough to actually display any prices. What a lovely shop. Unfortunately Brian didn't share my enthusiasm and came over a bit faint a few moments after entering and we were forced to leave. He claims it was the heat. We did end up buying a most gorgeous diamond ring though (hurrah) with which I am very delighted. Brian was equally delighted when he discovered we could claim back 10% of the cost when we flew out the next day. Sometimes Tourism pays.