Massive slackness on blog-typing! Christmas and New Year's were fantastic. In a nutshell...... Auckland, wine tours, Skytower and Waitomo Caves were stunning (thanks Keiko & Haruhisa), Whangarei and Bay of Islands were stunning- fishing for snapper, boat trips to Bay of Islands including hammerhead shark and dolphin sightings, spotlight hunting (thanks John and Jenny Waterhouse), coast and countryside of Wellington, including clay pigeon shooting and crayfish...

What a fantastic New Year! Was collected by Justin Verco at the airport in Sydney and taken to his lovely parents' apartment overlooking Sydney Harbour Bridge. They took us out for a lovely Thai meal on our first night. On New Year's Eve, we helped prepare the apartment for Justin's party. A decent group turned up in the evening and we greeted New Year with Sydney Harbour Bridge fireworks. Justin took us out to some of Sydney's most beautiful beaches including M...

Spent a few days thoroughly enjoying Melbourne. This is probably our favourite city so far! Our hostel was a short walk from the centre and we loved the cosmopolitan feel to the place. The sushi restaurants were excellent too. We managed to run through the beautiful parks and botanical gardens and also to have some picnics. Met up with Emma Stevens (who we'd met in Honduras) and she showed us around her city. We also visited Healesville Wildlife Sanctuary, seeing...

Brad and Tiff met us at Wellington Airport and took us to Gareth and Amanda's lovely apartment where we had a barbecue dinner. We also went cray fishing with Gareth. The next day we met Brad and were driven to his parents' house in preparation for the christening of baby Lily. The house felt more like a mansion and had its very own grass court tennis court. They all made us feel so welcome. Spent Christmas Day there in the sunshine and had a barbecue. Crayfish! ...

We were collected from Whangarei Airport by the lovely Jenny Waterhouse and taken for a trip up the coast (meeting John on the way), where we were taken up to Whangaroa Harbour and onto their boat to stay in the wilderness for the night along with some of their family members. After doing a scary climb in the morning (with stunning views over the Harbour), we were taken to their 'batch' which overlooked a stunning beach. We met up with Andrew and Ann Fraser (from...