Hi to all

Well after reading Hayleys note and seeing it has been nearly a week since I updated this thought has better quickyl recap where we have been so far!!

After coming down from the blue mountains we headed South again and Emma spotted that we were only an hour away from another big thing so being the losers that we are we quickyl got off the motorway and started scouring the country for a large merino. It was literally the biggest fibergalss animal I have ever seen so was worth the hours of driving!!

As we walked away with heavy hearst at the thought of leaving this Australian wonder it occured to us that we were now halfway to Canberra and it we were truly going to experience Australia we should probably go and visit its Capital despite it being in the middle of flipping no where!

Canberra was definitely an experience but probably not one we would repeat. The few buildign that are there are pretty interesting and the national portraity gallery was great but it's as if they have all just been trhown down on a peice of land and they couldn't be bothered to put anything else around them - so no restaurants, bars, shops, culture etc - definitely not competing with London.

We then carried on heading South and went to a small town that I can't remember the name of where we met a really lovely family who had us round their fire for the night toasting marshmallows so that was great. We also discovered perhaps the greatest treasure that Australia has to offer - the jumping pillow! It';s like a cross between a huge bouncy castle and a trampoline put stretcehd over the ground and kept me and Em amused for hours - luckily it's winter and there are no kids around as according to the picture in the brochure it wasn't entirely meant for us :)

We're now in Melbourne for about a week which is a nice change as all teh travelling was getting a bit repetitive - we ahve to drop off Ramjet next monday so only a week left with our beloved van before we have to start socilaising with people again!!

Explored Melbopurne yesterday and went on their free trams all around the city - it is the most amazing place and will easily keep us entertained. The tousit info then mentioned to us that is we went down to the theatres a few hours before and put our names down they draw a raffle for cheap front row tickets to see Wicked. We figured seen as we were here for a week we could do it every day - however due to our holy experience in the morning (story to follow) God was pretty damn pleased wiht us and we won first time! Wicked was once again fabulouso - although there are some crazy fans here and too many people painted green for us to feel entirely comfortable. A family with two kids were queing up with us and managed to win 2 tickets. When 2 sat next to us and we realised the other half of the fmaily were sitting right up in the balcony we felt awful so gave them our tickets andf swapped. This moment of pure self sacrifice (also a little relieved to not be ont he front row) was a little runied when I knelt down to the little girl and asked her if she was excited and she informed me they had all ready seen it 3 times - I mean seriously we thought this a momentous family outing!!!

So.... after keeping you on tenterhooks - we decided to go and find Melbourne salvation Army yesterday am only to discover that it is run as community project and we were probably the onyl people in there who ahd a house. Some of congregation were lovely but we were pretty much ignored as everyone our age were volunteers dealing with the coolection of people around us who got up to tell us about their life time in prison, their drug addications , alcohol rpoblems and sometimes to simply shout at swear words at us. We were starting to think that maybe this hadn't been the best plan ever when a little old woman at the front got up to do the sermon as she turned out to be Eva Burrows!!! me and Em were very star struck and even more so when her sermon was about people that have influenced her and we learnt about her family and saw babi piccies etc - to be honest i'm pretty sure she would be comfortable with us calling her Aunty Eva now!!

Anyway, I think that's enough info for now - hope you are all doing ok.
We have gone past our half way point now but am definitely starting to crave home - considering jumping on a plane tomorrow so you are definitely not all forgotten.

Love to you all
Em xx