From Darwin I headed back to Sydney for my last week in Australia. Thanks to my brother being my brother, my first stop after arriving at the airport was the pub so I tucked straight into a few bevvies to re-establish myself into the Bondi way of life. It was great to settle back in with Tommy and all of his friends, who had been so welcoming and friendly last time I was there.

Lazily on my behalf, this time in Sydney was mostly about soaking up some sun on the beach and ensuring I had everything ready for the next leg of my journey. Which of course meant shopping. I do shopping well. Tommy kindly took me to the Moonlight Cinema, which is a large outdoor movie screen in the Bicentennial Park in the city. They rent out beanbags but we just took down some blankets, cushions and picnic supplies (wine), which served as more than adequate supplies to keep us comfortable through the film. The film, incidentally, was Top Gun, which I'd never seen before and turned out to be 90 minutes of cheesy, aviation-based homo-eroticism, which is always a bonus.

The highlight of the week was Playground Weekender, another festival that Tommy kindly booked tickets for. A few of us piled into Tommy's newly purchased camper van, along with a shed-load of camping equipment and hidden booze and headed off for the festival about 2 hours or so drive away. Naturally, we broke down at the first petrol station, which happened to be about 5 minutes from Tommy's flat. Luckily, we eventually managed to push start it and make our way onwards, only by this time it was about 5/6pm and we hit full on rush hour. After a few further push-starts and a hot, sticky queue on various highways, we rolled into the festival grounds about 10.30pm. Great effort. Oh, and the entrance into the festival was a bit of a nerve-wracking one, as you're not allowed to take booze in. Knowing this rule, we still had a few crates of beers, ciders, 4 boxes of wine, 5 bottles of vodka, mixers and 6 mini bottles of Moet squirreled precariously in the van. However, even though security searched the van, thanks to Deano's smooth talking and smoke and mirrors they found nothing and we trotted merrily into the camp site.

The festival was great, really relaxed and in beautiful settings next to a river and nestled amongst some beautiful hillsides. There's a pool and a couple of stages and dance areas. One of the biggest issues of the festival was the heat-wave that had been sweeping its was across the country. On our way to Playground we noted in the paper that on the Sunday New South Wales was set to be the hottest area in the world. THE WORLD. And I was at a music festival getting drunk. It was so hot (48 degrees) that we generally couldn't do anything except shuffle around from shady area to shady area before leaping into the pool (which needless to say was disgustingly brown by the second day) to cool down. Once the sun went down the fun could begin and we enjoyed catching the bands, including Cold War Kids, Primal Scream, The Streets and Tom Middleton. Unfortunately, many of the daytime bands we had hoped to see were abandoned in favour of generally not doing anything, so we didn't see many, but the ones we did see were good.

Saturday at Playground is fancy dress day and we all planned and executed our costumes. Tommy went as Hulk Hogan (girl's vest, handle-bar tash and blonde mullet wig) and I donned a rather fetching looking poncho fashioned out of a Twister mat. From the rest of our group Deano went as the Milky Bar Kid, Rhadi as Snow White and Chris - possibly the most controversial of us all - went as Metro Man, donning a unitard, thong and wig, with a rather unsubtle torch shoved down his tights to emphasise his package, and a delightful red handbag. For some reason this drew a series of reactions, ranging from intrigue - girls taking photos of his crotch - to general disgust - 'you're sick, man'. I generally found this quite amusing. Everyone at the festival made a huge effort though, and it was great fun to be out and about with a variety of characters, including unicorns, cheerleaders, bumblebees, babies and Jesus (still nailed to the cross). I'd like to point out that Jackie and Iain were boring and didn't dress up.

On Monday we attempted to leave, but thanks to further van issues didn't quite manage that until about 5pm either. As a result we were the only people left at the festival site whilst waiting for the vehicle repair services. This had huge benefits for scavenging, and various great left-over items were recovered, including a paddling pool, Indian head-dresses, walking canes, 5 chairs, wands, and a sofa (although we couldn't fit that in the van so it was left for another day).

So it was great to spend my final few days in Oz larging it up with my brother in the stinking heat of a great festival. I'm missing him heaps already, and loved seeing him. Especially as he spoiled me thoroughly by taking me out on trips, feeding me beer and generally creating fun. On the Tuesday it was up early, bag packed, and off to the airport for the next big adventure - off to South America, with no Spanish, heaps of nerves, and no idea of where I was going to stay. Great planning there Laura...