We can now fully update you on what we have been up to since arriving in Sydney, which has all been a bit of a whirlwind!

We arrived at Hayley and Gary's house on 3rd April, two days after Hayley's accident to find it in quite a smoke stained state and to learn some details of what had happened and what state Hayley was actually in! Gary had of course tried not to worry us when we spoke to him in New Zealand, but finally in Sydney he could explain what we should expect when we got to see her.

Hayley had gone into the workshop at the front of the house, and had seen that petrol was all over the floor and then noticed an extension lead on the floor in the petrol. She thought to herself that it was a bit dangerous and so picked it up and unplugged a plug that was connected to it. That sparked and caused the explosion! Because she was standing in the petrol her legs were the worse effected area, and she was only wearing a pair of shorts and a jumper.

Hayley had received 45% burns to her body, with full thickness burns (3rd degree burns) to the lower half of her legs which required skin grafts, partial thickness burns (2nd degree burns) to her lower arms and hands, and superficial burns to her face and chest. Due to fears about the smoke effects on her lungs, and because of the pain her body was going to experience, Hayley was put into a medically induced coma for two days.

Her surgery took place on the Monday and so the earliest that we could go and see her was on the Tuesday.

Walking into her room in intensive care was one of the hardest things we have ever had to do. Hayley was awake and a little responsive when we first arrived and could see that Sasha had arrived and so very brave happy faces had to be planted on our faces. Hayley was bandaged from head to toe, with biobrane all over her face. Due to the mixture of drugs she was on (morphine, midazolam and ketamine) she was constantly in and out of consiousness, but mostly out of it!!

The following day she was much brighter and much more responsive, and after having her throat checked after the breathing tube had been removed was allowed to start drinking water, however she asked a number of times if she could have wine instead!! After just half an hour with her we had to leave as they wanted to change all of her lines as she has a bit of a blood infection and wanted to make sure it was nothing from all the tubes etc. But they did say that it's very common, and to be expected from time to time.

The next morning we were pretty hopeful that she was back on track as Gary received a phone call from the hospital asking if her handbag was at home! It turns out that she had spent most of the night constantly asking the nurses to get her her handbag as she knew she had brought it with her, which of course she hadn't! Gary asked if they wanted him to go in for her, and they then said hang on, we'll put the call through to the room. The nurse then answered the call and the next thing we know is the nurse is dragging Hayley's bed across the room to the phone! Hayley then asked Gary for her mobile, purse, some clothes that she can put on as she wanted to come home and she wanted to go to Bondi!! We haven't the faintest idea what or who is at Bondi that would make her want to go!!

So feeling optimistic Gary heads up to the hospital to get there for midday and finds himself sitting in the waiting room for two hours as they are changing all her dressings! They then tell him it's going to be about another hour so he came home and Ol and I went up! We got there about 3:15pm and she was totally out of it. The nurse explained that today had been a really bad pain day for her and that the changing of the dressings had been pretty horrendous! She had been screaming and swearing throughout and they couldn't do anything to help relieve the pain for her! Suffice to say after it was done they up'd her morphine as she was pretty out of it! We now know that at the time, Hayley was experiencing nasty hallucinations! She had experienced the whole dressing change as if she were in a horror film and thought that the nurses were trying to kill her, and that she was shredding her skin from her body!

On a good note though, the paper mask on her face (biobrane) was starting to come off and the skin underneath looked great! Plus the doctors confirmed that the grafts had taken and were doing really well!

A week after the accident Hayley was moved from ICU to the specialist burns ward, 7 floors up with the most amazing views over Sydney. It was a great relief for her as she went from having one-on-one nursing, to one nurse for every four patients, which meant a lot less prodding! However for some time she was still very dependant upon the nurses. A week and a half after the accident and being totally bed bound for all that time, she was finally able to start physio and the gruelling task of walking! Although at first it seemed like an impossible task, within a week she was walking unaided, even if there were a couple of faints here and there!

Once the feed tube had been taken out of her nose there was also no stopping her! Or it may have been the threat that another might have to be put in, as she was stuffing her face with as much food as the hospital would give her, as well as food we took in for her! With burns you need to consume an incredibly high amount of protein, and with the extent of burns that Hayley had experienced her body was basically enduring what your body would if you ran a marathon everyday!

After less than three weeks in hospital Hayley was then too well to be in the hospital and so she was sent home in time for Easter. She and all of us were incredibly anxious about how she would cope, and how we would be able to support her. But she has done so incredibly well! In just over a month since the accident she has gotten all her independance back, getting back to both university and work! Of course there is still a huge onward recovery plan, with compression bandages having to be worn for the next year and ongoing physio to ensure that she doesn't get contractures, but day by day she is improving incredibly.

Now that Hayley and Gary no longer need our support, it is time for us to hit the road and get back on with our travelling plans. We have bought ourselves a little campervan and spent a small fortune on the registration, insurance and a few repairs but will soon be heading up the coast towards Brisbane.

While in Sydney we have had a few absolutely fantastic nights out, meeting up with the wonderful Anna and Tom, who we owed many drinks to being the people that helped Gary get in contact with us in New Zealand. We also had a fantastic catch up with Merryl and Mark who were holiday in Oz, and of course we got to see Tyler and Sue! Sue was so fabulous to us and took us to an intimate little bar where Tim Robbins (The Shawshank Redemption) was playing with his band! A truely great night with Ollie being very star struck thoughout!