We said our goodbyes to the Murphys early on a Monday morning, and took the train to Central station in Sydney where we boarded our eleven hour train to Melbourne - the train journey passed fairly comfortably (lots of Bogans - Australian chavs) but with sleeping, eating, knitting and reading the day didn't seem too long at all in the end. When we pulled into Southern Cross station in Melbourne we felt as though we'd never left as this had been our home for four months.

When we left Melbourne back in September, Tim sent us a text message saying that he missed us and that there was no milk left in the fridge (it seems to be a habit of ours that we drink far more milk than anyone we stay with and so when we leave there is never any milk), so when we got off the train at Yarraville, we popped into the corner shop and bought a couple of pints so that we didn't turn up empty handed! Katie answered the door, and we were also greeted by a very bouncy Aspen, and a Paddy who had had his summer haircut and now looks a bit like a lion wearing Ugg boots. We also gave Tim and Katie the drawings which we'd done of Aspen and Paddy and they were really pleased with them.

We spent the first couple of days taking it easy, walking Aspen in the park, having dinner all together and helping Tim with some psychometric tests he had to do for a job application (we'd all just done the Australian Great IQ test on the telly and the psychometric test was more fun when all three of us did it - when Tim got feedback they said that he'd done it quicker than anyone who'd ever taken the test before!) Over the next few days, we visited the Old Melbourne Gaol and the Aquarium, did a tour of the MCG (Melbourne Cricket Ground) which was really cool and probably would have been even cooler had either of us known much about cricket, had a barbecue, and went to the Doggy Beach in Altona one afternoon when Tim and Katie weren't working (the four of us and Aspen went in the sea and played ball which was great fun).

On Sunday, we went into town to go to the Mary Poppins weekly Sunday barbecue and caught up with lots of Simon's old friends there which was really nice; we also popped into Debs' dressing room and had a really nice chat with her (good to know there were no hard feelings over the whole van-thing) and then we spent the evening watching the final Grand Prix of the season, desperately willing Alonso not to win. Thankfully he didn't.

On Tuesday, we met up with Wil and Karen (Wil is an Aussie whom we'd known for several years when he was living in the UK, and he married Karen recently and they moved to Melbourne). We've met up with so many people from home since we've been away and it's been really great. We went to their house in Sandringham and they cooked us a lovely dinner, and we ended up staying the night as we were having such a lovely evening catching up and sharing photos. Wednesday was our last day before leaving for New Zealand, and we spent the day pottering about doing last minute things like packing, posting more things home etc. In the evening, the four of us and Aspen picked up pizzas and went down to the waterfront at Williamstown where we met Darrin and Janine and their dogs George and Minty, and had a lovely outdoor dinner by the water's edge. It was a really nice night and a great way to spend our last evening in Australia.

We were home by about ten pm, and Simon and I went straight to bed as we'd bought tickets for the midnight screening of the new Harry Potter film in the local cinema, and as we were going to have to get up at five thirty the next morning to get to the airport, we wanted to get as much sleep as we could. When our alarm went off at twenty to midnight, we briefly considered staying in bed and not going but we really wanted to see the film, so we got up and headed to the cinema. Being over 15 years old we were in the minority, and lots of people were dressed up in character but the film was great and we ended up back in bed at three in the morning.

On Thursday morning, we were up at half past five (ouch) and Tim and Aspen took us to the airport. We said a brief goodbye and hugged as the tears were already starting to flow, and hopped on a plane to Christchurch - we were very excited to be exploring New Zealand but also sad to say goodbye to Australia, our home for seven months, and our dear friends.

We had an incredible time in Australia - thanks to all of our friends old and new. We're fairly certain we'll be back!