We flew in to Perth on the West coast of Australia and had booked to stay in Underground Backpackers hostel (supposedly Perth's finest) for the first five nights until we picked up the campervan. When we arrived at about 2am we were rudely told by a scruffy looking man on reception that we had no booking. I offered to show him our confirmation from their reservations lady and he abruptly told me that it didn't matter what I had, there were no rooms left and if we wanted we could sleep on the floor of the TV room for free!! I had to bite my tongue. The TV room was basically the basement with a brick floor and walls and there was European football on so there were a few people down there shouting and screaming. We paid to go on the internet to book somewhere else but everywhere was full or didn't answer the phone in the early hours ha ha. So we resorted back to the TV room and I sat there wondering how it had come to this....we had gone from staying in luxury pads to being turned away from hostels ha ha. Well we saw the night through anyway until 11am when the lady on reception apologised and put us in a room where we slept for most of the day. Despite our introduction to OZ, we have had a great time and I have had some of the most surreal experiences I will ever have in my life I reckon.

When I first booked my trip I really hoped I would see a few kangaroos while in OZ and I have definitely done that. The first kangaroo I saw was unfortunately the one we hit on a highway in South Australia. There are lots of wildlife roadsigns so you have to be pretty alert but there is literally nothing you can do when a kangaroo comes leaping out from the side of the road. Luckily for us and the kangaroo, it fell whilst hopping and hit only the front right side of the camper...otherwise it would have been a write off. We pulled in further up the road to assess the damage and there was just kangaroo hair stuck to the foot step underneath my side door...yuk. Steven's friend John travelled with us too and he said he saw it hop away so hopefully it will make a full recovery. There are tons of dead kangaroos and even a few camels on the road sides in South Australia - it's pretty disgusting.

Our second kangaroo encounter came when we arrived at a holiday park in Coffs Harbour. A little guy on a moped showed us the way to our site and when we got there there were heaps of kangaroos hopping around the campsite. I couldn't stop smiling. There is something funny about sitting reading a book or walking to the toilet block and kangaroos hopping around you. Steven even played a bit on the guitar for them ... until the kangaroo mistook his guitar for food and stood tall on it's back legs...it was massive! That was me running to sit inside the van! The kangaroos on the park were tame but I have heard they can be dangerous so better to be safe than sorry!

The next time we saw a kangaroo we were going to play a round of golf somewhere on the east coast (no girls I can't play, I just promised Steven I would try ha ha). I was concentrating to take a swing and tee off (I think that's what you say) and noticed that kangaroos were also hopping around the golf course ha ha. It was so so surreal I can't even explain.

Australia has been a great experience and we were lucky to have hired the campervan so that we could see many different parts. I think a lot of tourists go to the East Coast which is very geared up for tourists and is beautiful but we have also been to weird little places in the outback where there is literally nothing but a gas station and a few houses. The most bizarre place we visited was Madura, a small town along the Nullabor in South Australia. The Nullabor has the longest stretch of straight road in OZ - 90 miles and is pretty derelict and so we decided to travel none stop for two days and make only one overnight stay, at Madura. Madura has a population of seven and I think most of those people work in the roadhouse/motel we stayed at. We had decided to go for the safe option in the outback and stayed in a room at the roadhouse instead of braving it with the snakes etc. The room was musty smelling and upon reading the 'guide' I found that it had 'recently' been refurbished for the Olympics in the 1950's/60's (can't remember exactly) ha ha. I think it could have benefited from another revamp!! The next morning we got an early start and Steven's friend John was complaining that he was itching and bites started appearing throughout the morning...he had a bad case of bed bugs! Even though we were in the same room we were fine but John was literally covered in about 150 bites all over his body. I have never seen anything like it. He had got bed bugs in a hostel earlier in his trip but nothing like this. He had to hot wash all his clothes and belongings and we had to spray the camper in case he had transferred them at any point. I have heard horror stories where people have had them for weeks and then had to boil wash all their clothes but luckily for John they had not travelled with him and he spent the next few days looking like he had a skin disease and was itching like mad, poor lad.

I had a great birthday in Melbourne ... we visited Ramsay St where they were filming at the time which was fun and brought back a lot of childhood memories sitting in Nanny Ceelies watching Kylie and Jason in the soap. People actually live on the street and are advised when the filming will take place. They also have a 24/7 security man (who is very rude) to guard their houses from pesky tourists who might try to go a bit far and look around their property! Then we went to our first ever outdoor cinema - another surreal experience. We parked the campervan in the space back to front, tuned the radio in to get the sound for the movie and lay there all tucked up in bed watching a film ha ha. You can even text the food place who will bring hotdogs etc to your car if you don't want to miss the film.

We also visited the location of Home and Away which is Palm Beach just outside Sydney. I always thought Home and Away was the scruffy soap when we were younger (compared to Neighbours) but Palm Beach is beautiful and very exclusive. The houses are all well worth a few million and there is a golf course nearby where lots of retired ladies were leisurely playing golf dressed in all the gear! We had breakfast at the set of the diner and visited the surf club where two elderly men in their 70's were setting up for the day - I think they were the lifeguards. I expected hunks like on the soap not a pair of pensioners ha ha, it was funny.

We have travelled over 7000kms from Perth in the West coast, along the bottom and across the outback of South Australia and up the East Coast to Brisbane where we fly to New Zealand tomorrow. We have crossed 3 times zones (I think) in the different parts of OZ and have had to endure weeks of Ozzie Rules rugby (terrible game) and listen to them boast on about how good they are at sports ha ha. But we have had a great time. We fly to Christchurch tomorrow where the weather will be much like the UK is now I expect and that is when reality will hit. I'll let you know how we get on...