We had a heart stopping couple of hours in Santiago as we checked in. My electronic visa for Australia didn't seem to have been registered, which meant that the airline would have to reapply with immigration in Australia on my behalf. Apart from this taking a fair bit of time the major problem was that the Australian immigration system wouldn't accept my passport details when the airline made the application for me and they didn't know why. A supervisor came along and called Sydney directly to see what the problem was. Apparently the immigration system had crashed and they were trying to get it back online, they couldn't accepty any new details, they asked him to call back 20 minutes later. This was some 2 hours after we had first begun check-in and the flight was boarding in less than an hour.

We started to plan what we would do if they couldn't sort my visa. We agreed that Julie would travel and I would stay back in Santiago, largely because my insurance would cover my costs and the reorganisation of a flight as I had an email from STA Travel saying my visa was sorted, which clearly it wasn't, but it wouldn't cover Julie's costs as hers was fine. We of course discussed the very strong worded email we would send to STA Travel to ask what on earth happened, after all it isn't as if they don't specialise in this type of trip. We had tryed to contact them whilst all of our trouble was taking place but the time difference meant it was like 3am in London, so alas no joy. We got back to the desk 20 minutes later to the joy of hearing that things had been sorted, we now had to leg it to the boarding gate as the flight was due for boarding.

As I have spent some time in Sydney before our arrival and travel into the city was fairly swift and within an hour of landing we were at the door of our backpackers in Kings Cross (known as 'the Cross' - the Aussies like to shorten things, as we know it is difficult for them to remember too many words and letters). It was 7.30am and some of the bars in the area were still busy, whilst the streets were recovering from a big night, it had been the start of a long weekend with Monday being Australia Day, or "Strayla Day" (the shortening thing again, may be it's to do with struggling with inunciation), and a public holiday. We checked in and head straight for a fry up, after all we hadn't had one for over 3 months and we felt we were due one. It was overcast and the humidity was almost suffocating, apparently the day before the temperature had hit 40 degrees. It was like a sauna and not at all pleasant. We are hearing that the heatwave has moved south and next week in Melbourne and Adelaide they could see 40+.

The Cross is vibrant and fun, and also somewhat strange and tacky. It has some great bars and nightclubs where it seems every night is Saturday night. It is full of people from all walks of life and it is an experience just to walk down the main strip, you will see the drug dealers, the drunks, the ladies of the night, the smartly dressed onm that big night out and of course all the merry backpackers still in their beach shorts. It is like a Kavos or Magaluf, but on steroids. It has some great backpacking options though, we were just around the corner from the bar action and 20 minutes walk to the Opera house. The Original Backpackers is clean and friendly but our room backed onto the service road behind the strip, so we were awoken every morning at 7am to bin lorries loading the previous nights bottles and waste, and boy is it loud!

After our breakfast on day one we headed to catch a few hours sleep before meeting up with a few cricketing buddies of mine for lunch who are out here playing for the season, we had a few beers and some ribs (we were still hungry) before parting to head back to the hostel. We were just in time to join a large group who were heading down to the Cargo bar in Darling Harbour for an afternoon of beer and BBQ, they had a lot of free beer and wine tokens, it would have been rude to turn it down - I had forgotten about the free drinks that bars ply backpackers with in Aus to initially get you through the door. We got down there and it was familiar territory, Sunday afternoon in a bar.

The problem with drinking in Australia is the pathetic glasses you get served beer in, in this case schooners. They are just over a half pint, which perhaps is a good way of describing Australian's and their beer - they drink like Sheila's, they simply can't handle full pints. Poor blokes, you should see the state of them when they arrive in the UK for their first few nights out, you have to train them up. Anyway, they can rustle up a good barbie and that was going good and proper, though I have never been a fan of their sausages but the steaks... It was a good afternoon getting to know a few people and in the evening we watched the dragon boats cruise around the harbour to celebrate the Chinese New Year. To support the cause we headed into Chinatown for some food, it was a great atmosphere and the food was superb.

The next, Strayla Day, was as overcast as the day before and after a difficult night trying to sleep in our sauna room we headed down to spend the day around the harbour, the Rocks and Darling Harbour where all the entertainment was taking place. We watched lots of live bands on various stages, walked around the markets, hung out with the thousands of people waving their flags on the waterfront and looked out at the Tall Ships race. It was great to be amongst the party scene, which culminated in an awesome firework display over Darling Harbour. These Aussies might not be able to drink and their cricket team is going up the swannie but they know how to put on a firework display, fair dinkum. The only issue was that it had started raining at 4pm and we had gotten drenched. Still we felt right at home watching fireworks wet through in our raincoats, that's bonfire night every year for us Brits.

It rained much of Tuesday, so we did some shopping and headed to the cinema before meeting with another friend of mine to catch up. The weather perked up significantly on the Wednesday and while Julie headed on a day trip to the Blue Mountains on her own, which I had suggested to her but had done before, I went for a wander around and eventually to Manly, my favourite beach in Sydney, largely because it is big enough to find a space and a lot less touristy than Bondi. We met back up in the evening to go the Opera House to watch "The Complete Works of Shakespeare (abridged)", a bit like the "Reduced Shakespeare Company" if you are familair with that. It was very funny and it was great to see a show in the great building.

Thursday the sun was back radiating and Bondi beach was our detination, despite travelling for three months we haven't spent too much time on the sand and in the surf, so it was a good day chilling. Julie headed for the bridge climb in the evening, a real highlight for her, it certainly was for me when I did it 5 years ago. Her pictures were great and her face was beaming from the experience when we headed out for dinner late on the Thursday eveing. Tomorrow we fly to Tasmania, I never made it there when I was last here so it will be a new place for us both.