We landed 30 minutes later than scheduled and got the plane shortly after landing; we'd filled in the landing cards and I had declared some tea I'd bought in Bali (granules, mangosteen flavour) and had to fill in Ebola cards.

We went through immigration - electronically, and collected our bags after a sniffer dog had a wiff of them as they came up; those tv programs are all they seem to be and more. We then went through another queue to get out, all our landing cards were checked and the customs guy asked me a question I did not understand. He asked me again and I turned to Edd and asked him what the question was - his accent was so strong he may as well have been speaking Russian. Apparently he wanted to know if I was travelling with any one, which I was, Edd was behind me pushing the trolley with our bags on; I'm not sure if he thought I was a super light traveller, only needing a small back pack on an international flight.

We were directed to the inspection section of the airport and I showed another officer my landing card, holding up the beautifully painted Bali pot, seriously hoping it wouldn't be confiscated; I could have drunk it between buying it and arriving, so it would have been an opportunity missed and good tea wasted. I was definitely going to ask if I could keep the container though, if all else failed.

We were asked to follow the big green dots on the floor with arrows inside them, doing the walk of shame we past other people whose bags were being searched and I had images of the contents of my bag strewn all over the desk. It only took 2.5 minutes to catapult itself all over the bed, this would be unpacking with a purpose. I was doomed.

 We walked through automatic doors and immediately spotted 2 familiar faces; it took us a second to realise what had just happened - we'd gone straight through customs and out the other side without being searched or having my tea confiscated. Result! The Melbourne girls we'd met in Halong Bay were there to fetch us and we had big hugs all round; it was a very different welcome to what we were used to - normally being bombarded with taxi / took took drivers and having to figure out where on earth we were going. This was a much nicer arrival and very fitting, considering we weren't planning on leaving in the next 5 days, like during our travels.

One of the girls had bought us Tim Tams biscuits, apparently an Australian must have and not something Edd and I were familiar with. We walked to the car with them and loaded up - we had to get to the bank and pick up our cards so we had money, otherwise it was going to be a loooong weekend ahead of us.

We first went north, for some breakfast at a little place called Auction Rooms, that was apparently one of the top places to eat breakfast in Melbourne. The breakfast was delicious and we at up, leaving an hour later for the CBD to find the only ANZ Bank that was open on a Saturday. We were introduced to 'the left hook' turn, where you wait in the left hand lane in an intersection and then turn right when the traffic lights turned orange, minding that no one jumped the light. We were both horrified at this new move as it did not seem safe by any stretch of the imagination - I was probably going to avoid them like the plague.

We waited in a virtual queue and were finally called to a personal banker. Our accounts hadn't been opened the way we'd though, but we did have cards and access to the money that had been transferred, so we were starving till Monday. 2.5 hours later though, we scheduled another appointment for the Tuesday as we still weren't even close to being finished, and left with our Melbourne friends.

We dropped one of the Melbourne girls off at her house, collected a box we'd sent her from Vietnam with the touristy stuff we'd bought and left with our Melbourne chauffeur friend, who dropped us off at the service suite that had been booked for a week, while we waited to move into our house share the next weekend.

We unloaded the car and said goodbye, she wasn't feeling very well, so wasn't going to be joining us for dinner later. We introduced ourselves to the owners of the suite and were shown to the room. It was larger than we'd imagined and beautifully clean. We unpacked our bags and the 2 boxes with our things in, piled up the washing next to the machine, but couldn't do any as there wasn't any washing powder and I'd thrown the last of ours away in Singapore. The pile was high and there was no little old lady in a back street that would charge us per kilo to do our washing. Edd's mum was also no where in sight. We were going to have to do this on our own for the first time in a very long time. We were adults again and it sucked.

We watched a bit of tv and then had a 1.5 hour nap, having not slept much / at all on the plane. We got up at 5.30pm and got ready for dinner that we were having with the Melbourne girl that wasn't ill; she collected us at 6.30pm and we drove back into town, parking in a parking lot and making our way to a little Mexican joint.

It was busier than she'd ever experienced before, so we ordered drinks and then sat and waited for a table to open up. We were there for about half an hour when a table became available and we sat down for dinner, ordering quesadillas, a burrito, and some nachos with dip.

The food was delicious, but far too much - something I had noticed at breakfast - and we finished up, deciding whether or not to go for a drink elsewhere or go home. Edd and I were tired and so was our Melbourne friend, having gone out the night before and having had a late night / early morning before getting up to meet us at the airport. She was happy to hear we wanted to go back to bed and we piled back into the car, for the 30 minute drive back to the suburbs.

We said good night and made our way back to the suite, locking the bottom and the top latch as we couldn't remember what we were told to do and decided we'd rather be safer than not safe enough, considering they had 2 small children. It had been a busy first day and we were looking forward to a good night sleep in preparation for a long day ahead.