Arrived in Sydney after travelling for 24hours, only to find they'd lost Pete's bike & have to hang around for 2 hours while they tried to find it! Turned out, it was on the plane, but the baggage handlers hadn't managed to locate it. Pete got $100 for the inconvenience and therefore some new board shorts from Bondi Beach! We're leaving Sydney tomorrow and I'll be sad to go as we've had such a brilliant time. It's been lovely to see my brother and he & Sarah have been brilliant showing us all the sights. It's been really luxurious being driven around instead of having to negotiate the country's public transport! The first day we took it easy as we were very tired, but we made it up to 'the gap', which is literally a huge gap between the north and south headlands with fantastic views. Got a great photo of the city including the harbour bridge. Then in the evening we had a 'barbie' at Sarah and David's house. with Sarah's brother, sister-in-law & sister. It was yummy and the weather was perfect for it, although Pete and I are finding the mid 20s quite cold after being used to 40oC heat in Singapore & 35oC in Japan. Next day we went to Bondi Beach, had a look around the shops & had a very expensive sandwich for lunch! It is a good place for people watching and very easy to spot all the British backpackers! Then Pete and David braved the sea, while Sarah and I sat on the beach (I did test the water, but quickly retreated - it is just the beggining of Spring here, so the water has had no time to warm up yet). Pete had a go on David's boogie board & managed to catch one wave! That evening we had a meal with Sarah & David's friends at a restaurant which had a brilliant location on the harbour and was near Russel Crow's apartment. Sunday, we went to see the Opera House & got some great photos there. Then got the ferry across to Manly, where there was another great beach. It was father's day in Australia, so that evening we went out for yet another meal (fantastic chinese food) with about 30 members of Sarah's family! It was quite daunting as they all seemed to know all about us, but we couldn't remember all their names! They were all lovely and gave us lots of suggestions about where to go and what to see on our trip up the East Coast. Today we took a drive to Palm Beach, better known as....wait for it....Summer Bay from Home and Away! It was an absolutely beautiful, practically deserted beach (unfortunately they weren't filming) & we had the best fish and chips there. I got very excited when Sarah pointed out a white bird with a red head and told me it was called a 'gallah' - that's what Alf Roberts is referring to whenever he insults someone by saying "You Flamin' Gallah" (if you don't watch Home and Away, you'll have no idea what I'm talking about, but I know lots of my friends will appreciate this bit of trivia!) On the way home we spent quite some time driving around a national park looking for rocks as David insisted that Pete showed him what he could do on his bike (on the night of the BBQ, he tried to create a small obstacle course in his back garden, but only had small blocks so it wasn't very successful!) We've had a great time and now we're very excited about seeing the sights of the East Coast. PS we've managed to upload some of our millions of photos onto this sight now if you want to have a look. xx