Hurrah! We are off to Sydney! Bondi Beach here we come! No more rain coats, no more long sleeves or jeans. From here on its bikini and sarong right the way until we head back to London……

Three out of five days of torrential rain!!!

So much so the airport was closed for a day and cars were hit with hail stones. Hail stones???

I have the moodiest shots ever of Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. I mean seriously, hail stones??!!! When will it stop?

This is just silly now. We're in Oz and it's summer isn't it? New Zealand had one of the wettest Decembers on record, the locals in Chile couldn't understand why it was so cold and wet so far into the spring, Easter Island was washed out and now this. I've decided that my boyfriend is way too smug when he sends group emails home, so all our friends have been doing rain dances around little dolls of us.

Voodoo dolls or not, it wasn't enough to stop the Australian sun from coming out to play with a vengence once it had decided to. I'm using factor 30 for the first time in my life.

Hurrah, thank you Sydney!! At the very least we can spend the last of our way too few days here bathed in glorious sunshine.

We'd initially found somewhere to stay at Manly Beach, but decided quite quickly it wasn't for us. The fact that at the time the rain and hail was so hard you could barely leave your room probably added to that, but we were really put off by the hostel owners who told us we had to be in our rooms by 10pm. We didn't find that out until we saw a sign on the door once we were in and settled, so a note of warning to other travellers that are going for the first time - it might be worth checking whether there's a curfew before you sign in and pay.

We've had a really short time here - just five days before we carry on to South East Asia, but we've been trying to make the most of it.

We've walked right the way from the northern beaches on the outskirts of the city all the way down the coast to Bondi taking in some fantastic views.

Sydney really is a stylish city. .Some parts are a bit plastic fantastic - people seem to be working out wherever we look, but overall it's a fab place.

Coming from London where we are used to being able to dress up or down just about anywhere without anyone blinking an eye, we found it a little odd that some of the bars force you to go home and change into evening clothes after 8pm, but it's got a good vibe all the same.

And you can get salad!! Oh salad!!! Smoothie bars too. After weeks of burgers, potatoes and Kiwi breakfasts in New Zealand (which I have to say I wasn't complaining about at the time) and months in South America not able to eat raw veg I was virtually tripping over myself for vitamins.

Of all the places we have visited on our trip so far it's the first place that both my boyfriend and I agreed that we would consider moving to, to work for a while. It has everything that London has, with glorious sunshine (well, that's when it's not hailing) and fantastic beaches on top.

I love the general easy goping attitudes of the people here, the anti-litter signs telling you not to 'be a tosser' and the general feeling that everyone is on holiday even when they are working.

As with all the places we've been on this whirlwind trip round the planet, we've found ourselves wishing we had more time here to explore properly. But, and this is purely from a backpacker on a budget point of view, it's just as well we haven't.

I looked at my bank balance yesterday and seriously thought that someone had duped my card - there was a good two grand less than I was expecting in it.

Unfortunately after working out the figures I realised that in fact no-one had touched my card except for me - I've spent it between NZ and here. I must have blown more than a weeks worth of accommodation in that club alone!

Damn. Hurried recalculations of our budget and we're leaving the 'West' for Thailand.