Our next stop was Monbulk. Unfortunately, they no longer make Jam here so we had to make do with visiting William, Merryn, Aiden, Thalia and Ryan. I am kidding of course. They are an amazing family who we know from their days in Perth.  They were kind enough to let us camp in their back garden and show us around the area, including trips to wineries, boating / knee boarding on Lake Eildon, icecream factories, rain forest walks and sand sculptures. We also took a ride on Puffing Billy.

Our next stop would include a boat trip to Tasmania but we were coming back to Monbulk to spend some more time with the van Bremen's.

We spent quite a bit of time in Melbourne. Fiona's parents and her brother's family (Tim, Chris, Ben & Josh) came over to visit us and to go to the Australian Open.

While I went with Colin and Tim on the Carlton brewery tour (it's a tough life I tell you), the rest of the family went and visited Fiona's Aunty Pam and Uncle Peter.

We visited Ken and Jan for lunch. They looked after us while we were in Mozambique back in 2011. They are an amazing couple who are currently setting up a school with Iris in Nepal.

We spent a fair bit of time exploring Melbourne with our family.

We were lucky enough to be able to catch up again with Chris, Lyn, Jane and Pippa who we initially met in Kununurra. We went to Luna Park where Zoe was able to feed the adrenalin junkie that now lives inside of her!

On the way to Wagga Wagga we stopped in at a Woolies for lunch. Once we got to Wogga, we realised that someone (not naming any names ... Fiona!) had thrown my wallet in the big blue bin out the back of the supermarket.

After an 800km round trip to retrieve my wallet all was well in the world again. I took the opportunity on the drive by myself to take a few photos which was a nice way to break up the drive.

We visited Fiona's Aunty Pat in Wodonga.

Bathurst was one spot I didn't want to miss. Unfortunately I couldn't manage to time it to be able to watch the Bathurst 1000 V8 Supercars race around Mount Panorama, but to be able to drive around the track (at a painfully slow 60 kph) was a bit of a pilgrimage for me. It was amazing to see how technical the track is and how insane it must be to do 300 kph plus around here.

Hamish and Sarah, the couple we camped next to in Narrabeen, kindly offered to show us around Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. It is a beautiful part of the world.

We visited Scenic World which was a great way to explore some of the natural beauty and learn a little about the old mine that was located there. The highlight was the trip down and back up the worlds steepest railway and the glass bottom cable car.