Guess what?! I'm going to be back in oz in two weeks! Hope to see you all at the arrival hall bright and early (06:20 to be exact) on the 12th of Jan waiting for Qantas flight QF10 to touch down. Hope everyone had a good Christmas and here's wishing you all a happy new year. We're gonna be in Damascus for it which will be a bit strange.

Anyway, I'm Aleppo (Syria) at the moment. Only got time for a quick update. It's pretty cold but we've had a fairly good run of weather for this time of year. We've been 'on the road' for three and a half weeks and it's been pretty good. There have been a couple of hiccups and at times the organisation has been bordering on shambolic but I take comfort in knowing that Adam and I got an absolute bargain on this trip. I dont think we could have done it cheaper hitchhiking.

I've taken a fair few photos with my new camera (yeee!) and I promise to put them up when i get home. Some of the places we've been to have been just out of this world. There have been so many instances where despite my best efforts, a photo just hasnt been able to do a place justice.

The most recent has been our trip to the rose-red city of Petra. If you dont know what I'm talking about, go rent a copy of Indiana Jones and the last Crusade and skip to the last 20 minutes or so. The place was awesome.

Apart from that, we've been to the pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx, the Valley of the Kings, Abu Simbel (built by Ramses II), sailed down the Nile, driven under the Suez canal, climbed Mount Sinai, snorkeled in the Red Sea, floated in the Dead Sea, visited one of the best castles in the world and been to enough ancient temples to last a lifetime. The pace has been more hectic than our trip to Europe... probably because it's actually organised, but it's been great to kick back and let someone else figure out how to get around and where to stay.