Get tipsy in Tonga for 80p - that's what Sharon did!

... and Craig did too! Their beer is strong stuff.

Well we made it to Tonga after hours spent trying to sleep on a bench at Auckland airport - that bit wasn't fun.

Since we've been here, we've flown up to Vava'u island (if you want to pronounce that think Thierry Henry in a car advert) and been whale watching. We saw two humpback whales which were amazing. We did some great snorkelling as well (Sharon thought it was better than the Great Barrier Reef!) and we saw Nemo again - he does get around!

We went to a Tongan Beach Feast - well, it was Tongan, anyway. The 'Beach' turned out to be a 5 metre strip of gravel with the odd bit of sand, and the feast was only a feast if you like seafood - as neither of us do, we just spent the night eating boiled yams. Yum. The 'dancing girls' were the local school children trying to raise money for school books! Actually, it was quite a cool evening - just not quite what we were expecting - none of the usual tourist trappings which, afterall, is why we came here.

Tonga is a lovely country - very laid back. We turned up at the airport with tickets showing the wrong names, flight number and flight time, but none of that mattered - you just tell them where you want to go and they put you on the flight. Your boarding pass is your seat number scribbled on the back of your ticket!

Today we visited Stonehenge (the Tongan version) - theirs is more impressive! We also went to see some amazing blow holes, some caves, Captain Cook's (known in Australia as Cooky) landing site, some ancient royal tombs (Sharon was more impressed with the pigs wandering around them) and a tree with two bats in, which the locals seem very proud of (it's especially marked on their tourist maps!).

Those of you that wanted more photos may need to wait until we reach civilisation - it took us ten minutes just to load this page!

A couple more days and then we're off to Samoa.

Thanks again for the comments ... apart from the one about FP making us work until we drop...