The last couple of days have been quite interesting.

On Saturday morning, while we were still in time, we set out to Circular Quay for filming with the Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge flanking us. After that, we headed to the gigantic racecourse where we stayed on for a night vigil with the Pope, where he gave a beautiful sermon on the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives, attesting to his strong spiritual and philosophical background.

Following that, Karl and myself went to meet Brendon, our gatekeeper in Oz, and then headed off to an adoration tent, where devotion and heat were present in equal doses. Afterwards, ensconced in a cold weather jacket, a scarf hoodie and a mild weather sleeping bag, I was in a position to ignore the biting cold and dozed off for a good eight hours, which was more than I could accumulate while I was sleeping in a normal bed.

On Sunday, the sound of choral music gently roused me from my slumber, and I stayed in that happy “in-between” state of being half asleep for an hour or so, until it was time for Mass.

This massive (pardon the pun) event was worth sleeping out for, notwithstanding the fact that our place was only afforded a view of one of the many LCD screens and that many around us were still asleep. We spent Sunday evening at Matt and Deb’s, a friendly couple that hosted two of us for WYD week, after which we headed back home to an inviting bed.

Monday was a day for ourselves- I met up with relatives and finally got to see real life koalas and kangas, then went off to dinner with some of our hosts, which at 8 in the evening was quite late by Australian standards.

I’m writing this on a battered laptop while the train I’m on heads South to Victoria. Then it’s off to search for an internet connection- and on a trip where we only had 10 minutes of mobile network coverage, finding an Ethernet cable, let alone WiFi, is bound to be an adventure in itself.