Typical! You leave a town, and that's when the weather clears up! Ah well, but I can't really complain. The rain on my last full day in Perth was no more than a couple of showers, which actually made a refreshing change from the heat & dust of the previous three weeks.

So I jumped in a taxi at the crack of dawn and headed to the airport for my flight to Adelaide. The view out of the window was strangely familiar and yet unknown. I realised that it was the same crazy desert scrub that we'd been seeing from the van, only from a new vantage point. The dry river beds we flew over looked to me like giant bunkers in a planet-sized golf course.

I was met at Adelaide's swish new terminal by my cousin Su & her husband Barry, and they whisked me off to their house on the eastern edge of the city. After a quick bite to eat, I had a dunk in their fabulous swimming pool. We carried on chatting all afternoon, catching up on family gossip from both sides of the planet.

That evening we drove up to see their daughter Julie's new house at Ashton, up in the Adelaide hills. Julie & her husband Stuart are completely rebuilding a house along ecologically-friendly lines, with things like grey water evaporative cooling, double glazing (I know how bizarre it sounds to trumpet double glazing as a new technology, but in Australia it really is!) and photovoltaic cells on a specially inclined roof. The highlight for me was their farmyard, complete with chickens and alpacas!

For dinner Su, Barry & I walked round the corner to their local Thai restaurant "Sawasdee". Being in a suburb, I wasn't sure how good it would be, but I was willing to give it a try because Su & Barry were raving about it. And it turns out they were right to: what a treat! Friendly service, delicious food, and a pleasant interior.

We finished the evening back home with a luscious bottle of red wine out on the patio, which helped me shrug off the two-and-a-half hour time difference from WA.

Thursday was a pretty action-packed day. Barry suddenly had a free day (he thought he would be at the cricket, but the Test against the West Indies didn't start until the next day) so he drove me & Su all over Adelaide. We started with the view over the city from Montefiore Hill, then had a little stroll along the Torrens river through Elder Park, where I got the chance to take a series of photos of a pair of black swans courting, then shagging.

Next we headed to the botanical gardens, where we visited the new tropical house. Called the Bicentennial Rainforest Building, it looks somewhat like a gargantuan metal slug. We were getting a bit peckish by this stage, so we decided to head to Semaphore Beach for some tasty fish & chips. They're a recurring theme whenever I'm with Su & Barry: we worked out that we had had fish & chips together in Port Melbourne, in upstate Victoria, and now in Adelaide as well!

The beach at Semaphore is almost as fabulously white, long and empty as at Swanbourne in Perth, which I have to admit I wasn't expecting. Sadly, the wind was whipping up a fine blast of sand, so we didn't spend too much time by the sea. Instead, we drove round to Port Adelaide, where we had a cup of coffee, a little stroll, and then stumbled across a microbrewery where I had the serving platter of all six of their beers.

That evening I met up with David, a friend of Johannes' in Sydney. We had a drink at the Universal Wine Bar and then dinner at a Greek restaurant nearby called Eros. Cheesy name! But the food was good. Next stop was a beer at a super-traditional Australian pub that looked just like a super-traditional English pub, and we finished with a coffee in a very posh-looking coffee shop.

Friday was a little less busy, but just as much fun. Julie & Stuart came round for coffee in the morning. We had a snacky lunch and a relaxed afternoon in the pool. Later on I went into town with Su and we visited the Migration Museum, which was not that great to be honest but dealt with some interesting issues, in particular how Anglo-biased the migration policies of Australia have been throughout the history of the country.

Su & I had a cheeky coffee in the middle of Adelaide's shopping district, and then I met up with my good friend Adam. He took me to the opening of a solo show at a gallery in town. The artist is a good friend & colleague of his who has done lots of stage set design for Adam's theatre productions. The pictures were great!

We had a quick wander round Adelaide's famous food markets before heading to a Thai restaurant that Adam knows well for a delicious dinner (I had soft-shell crab for the first time - weird but tasty). The evening was lots of fun!

Saturday was my last day in Adelaide, so it was lovely for me to be able to have a big family breakfast with Su, Barry, Julie, Stuart and their two kids Callum and Elise (who, bless them, remembered me from my last visit to Adelaide in 2005) at ETC, the East Terrace Continental, a wonderful relaxed brunchy place with funky furnishings, great coffee and delicious food.

All that remained after breakfast was to pack my bags, have a farewell dip in the pool, and then head to the airport. Su & Barry had a drink with me in the terminal building, then left me in the queue to board my flight to Melbourne. Farewell, South Australia!

I had a couple more days to spend in Perth, and I did it at a radically slower pace than I had become used to over the course of the camper trip. It was weird to think that I didn't have to dash around and see everything I wanted to see in about half an hour, then jump into my vehicle and drive for another six hours. Instead, I "did" Perth in my old-school backpacker style: Lonely Planet walking tour interspersed with food & drink as & when.

Perth is a smallish city with big ambitions. There's clearly money sloshing about here, what with the whole extractive industries boom and related service sector growth. Everyone had told me how English the people of Perth are, but I was surprised by how many Chinese I saw walking around. It's a boom town alright. You talk to people about the current economic downturn and they say "yeah, but it's going to go up up up really soon".

Architecturally speaking, Perth's centre is a little grid of streets with many Art Deco buildings but more & more brand spanking new skyscrapers in the modern glass-and-steel mould. I have heard that Perth is fond of blowing up its historical buildings, but I'm glad to say that there are at least a few nice ones left. For now.

Among the prettiest gems is His Majesty's Theatre, or The Maj as it's affectionately known. I had a peek inside courtesy of a very kindly gentleman who works as a volunteer guide there. He was very friendly and clearly chuffed that people would come from far & wide to visit "his" theatre, but the poor dear didn't really have all that much to say. Ah well, it was a treat just to stand in a 100-year-old theatre and look around at how they've restored the velvet seating & the paintwork.

After lunch I had a quick coffee with Blake, then meandered back through the CBD and up into King's Park. This huge open space sits atop a hill that has a commanding view over the city and all across the Swan River, which at Perth becomes a huge bay before flowing into the Indian Ocean at some narrows a few kilometres further west at Fremantle. Perth's botanical gardens are in Kings Park, and they have a fabulous treetop walk bridge thingy that takes you through the canopy of the local forest.

After the considerable amount of walking that I'd done, I decided to treat myself to a sunset at the beach. Perth has absolutely fantastic beaches: white sand, big surf, and most importantly hardly any people! I went to Swanbourne beach (which was itself a good half-hour's walk from Swanbourne railway station, it has to be said) and then strolled up and down the monster expanse of gorgeous beach. Almost the only other people I saw were kitesurfers who were plying their way slowly northwards in the stiff sea breeze.

I plonked myself down on my trusty green striped beach towel that I'd bought in South Africa all those years ago, and enjoyed a last bit of hot sun on my bronzed body, shielded from the wind by the dunes I had climbed up into. It was heaven!

The trip back into town was a lot easier thanks to the coincidence of me passing the beach bus stop just at the moment the bus was doing the same. I hopped on, changed onto a train, and then walked back to Blake's apartment to get showered and changed for dinner.

I met with my friend Shane, a self-employed property developer who does up big places out in the bush and then sells them on, for some Malaysian food and a few drinks. But before long I was in bed, worn out from the day's exertions.

Tuesday was more of the same, with a slow morning of repacking my luggage (this time without a hangover and the time pressure of having to bring the van back - phew!) followed by a spot of lunch. Then I took the train out to Fremantle and walked around there for the afternoon.

Fremantle is, or used to be, a separate town that serves as Perth's port. It stands at the mouth of the Swan River and has a lovely compact and ornate city centre with fine Art Nouveau and Art Deco buildings. It's also famous for being the home of the Little Creatures brewery. Little Creatures has a brasserie-cum-beerhall out on the marina which is a bit of a backpacker mecca, but I have to say I was underwhelmed. The one in Melbourne which I'd been to a month before with Rainnie was much more atmospheric in my opinion.

Perhaps it wasn't Fremantle's fault that I found everything a bit less attractive than I had expected. It might instead have been the result of this being my last day in Western Australia. Sure, I was distracting myself by walking all over and looking at stuff, but there was no denying that I was on a bit of a downer after the manic three weeks in the campervan.

Thank goodness I'd had a little pilgrimage to the beach yesterday at Swanbourne, because Fremantle doesn't have a beach to speak of. I would have been extremely cross at myself if I hadn't luxuriated on a big fat white sandy beach one last time, considering how many gorgeous such beaches Rainnie & I had seen on our trip.

My mood perked up when I saw the sun set over the marina. For once it wasn't a case of "golden orb drops into cobalt sea", but rather - thanks to the dodgy weather that day - "copper orb lights up sky in flood of purples and reds before dropping into steely sea". At last, some colourful sunset photos!! (Ooh, hark at me, bemoaning the idyllic weather conditions of the previous fortnight!)

Moodwise, things only got better after sunset: my friend Robert in Sydney had given me the details of a friend of his in Perth, Francois, and I had arranged to meet Francois that evening in Fremantle for pizza. He brought along a friend of his, Simon, and the three of us had a delightful evening of wine and conversation, first at the pizza place and then at a gelato bar.

I do enjoy meeting new people who I have some slight connection to (as opposed to random strangers, which I always find a bit daunting - which is not to say I can't or won't meet random strangers, but it's always nicer if you're introduced to someone, even in the vaguest of ways, I find).

Francois was kind enough to drive me back into the city - which was lovely, considering I was still wearing shorts & a teeshirt but the temperature had dropped into the mid teens with the wind & rain. And then I got changed into warmer clothes, walked into Northbridge to do a spot of internetting, and walked home again, safe in the knowledge that I was checked in for tomorrow's flight.