We made it to Australia with no problems. The flight from Honolulu to Sydney was about 10.5 hours. A long time to sit on an airplane to be sure, but much better than the 14 or 15 hours it would have taken from Los Angeles (even longer including connections to Seattle). We rented personal video on demand units for the flight which allowed us to watch movies and other programs we were actually interested in rather than the sole selection offered to everyone else. I watched two movies; Deborah watched four. Add some reading and sleeping time, a couple of meal breaks, and we were there in a tolerable amount of time. We crossed the International Date Line sometime during the flight and suddenly skipped to the next day. That’s a hard concept to get your head around - It feels like I’m writing to you from the future. 
Passing through Customs and Immigration in Sydney is easy. We had electronic visas which were attached to our passport numbers in their database. I should note that the Australians aren’t quite as paranoid as the Americans when it comes to airport security. It’s a more relaxed atmosphere and you don’t have to take your shoes off when you go through the baggage screening.
It was about an hour and a half flight from Sydney to Brisbane where Deborah’s friend Lorraine lives with her husband Russell and daughter Lauren. They have a good-sized 4-bedroom house with beautiful wood floors. They only use half their two-car garage. The other half is Russell’s man cave where he smokes and plays his computer games. As we arrived in the evening we just sat around and talked until our jetlagged eyelids forced us to turn in.
