Boris Johnson is finally back in Britain after a mammoth eight-day foreign trip where international summits were overshadowed by mounting questions about his leadership and defence spending.
The Prime Minister welcomed Kiwi counterpart Jacinda Ardern to No10 today, where he was also dealing with the fallout from Deputy Chief Whip Chris Pincher’s resignation amid groping allegations.
Mr Johnson’s Tory woes dogged him to Rwanda, Germany and Spain as he was repeatedly quizzed about a growing Conservative revolt against him in the UK.
He tried to escape with swims, a boozy barbecue with G7 chiefs and striking up a new “bromance” with long-time sparring partner Emmanuel Macron.
But time and again he was forced to confront criticisms of his leadership style, election humiliations and how he felt about critics plotting against him in Westminster.
The PM began the week in Germany, as the Government’s luxury Airbus A321 aircraft landed at Munich Airport at 6.18am on Sunday.
Johnson had flown eight hours overnight from the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Rwandan capital, Kigali, to kick off the second leg of his three-stop tour.
Still reeling from losing by-elections in Wakefield and Tiverton & Honiton three days earlier, he travelled by helicopter to the remote Schloss Elmau in the German mountains - a “luxury spa retreat and cultural hideaway” 3,280ft above sea level in the Bavarian Alps.
The four-storey castle was built between 1914 and 1916 as the First World War raged in Europe.
It was another war on the Continent which dominated discussions at the schloss, as fighting raged in Ukraine.
There were three days of diplomatic alpine negotiations with US President Joe Biden, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, Japan’s Fumio Kishida, Italy’s Mario Draghi and EU Commission and Council presidents Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel.
But the leaders also found to taunt Vladimir Putin from afar.
Opening their talks in the Bavarian sunshine as the mercury topped 28C (82.5F), Johnson suggested: “Can we take our clothes off? We all have to show that we're tougher than Putin.”
He also urged the leaders to "show them our pecs", while Trudeau recalled Putin’s favourite pastime of "bare-chested horseback riding."
In the end, the men shed only their ties - and Johnson would not wear one again until he arrived in Madrid three days later.
Johnson and Trudeau also bantered about the size of their official planes, with the British PM insisting his is “very modest”.
On Sunday evening the leaders and their partners attended a live jazz performance before repairing for drinks.
Johnson and Macron - who earlier eased tensions between them to such an extent that a Government source claimed they were enjoying a “bromance” - were later spotted necking local whiskey with their arms around each other.
The pair downed drinks from Slyrs Distillers, which creates “high-quality Bavarian single malt whiskeys and whisky liqueurs”.
Pictures which emerged later of the G7 chiefs looking merry suggested a fair amount of booze was guzzled.
But Johnson was up early the next morning for a dip in the “crystal clear” Ferchensee Lake.
A Government source said: "He was very refreshed as he came in, and it was an ongoing banter between him and Justin Trudeau because Trudeau sort of ran around the lake as the Prime Minister was swimming in it.
"So all this banter about riding bareback and imitating Putin and displaying their pecs got a new lease of life off the back of that."
On Monday, the leaders and their spouses, including Carrie, enjoyed a barbecue on their last night as a G7, before departing for the NATO Summit in Spain the next day.
The PM landed at Munich Airport in a police helicopter, having been whisked 25 minutes from the schloss to the airfield and his waiting jet.
The Bundespolizei chopper clattered onto the apron and drove Johnson to within feet of his Airbus, known in No10 either by its registration G-GBNI or simply “the little plane”.
He strolled across the tarmac with two shirt buttons undone before taking his seat at the front.
Lunch on board was egg, ham and chicken salad sandwiches, along with a pack of ready salted Chipsfrisch, washed down with apple juice and water.
During the flight, the PM worked on his government Red Box papers, as well as reading what a source described as “a heavy history book” minus its dust jacket, and a tome on Shakespeare.
PMs traditionally grant the travelling media 30 minutes of questions on such flights, where reporters can ask anything.
David Cameron seemed to resent the sessions, Theresa May looked terrified by the ordeal but Johnson, a former journalist, relishes the encounters.
Indeed, he even signalled he misses his “lucrative” former career, where he was paid £275,000 a year as a Daily Telegraph columnist.
“Do you know what? I've realised where I've been going wrong with all this,” he confided as the 500mph plane cruised at 38,000ft.
“I've got to recognise that years and years ago, I used to do the kind of jobs that you all do now, and it was a great, great life and a great privilege, and what you are able to do is offer opinion, commentary, analysis, predictions about politics, about individuals and so on.”
He went on: “It’s very lucrative sometimes.”
Sitting in seat 12C with a burgundy government folder and black and red, hardback A4 notebook perched on his lap, the PM fiddled with a blue and white pen which had “Kigali Convention Centre” written down the side - a souvenir from his Rwandan trip.
Twenty minutes into the grilling - and halfway through the two-hour flight, the plane was hit by strong turbulence, forcing Johnson to abandon the mid-air briefing.
Seatbelt signs came on and one of his protection officers signalled for Johnson to return to the front of the plane - the PM staggering down the aisle as the jet was thrown around.
“We surrender!” quipped the Tory chief.
One seasoned traveller described it as the “worst turbulence” they had ever experienced.
The briefing resumed 15 minutes later when the PM joked to journalists: “You’ve had time to think, that’s a terrible mistake!”
Touching down in the Spanish capital just before 5pm, a dozen-vehicle convoy, including black Volkswagen people carriers, police cars and a Range Rover, were waiting next to a red carpet before the motorcade sped on blue lights into the centre of Madrid.
Johnson and his close team were staying in a skyscraper hotel in a part of the Spanish capital described by an aide as the “Madrid Canary Wharf” for its huge glass and steel buildings.
A row over defence spending had already erupted, fuelled by a call from the Chief of the General Staff for more cash - and demand echoed by the Defence Secretary.
Then the travelling media pack revealed the Government will break its pledge to increase the MoD’s budget by 0.5% above inflation during each year of the Parliament.
For Johnson, who received widespread praise for promising billions of pounds more for the armed forces a year ago, it was frustrating.
But he refused to bow to pressure - instead choosing to contradict NATO’s own assessment of how much the UK spends.
The alliance says it is 2.12% of GDP but the Government claims it is 2.3% because it includes cash for Ukraine.
“We’re right,” the PM insisted, clearly annoyed.
The next day, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace revived the row, telling defence correspondents: “It is not my core budget, it doesn't buy me any more planes, tanks or ships.”
Hours after his first face-to-face meeting with newly-elected Australian PM Anthony Albanese - who told Johnson he likes to be called “Albo” and gave the PM a shirt of his favourite rugby league team, South Sydney Rabbitohs - the Premier was again being grilled about defence spending and cutting 9,500 troops.
Later that night, he was pictured standing alone in a vast gallery at the Prado Museum, deep in contemplation as he studied a painting.
At the same time 785 miles away at the Carlton Club in London, his Deputy Chief Whip was getting so drunk an incident unfolded that led to him quitting.
The PM, who managed to sleep on the flight home from Madrid on Thursday, received Pincher’s resignation letter moments after touching down at the Inflite executive lounge at Stansted Airport.
Truly, it seems, there is no rest for the wicked.
