Cairns

We got in at about 6.20pm, we had arranged for pick up again, but our bus was half an hour late and we couldn't find any vehicle that looked like it was for us, so once again, we did the walk. Lugging all our stuff, 20 minutes this time, not too bad, and definitely the last time! Lucky it was the evening, it was still very hot. We got there eventually, and were greeted by some rowdy people who poured wine down our throats as soon as we stepped foot through the gate, a little over whelming but much appreciated! It was a great hostel apart from being noisy and a bit dirty. We got free breakfast, free meals every night at a bar in town and free unlimited internet use. Pretty good. We sorted our stuff out, signed up for the bar crawl that was happening on the Monday, which was another good deal. For $10 dollars you get a t-shirt, 4 free drinks, your free meal at the bar, and then a slice of pizza later on, couldn't resist. We used some internet time and then headed into town for our meal. There was a little hatch in the restaurant for hostel goers to collect their meals, all basic pasta dishes but very good when it's free! Afetr dinner we started to go for a wonder around but figured we'd just use the next day to do that, we were pretty tired so when we got back we chatted with the one other guy who was in our room for a bit, and then made use of an early night. It was a noisy night for parts, to be expected to some extent in a 'party hostel', but some people were being plain ridiculous. It was so hot all night, the air conditioning and both ceiling fans didn't work.

Cairns lagoon

 We were hoping to get up in time to catch a free breakfast in the morning  but missed it by minutes! So just sat on the internet again for a while, ended up chatting with Mum and Dad on instant chat, which was nice! Eventually we said goodbyes, I grabbed some brunch, and when we got back to our room a couple of new people had arrived in our room. They were English and we got on very well! We did some laundry, for the penultimate time! And then headed into town and wandered around. We went to the lovely lagoon, I paddled through the water which was so warm. It was 33 degrees that day and incredibly humid. We sat on a wall over looking the sea for a bit, watched some heron type birds fishng, and then spotted something swimming near the shore. At first we thought it was a turtle, but it turned out to be something belonging to the stingray family! We went and layed under a palm tree by the lagoon which was bliss. It just got so hot though so we went to the newsagent and I got a slushy ice drink and Phil had an ice lolly, definitely needed. We wandered down to the reef fleet terminal where we'd need to be to go snorkelling the next morning, and then looped back round to wander back. There was a shopping centre further up the road past the turning back to the hostel, so we walked around there for a bit. There are Christmas decorations everywhere now, it definitely isn't seeming right! We walked back to the hostel late afternoon. The sole of my shoe decided to fall off half way, the glue must have melted in the heat! We got talking to our room mates again until it was time to go for dinner in town again. Dinner was nice, we came back and went online again until we were kicked off at 10ish, and then went to bed.

Another noisy night but Phil and I were up at 6 to get ready for snorkelling. The kitchen closed at night time, but the sign on the door said it opens at 6.30am which worked out well so we could grab some breakfast before heading to the reef terminal at 7ish. We got ready and then just hung outside the kitchen waiting for it to be opened. Time was going on and we were getting very aggitated, we walked round to reception to see if we could find someone but there wasn't a soul about. We went back round to the kitchen and just waited. I had a bottle of water in the fridge that if I needed anything for that day, it would be that. We realised we were not going to have any time for breakfast by this point, but I was not leaving without my water. Bang on 7 just as we would have needed to leave to get to the terminal on time, someone appeared and unlocked it, we weren't happy and said they were supposed to open up at 6.30am but we didn't have time to discuss it, I swigged some orange juice, grabbed my bottle of water and we rushed off. We made it on time, checked in and boarded the boat. It was another gorgeous day. This boat was much, much bigger. We filled in a medical form and then took advantage of the free tea/coffee and muffins, which made do as breakfast! On the top deck there were two trampoline type things, which people used for sun bathing! We attempted to stay out the sun this time and sat down the side of the deck. They played music out some speakers which was a nice touch as we cruise out on the Coral Sea! We saw a few fish fling themselves out the water as we moved along. It was pretty choppy and I was gradually getting more and more travel sick. Luckily just as I was getting to my worst, we were stopping up. We got into our very over the top stinger suits, hoods and all! Got our gear, and then boarded a little glass bottom boat which took us to shore. It was really cool seeing huge fish under the boat. We were snorkelling off the edge of Michalemas Cay which was a little bird sanctuaray island. It is a pretected area so we only had a little roped off area on the sand to use. The water was a little chilly but it didn't take long to get in. Again, it was all so incredible, so many different colours of fish and coral. Fish swmming right past your face, schools of them munching off the coral, lost in your own little underwater world. Phil and I tried to stick together a bit better this time, it is hard, but I'm glad we managed to as Phil ended up spotting a turtle sleeping at the bottom of the sea! Amazing! So glad we saw one in the end. The longer I spent out there the more sea sick I began to feel again, not sure why, probably just because I never had a proper breakfast. We took the first boat back to the main boat for lunch, and I sat, slumped over with my head on my hand, boat still rocking, and struggled my way through a delicious plate of the buffet, trying to not bring back up every bite! I made the mistake of putting a prawn on my plate which did not help matters. I maged to eat it all though and just laid back on the boat after that waiting for the nausea to pass. Eventually it did as we moved on to the next spot, Paradise Reef. We moored up, quite literally, in the middle of the ocean, on the outer Great Barrier Reef. It was quite scary to look around and see nothing but the ocean! And we all got into our gear again, and jumped off the back of the boat straight into the sea. The water was much warmer, but much choppier. You could feel yourself going up and down over the waves and too often I'd choke through my snorkel as waves went over my head! It was scarier out at this point, because when you got to the edge of the reef, it just plummeted down into deep blue, you couldn't see very far so it was scary knowing what might be beneath you! Lots of fish hung around at the edge of the coral, and some of the divers were descending down there which was cool to watch. I carried on paddling around the reef. Phil headed back to the boat as his ear was really started to play up, and shortly after I followed. It was really tiring swimming against the waves, but easy swimming back to the boat as they just carried you along! Amazing how strong it is as it was carrying me past the boat as I waited for others to get back on, I had to hold onto the side. The sea sickness was still apparent but much more tolerable, definitely helps having food in your stomache! So again we laid back and relaxed. They blasted out some good music, put the sails up, and we drifted along the ocean in the sun, it was wonderful. After an hour or so we went in to watch a little talk/presentation one of the crew members was doing which taught us a little about the fish and the sea. We enjoyed some afternoon cheese and biscuits and then carried on our way back to Cairns, arriving back to land about 5pm. That evening was the hostel bar crawl we'd signed up for, so we went via an off liscence on the way back to get a couple of beers and jumped in the shower. Our room mates came back and we got ready for the night together. We ended up missing the main group of people that went out, but we caught up with everyone and had our meal and fair share of the free beer. Phil, me and our two room mates ended up sticking together all night and we had a good laugh. The police are very strict in Cairns, they actually breathalise people as they go into bars to see how drunk you are. If you are over whatever limit they have, you are sent home! Good idea I suppose but flawed in some ways. We were all fine anyway, we got to the last bar and there was a table dancing competition, for guys and girls. Phil and one of our room mates entered which was very funny. Phil went on to win the whole thing! But the prize was no use to us as it was a 3 day free hire of a campervan. Still, entertaining. Free pizza time came and it was delicious, by this point we were happy to sit down and chat, etc. Everybody else disppaeared back into the bar and we got the leftover pizza slices, yum. We took ourselves off back to the hostel when we were ready and went to bed.

Amazing fish

TURTLE!

The divers underneath me feeding the fish

Phil and I were up at 7am! It was way too hot in that room. We headed for the computers to try and check in online for our flight the next day, but couldn't for some reason. We managed to take advantage of the free breakfast for once and then Phil went back to bed. I ended up getting chatting to Mum again online for ages, and then went bac to bed too. We woke up about 1.30pm and had some lunch. We went back online to to try and check in again but I still couldn't, I decided to use the time to catch up with uploading photos as I do get worried this laptop will blow or get stolen or something and I'll lose all my photos! I managed to get a good load done and we went back to the room to pack. Phil ended up having a very long in depth talk about football with the other guy in our room so that was good for him! And we arranged to go to the bar for dinner together. Supposedly there was a quiz on and the hostel was going down again in a group, free pizzas and all. We booked our airport shuttle for the morning, got our food from the kitchen to avoid the problem we had last time, and got ourselves ready. Again we were late in joining everyone so ended up on a separate table, but it was good fun doing the quiz, although we didn't win! And we took advantage of the free pizza again. Definitely got our value for money's worth whilst staying at this place. That was a nice evening and once again we headed back, got chatting for a bit, and eventually went to sleep.