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Published: November 15th 2011
G'day from sunny Oz!
Sorry for the long gap between blog posts - we've been busy busy everyday pretty much it seems! But Australia has lived up to expectations so far - we started in Cairns about 10 days ago and are now further down south in Airlie Beach for a few more days. Cairns was a great place to start as we were thrown straight into crocodiles and spiders in the rainforests (not literally). Unfortunately (or luckily in my opinion) we didn't see any crocs in the wild, but did see some in the animal sanctuary - Rich held one!
We did a great day tour where we got to swim in waterfalls and lakes up near the rainforest - and the tour guide had a brilliant concept for the day: swim, eat, swim, eat, swim, eat......! Worked well for us 😊 We also saw a wild cassowary bird (which I remember Stella telling us about before we left....you were right, you wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of one of those!). They're basically rare, flightless birds, about the size of a ostrich, but with a claw on its foot that can rip open a human in one go....nice! So we stayed inside the bus to take photos as you can imagine!
We then did a day trip on a boat out to the Great Barrier Reef from Cairns - great snorkelling there; so much coral and lots of Nemos! Rich also did his first scuba dive which he said was awesome, although only a few metres down.
Coming down the east coast, we stopped in Townsville to meet up with a couple that we met in Fiji and went out for drinks and dinner with them which was lovely 😊 We also went out to Magnetic Island from there, where we stayed for 2 nights in a cool little hut and also got to hold a koala! They sound cuter than they actually are though we discovered.....have massive claws which unless you stay perfectly still they'll dig into you no problem! Apparently you have to convince them that you're a tree, as that's the only thing they feel safe with!
Back onto the Greyhound bus service and down south further to Airlie Beach, where we are now. Here we did our 2 days/1 night sailing trip on a boat called Siska. Had such a fun time on the trip and were happy not to be on one of the "party" boats - as being hungover on a boat didn't appeal to either of us! Met a lovely group though and went for a night out with them all back on land yesterday 😊 During the trip we got taken to Whitehaven beach; the sand is 98.9% silica and can only be described as walking on McFlurry! Have never walked on any sand like that before it was amazing! Also because it doesn't contain a lot/hardly any iron it never gets over 25 degrees and so you can walk on it without doing the embarrassing hot-sand run! Unfortunately it's stinger season around here at the moment and seeing as they have jellyfish that can be pretty nasty so you shouldn't swim without a stinger suit on. We wore these to snorkel but I was still veeeery wary! Out on our snorkel though we did get to swim with a SEA TURTLE which pretty much made my life!! Disney/Pixar have got sea turtles down to a tee in Finding Nemo - they're so chilled out and not bothered by us at all! This one was about a metre long and came up so close Rich nearly trod on him! Amazing experience though 😊
So that's what we've been getting up to the past week and a half really! We're heading down the coast on Thursday night (for our over-night 12hr coach trip....can't wait!) to a place called 1770 (Agnes Water) where I think we're riding scooters.....could be interesting, we'll see! Hope everyone's well back home and looking forward to see you all in December 😊 xxxx
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Mum Lester
non-member comment
Hello
You sound like you are having the best time! Always lovely to hear all about your adventures. Looking forward to seeing you both again next month. You may not be as keen to be coming back to our miserable UK weather!! Xxx