Arrival in Cairns

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Hello people. I'm finally about caught up. Given how early my flight was I had most of the day here. As I have been on the road for so long I'm just taking some time out to rest up for a while and be bit lazy.

Cairns itself is nice enough with lots of palm trees everywhere and a real tropical feel to it- as evidenced by my permanent state of sweaty disgusting-ness. Since I am being lazy I haven't really done much. The first day I took a walk along the Esplanade (both Darwin and Cairns have one- I haven't seen them elsewhere, maybe it's a northern thing), had some lunch and booked a day trip which I'll cover when I do it. After lunch I came back to the hostel for a bit, lazed, then got some dinner, came back and had a couple of beers in the hostel bar, getting dragged into playing cards with some randoms until bed. Today I have swam in the hostel pool, and written blog entries. As I write this at 4pm that is all I have done.

I'm not convinced there is much to do in Cairns- it's basically just one big dive shop- and I already have my diving booked as part of my next trip. Another problem is that I really don't like the hostel. It's OK in itself but it's too far from anything and in the heat and humidity walking for more than about 5 or maybe ten minutes is a real chore. Because of that I feel like a bit of a shut in. There is an hourly free shuttle bus into town which helps but not enough. The hostel seems mostly populated by the kind of backpacker who sticks around a place trying to find temp work just in order to stay there, but all the while complaining- I've heard a lot of people say how bored they are and I think there's a pretty dejected atmosphere. I don't understand why people do that- if you can't afford to get around and enjoy yourself, save up some more until you can, dur! And I've ran into a few people from the last night who are now blanking me- it seemed OK last night so I wonder if I was unintentionally massively offensive last night. Maybe they are just lacking the social lubricant of alcohol.

I hope Cairns improves.

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Photos

View from the Esplanade
It seems to be all mud flats- I was expecting a beach!