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Published: March 31st 2008
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Hello there,
Ok, so yet another bus journey - eek, 12 hour one, our longest yet!! Heading out of Hervery Bay and up to Airlie Beach, the home of the Whitsunday Islands. The 12 hour bus journey was long, Molly slept and Dan stared out of the front window into the small hours!! Its amazing how fast time goes when your listening to good music and pondering life.
Ariving at Airlie Beach we were pleasently surprised, a small place with a lagoon, 'The strip' and.. oh yes.. The burger competition boys (see previous blog), still on the goon. The heavens opened for 2 out of 5 of the days we were there but it didnt matter too much as it was still hot. The accommodation we stayed in was.. well.. not the nicest of places, a little damp smelly room, but it did the job for the duration of our stay. We were lucky enough to be graced with some wondefully butch Aussie lesbians as our neighbours who persisted to drink drink drink into the early hours of Easter. What happened to little sweet bunnies, Easter eggs and sunday lunch!? Dan was frightened by the 'skin 'ead' one and
Sun set
Check the dude in the background!! proceeded to go the long way round to the toilet in fear of losing his boxers. Although they were probably more after Molly's!!
We had a day trip on the lovely 'Camira' catermerang cruising around the Whitsunday's with free booze after 11am - Happy Days!! We were lucky enough to have brilliant sunshine all day. We crusied around Hook Island were you could go in for a snorkle, although the visibility was poor due to recent bad weather and you could only see for a meter. Dan did see some nice coral and a few fish, but the visibility did make it a little disappointing. We had to put stinger suits on as it was stinger season. The wonderful 'Iracanji' Jelly Fish, one of the killers of the sea, was out and about, although Dan didnt see any. Apparently they are invisible, the size of a thumb nail, and if their tenticles touch your skin your in for a several week stint in hospital in agonising pain. If they touch any part of your torso, you probably have about 15 minutes before you keel over - hence the stinger suit covering most parts of your body. The stinger suit
doesnt cover you hands, feet and face so if it gets you there, it'll just really really really hurt - resulting in Molly's reluctance to get in the water this time!! They are rarely seen though and hundreds of people go into the water around Whitsunday's every day.
We rolled up on Whitehaven Beach in the afternoon and got onto the pure white sands for an hour or so of sunbathing and extremely poor frisbee throwing!! This is one of the most beautiful beaches in the world, its actually in the top 10! The water is crystal clear and there was a couple of helicopters on the beach dropping people off to camp. The catermerang was really cool, we had so much food and drink, and some friendly Aussie's to speak too. The couple we were speaking too in their 50's were very chilled out and sampled more than there fair share of beer and vino. It was very funny watching them trying to hide the fact they pretty sloshed, and stumbling off the boat at the end. We sailed past some pretty tasty houses on 'Hamilton Island', including homes owned by; Geroge Harrison, Julia Roberts and Nigel Mansal. It
Tree Frog
Accompanied us on our boat cruise was a full on day and we didnt get back until 6 ish, Dan found out the boat was worth 4.5 Million, so a little out of our league. He also found out how to make a compass out of his watch with a little help from the captain.
We got up at 1am on Sunday morning, to head the bus stop to get to Cairns, oh yes, another 12 hour journey! Not so good this time, a little hot and Molly got eggy!!
When we arrived in Cairns, we pretty much headed straight up to Cape Tribulation, 3 hours North. This truely was the most beautiful place we've seen in Australia. We got on a tour bus, which was the easiest way to get around as we were heading out into the middle of the rainforest!! We had a mad tour guide, who chatted for Australia, but she pretty much knew everything about the area and gave us a good insight into where we were. We went on a river boat cruise on the Daintree River, the oldest rainforest in the world, pre-dating jurassic park!! We were lucky enough to see a Croc sat on the bank and
a dead bloated lizard which we all thought was a croc! Very exciting! This was a great boat ride and being amongst the oldest rainforest isn't something you do everyday!
We then headed onto a Boardwalk amongst the rainforest. Again our tour guide seemed to know everything so this was really useful. Dan licked an ants arse, which isn't something you do everyday! You get a sensation like licking a battery and then a citric after taste- ummm. Weird! After this we headed up to 'Cape Tribulation Beach House' which was truely at one with nature. We had a very sweet little room and a lovely restaurant that went out onto the beach. Molly wasn't too impressed by the size and amount of spiders- they were BIG!
The following day we decided to walk around the area, before we even left the Beach House a 5 foot long Monitor lizard walked casually across the path! Which was really cool. After this we headed out to 'Mason's Water Hole'. This was a crystal clear creek - thankfully not infested with Crocodiles as the water was too cold, so we could have a swim. This was really beautiful, and Dan got
to see a Moray eel which was about 2 feet long. We walked along the beach soaking up the scenery, the rainforest goes right down to the beach. There were very few people on the beach which made the views even more spectacular and very unreal. We also visited 'Mossman Gorge' which had massive bolders and clear green water, and we walked over a suspension bridge.
The trip ended up at Port Douglas, a swanky town on the edge of the rainforest. We had a really nice hostel called 'Dougies' and a very very cute 5 month old puppy which Molly kept playing with (and Dan). When leaving here, some idiot went into trailor without telling our driver, so as we drove off, the trailor door was hanging open, and obviously, only our bags fell out! Only when we were 5 minutes down the road did a car pull the bus over and told our driver that the door was flapping open and 'some bags' were down the road. How we laughed- NOT. Thankfully, the bags were put back in, and the trailor padlocked up!!!!
So we're back in Cairns, soaking up some sun and recovering from a massive
Jeremy Cricket
A scorpion having lunch on a crickets head! walk we did yesterday, the 'Blue Arrow' walk. This could have been disasterous due to some misleading directions and Molly slipped on her arse putting her in a pretty eggy mood. Still, we literally climbed a mountain, which is always a good thing to say you've done. The whole walk starting from the hostel, must have been about 9/10km.
We joke about it now, but it was actually a mammoth of a walk especially with Dan wearing flip flops on basically a goat trail, so not the best choice of footwear!!
We're off to Fiji on Wednesday for 6 days and then LA for 7, then home!! We may do another blog, but because of the short amount of time we have in these 2 places, this could be last.. boo hoo..
Anyway, Speak soon.
Dan and Mol xxx
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