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Diving Cairns
Another embarrasing snorkel photo Diving was amazing and extreemly exhausting. 11 dives in just 2 and a half days. We were a bit worried about our first dive as we hadnt been down on our own before. I think we did surprisingly well, we managed to navigate to the reef and back to the boat using the compass. We did have a slight incident on the compulsory safety stop 5 meters below the boat. We had to hold onto the rope but wojie had too much air in her suit so was upsidedown the whole time. I was in histerics so was unable to help and lost alot of my air in the process. We did manage to see a nemo (clown fish) on our first dive so were happy with our effort. As part of the Advanced Open Water course we did we had to do 5 additional dives; navigation, night, deep, photography and fish ID. The navigation went really well, using our compass we managed to swim in a prefect square stopping only once as a huge wrasse swam past us. The night dive was also really fun. We both got kicked in the head several times by our slightly simple fellow team
member.
I should mention now that there were four of us doing the Advanced course. The other two made us look like pros! The guy, Gustav swam everywhere quickly, kicking everything on his way and frequently had to surface early as he ran out of air. The girl, Joyce was ridiculous. She had $700 hair extensions and after the first dive these had turned into one huge dread lock!
Anyway the night dive was a success and the next morning we had to do our deep dive. I couldnt get my ears to equalize so we all had to call it off. We did see our first two turtles though, except Gustav who was too busy swimming! We also did a photography dive which we absolutely loved and as you can see we got some pretty good photos. On the final day we attempted our deep dive again this time successfully. We also did our fish Id where we took ID cards down with us and had to try and remember what we saw. All too soon it was over and we were heading to the after dive meal. We were exhausted and planned on leaving early but
then we went to the Woolshed. An amazing bar/club which played non stop cheesy music and dancing on tables seemed to be the norm. It was great fun but we were exhausted by the end of it.
The next day we had an early start as we headed up to Cape Tribulation. The only place on earth where two world heritage sites meet, the barrier reef and the jungle. On the way up we went on a crocodile cruise. The salties are notoriously dangerous and absolutely no swimming is allowed. They often swim 13km out to the reefs to feed. We saw 3, one was a large male who a couple years before killed and ate a cow from the neighbouring field. We also went on a short walk through the rainforest where as it says in the title it rained. When we got to the hostel at Cape Trib it was still raining so the only logical choice was a good long nap! The next day we went down to the beach which was stunning. We had to get the bus back at 1pm so there was a short bit of sun bathing. We stopped at a few
lookouts on the way back. We also stopped at Port Douglas which was a very pretty but very expensive town. When we reached Cairns some of the friends we met on Fraser were there so we went out to celebrate out last night in Australia.
It was a 3 hour flight from cairns to sydney then a mammoth 9 hour flight to Bangkok. After being completely ripped off by the thai taxi driver we made it to our hostel. The hostel was quite far from the main area so via taxi (this one driven by a man who claimed to be the thai Tom Cruise) to kao san road, backpacker central. We visited the weekend market which was enormous. We got completely lost amongst all the alleys. We bought some baggy trousers as we couldnt cope with the heat in our normal ones, the lady in the shop called them aladdin trousers then thought we'd called them bin laden trousers, slight language barrier! We also bought some bags, quite a few actually it was a bit addictive as there were so many nice ones. Lunch was spring rolls with unidentifyable filling and 'chicken' on a stick. The chicken was
cold with gritty bits it put us off food for the rest of the day. To finish off the excursion we hopped on a tuk tuk back to the room. They seem to drive very fast considering theres not much between us and the road. We very nearly had a crash and there was angry tooting from everyone. Bangkok seems a crazy place, you can buy anything, degrees, passports. You have to barter for everything though which can get a bit tedious, the taxi drivers are by far the worst.
It was a really hot day today but we managed to walk to the grand palace. We had to cover our arms and legs so Wojie had to borrow a sarong type thing. The palaces were really beautiful so much detail and beautiful colours. We only lasted a couple hours before running the traffic gauntlet to get back to our room. Not a pedestrian friendly place. Then it was fan time, the photo says it all!
We were up early the next day to get to the airport. We made it all the way to the check in and we were told we needed a chinese vis. We
managed to change our flights to the 22nd and got back in another expensive taxi to the chinese embassy. When we got there it was about to close at 11.30am. So we had to find somewhere to stay for the next few nights. We have no idea where we are at the moment. Still in Bangkok but other than that no idea. No one here speak english and no signs are in english so we just loiter around! We managed to get our visas though so off to China tomorrow. We have a nice room although there is some very strange lighting, we think it may have alternative uses sometimes!
Hopefully our next blog will be from china, or anywhere but Bangkok!
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