Cairns, Australia

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I was amazed to find myself with three seats to myself on this flight. I also had three blankets and slept like a baby, except when we had to get off to refuel in Darwin at 2am. I arrived in Cairns and the first thing I did was go to the supermarket get some real western food, while marvelling at how easy it was to get directions to the supermarket now I was in an English speaking country.

My first meal was cheese on toast (It's impossible to get toast done correctly in Asia, so cheese on toast is out of the question). I also stocked up on crumpets for my breakfast, another thing I hadn't eaten since I left home. I found myself feeling quite cold, although it was over 20 degrees and people were sunbathing in town.

I headed out to look for a travel agent to book a tour for Ayers Rock, finding out that my travel agent in England had advised me badly about only needing 24 hours there - most tours lasted for at least 3 days. I managed to arrange a overnight tour with one company that fitted in with my flight times - giving me about half an hour buffer on either side. If anyone else plans to go to Ayers Rock I would advise spending several days there, if not more, as I missed out on Kings Canyon amongst other things.

After this I just wondered around town and looked at the artifical lagoon and some of the dive packages on offer, before heading off to bed to make sure I was up in plenty of time to catch my morning flight to Ayers Rock.

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Photos

Plane journey
With three seats... all to myself!

Landscape below
The baron and dry outback below was visible just after sunrise

Landscape below
As we neared Cairns, located in the tropics, the landscape became very green