Wow, we made it to Cairns in goodtime, the final destination on our big oz extravaganza. The reasons behind this haste were not so great- Magnetic island was great, my first glimpse of sub-tropical paradise, though by the time we had driven further up north the rain had caught up with us, so Mission beach, an equally spectactular place and on every travellers list was a bit of a wash out. In all truth we were driving each other mad by sitting in the close proximity of 'Campers' all afternoon, so we thought for the sake of all our sanitys we had better head out to Cairns!
Cairns is a wicked place, full of colonial arcitecture and fellow back packers. There is even a 'Backpackers Resort', which looked very flash, but when we heard the prices we had to scarper pretty quick! No luxury for us! As we made it to Cairns with days to spare, we thought we would nip up to port Douglas. It was absolutly lovely there; full of pretty restaurants on the marina front, markets and seafood everywhere. The backpackers we parked up in was amazing, with pool, hammocks and very cheap beer. On the way back down to Cairns we passed the Queensland tropical zoo............we had to go in! The only wildlife id seen so far was road kill kangeroos, so to actually feed the real things, stroke a koala, hold a baby alligator, and watch the crocodile, bird and snake shows was very cool! And the day was rounded off as only we could do it- clare left the headlights of campers on for the 4 hours we were in the zoo, so 2 burly zoo keepers had to be called out of the zoo to give us a push! Very funny; almost as funny as when she reversed into an unsuspecting vehicle in the campsite car park. No real damaged was caused, so its all good!
Once we were back in Cairns, i did the honours of saying a sad good bye to Campers; not really all that exciting, considering the girls were preoccupied with Clare extending her tattoo! Then we headed out to celebrate Cairns with several people we had met along the way in Oz. All in all, its been a very cool place, though i wont be sorry to say goodbye to the prices. We fly to Thailand tommorrow, and i am unbelievably excited! ( though not excited about spending the next 40 hours travelling between airports at Cairns, Sydney and Bangkok) Not really sure what to expect Asia, especially from Cambodia and India, but i think im ready for it; i am fully replenished in the way of antibacterial wash, baby wipes, insect repellent and loo roll. I can take what ever is thrown at me!
