Sorry its been a few weeks since the last update, we've been having a very hectic time! So we arrived into Cairns on a very early Monday morning, after a lush flight where we both had 3 seats each and lots of pillows and blankets! That night we went out to a place called the Woolshed where we danced on tables and drank tequila, a good night was had by all!

We hired a car a few days later and drove up to Cape Tribulation for a night, but the weather was not on our side, and it rained constantly! On our way up we drove past a big Ostrich like creature, so decided to get out and take pictures. Rach kept telling it to come here and smile, but when we arrived at the hotel we got talking to a member of staff who told us it was a Cassowary and they are actually evil, and one had killed a child a few weeks ago with its giant weird claw! oops! It was a beautiful place, but we were looking forward to getting back to Cairns the next night. Unfortunately, the rain took over once again and there were two creeks that had completely flooded the roads! We managed to get through them eventually in our little Mazda, and there will be video evidence as soon as we get to a computer that will let us upload them!

Back to Cairns to begin our 4 day Open Water Scuba Diving course which consisted of 2 days pool training with 'Ruthie' our patronising whale of an instructor, and Brad the fit 18 year old helper, who Rach fancied until she was informed of his age! After the pool training we headed out to the Great Barrier Reef, it was really good, and we all did really well, until the seasickness defeated Alyx, and she couldn't do her last 2 dives. But Rach was a hardnut and she is now qualified to dive up to 18 metres! We saw Nemo, stingrays, and even got to scratch a turtles back. In between dives Rach entertained herself by stealing all Andrews clothes while he was in the shower, and locking him in the bathroom. The plan backfired when we realised the doorhandle was broken and he couldnt get out for ages! Served him right for putting on Alyx's bikini though!

All in all we were in Cairns for 10 days, probably a bit longer than we intended to stay but it was such a nice place that we're glad we did. After the motion sickness wore off, we headed down to Mission Beach - not the most exciting place you'll ever stumble across, population of 500 and we think they're all related. Everything shut at 6pm, so we did nothing, and moved swiftly on the next day to Townsville, where we also did nothing, but had our first bbq which was good fun.