After checking out of our hostel we met Grant's brother, Aaron who had kindly agreed to put us up for the rest of the week. We were really thankful for this - some space to sort ourselves out before we head to Asia and being able to save money by not having to be in a hostel! We spent most of this day sorting ourselves out and doing jobs like washing and checking budgets etc. We did go for a wander into and around the city centre which was nice, pretty small but ...

Yet again we had to be outside the hostel at ridiculous 'o' clock, 5:30 to be precise! From the start we knew we would have fun, there were some real characters on the bus. We headed north for an hour or so, passing over the Tropic of Capricorn until we reached Ti Tree where we had breakfast, Ti Tree is pretty much exactly in the centre of Australia. We stopped off at Wycliffe Wells which is a 'town' where they have the most UFO sightings in Australia apparently!...

We arrived in Alice Springs to 40oC heat in the shade. Ridiculous temperatures, we were nearly melting as soon as we stepped off the plane (it actually isn't as bad as it sounds as the humidity is really low so its loads easier to cope with than you'd think!). We went to our hostel and had a quick look around Alice; since it was a bank holiday nothing was open, we found some hats and fly nets before heading back to the hostel - only a quick foray out into the bur...

Last Saturday was Australia Day, a big public holiday over here. We celebrated by having a traditional Ozzie style BBQ at Debbie and Grants. Our Irish mates (Denise and Rob) came over as well as some of Debbie and Grants mates. We all had quite a few drinks and it was decided that we should collect cane toads from the garden and have a race!! Collecting them wasn't too difficult (well Debbie did all of the hard work here) if you can avoid the poisonous glands on ...

We arrived in Cairns on Tuesday after our last bus ride with Greyhound and were met by Debbie and Grant at the bus station.We met Debbie and Grant in Peru when we did the Inca Trail and they are kindly putting us up for the week while we explore Cairns.It is so nice staying at their house, which is so beautiful, right by Clifton Beach, about 20 mins out of Cairns. Wednesday we had a sorting out day (lots of washing!!) and went into Cairns with Debbie for a bit ...