We arrived in Cairns just under a week before we had to drop off the van. I had some old friends living there from Jersey so we gave them a call and they arranged to meet us near their home. Wayne came to pick us up and we followed back to his home and met the rest of the family Dee, Morgan (6) and Maia (3). We chilled around their home for the day and caught up on what they and we had been doing since we saw them last. On the Monday Dee had work and we went on...

We drove around South Mission beach and checked out the area before heading further up to main Mission beach. On the way down there were signs all over the place for Casowary crossings. We made sure we kept our eyes peeled, as (other than destroying your van!) apparently they use their massive claw to tear your stomach out! lol... As you can imagine, everytime I heard the slightest rustle in the bushes, I was ready to jump back into the van! ha ha... We found a ...

First thoughts whilst driving into Airlie Beach - Beautiful! We found a campsite about half hour to 45 minutes walk from the town and set up camp. We caught a bus in and went for a wonder around. One of the things we've noticed most about Australia is the amount of free places available for families to go. They have massive lagoons with water features and free gas BBQ's etc... It's such a shame they couldn't do things like that at home. We stopped for a drink a...

We drove to Rockhampton and on the way I noticed a sign for a place called Mount Morgan. Hayley had some friends there which she had met ten years before when she went travelling, who she had told us to call on our way through. As we hadn't realised that Mount Morgan was just before Rockhampton, we found the nearest campsite and contacted them. Megan invited us to come for dinner and stay the following night. So, the next morning we checked out of our campsite a...

We booked a trip to a place called 'Lady Musgrave Island' which is the start of the Great Barrier Reef. The boat was a bit choppy and there were people in the lower deck chundering all the way. There were one of two people on the top deck where we were with dodgy tummies but luckily we were ok and just ate chuppa chups all the way. We arrived at the island and all got onto a pontoon in the middle of beautiful clear green coloured water - stunning! We jumped in p...