Next stop Townsville...left Mission Beach on the Monday morning (18th) for a bus at 9am that took about 4 hours. Another crap film and we were there in no time! Made our way to the hostel we had booked, a place called Globetrotters which thankfully was only a short walk, still not able to manish carrying all my possessions around on my back for extended periods of time! ;o) The reception area was deceptively nice, clean and modern....the room however was not! We paid 60 aussie dollars for a twin room with en suite so couldn't really complain, comparative luxury to the places we were going to be staying in (weirdly a double was 75, didn't want to share a bed that much!) but the room was really grubby, damp and strange smelling. Needless to say we didn't need an excuse to escape and mooched around the town for a while which was even worse than the skanky room! Turns out EVERYTHING is shut on Monday so the place was like a ghost town, bizarre. Didn't help that alot of the shops were boarded up anyway and so shopping was over in about 10mins. Walked along the Strand, the main road on the sea front and pretty memorial gardens which were nice but had seen it in about half an hour! Did a lot of laundry and thankfully the only internet cafe in the town was open as was Mc Donalds, hence our evening was planned ;o) Our disgusting room did have a TV so we came back for new Scrubs, Desperate Housewives and ate a lot of chocolate before chatting for a while and sleeping before 11pm - about a 12hour sleep!! Party town....

The next day we prob didn't get out of bed until midday, no urgent sightseeing so didn't feel too bad!! Walked down the Strand and found a nice spot to base ourselves for the afternoon. Sat on the grass verge down to the beach reading, listening to the iPod and getting yummy fish n chips in paper bags for lunch (whilst evilling the circling sea gulls!) Stayed there most of the afternoon before walking all the way down to the end of the Strand to the lagoon and Kissing Point - don't know why it is called that but would be rude not to! ;o) Came back to the hostel for some TV and getting ready to go out in party town.... not. Booked loads of flights, hotels, buses etc for more places on our trip including Magnetic Island and parts of the US and decided out of a choice of about 2 different options that Subway was a good shout for dinner (the other one was Mc Donalds!!). Really can't tell you much more about Townsville as it was decidedly crap!

Headed off the following morning (Wed 20th) to Magnetic Island, about 8km off the coast and a 20min high speed catamaran journey from Townsville. Don't really know what we were expecting but it was odd.... LOST esque but with a fully operational bus service and nothing else, half developed but with no other infrastructure, shops, restaurants etc! Got an all day bus pass for 6 dollars and went straight to our hostel in Picnic Bay - it used to be the main port to and from the mainland before Nelly Bay but now was deserted. Got off the bus and walked up to our hostel, Traveller's Hideaway (very apt name!) where we checked in for one night into a 4 bed dorm.... the room was no bigger than 2 bunk beds with the smallest path between them, no space for bags or anything and no windows, was like a coffin! Had an hour to kill before the bus came back so explored Picnic Bay, that took all of 10 minutes. Got strawberry thickshakes from the one cafe and walked along the jetty, managed to spy a cuttlefish and some other cool looking fish but that was about it! Got the bus all the way up to the northern part of the island, took about half an hour and we arrived in Horseshoe Bay, the main beach. It was really beautiful and we walked all the way around before sitting in the sunshine for a few hours and having a drink at the pub. The only other area worth exploring was in the middle of Horseshoe Bay and Picnic Bay - a place called Arcadia so got the bus back to there and there was absolutely nothing there!! Had nearly 2 hours to kill so admired the scenery and sunset and sat and played cards at a picnic table for ageeeeeeees! Got really cold and dark so headed back at the first possible opportunity and got some dinner from the cafe in Picnic Bay where we had bought thickshakes from earlier. Fairly standard pub grub but quite expensive due to the remoteness of everything! Went back to the hostel, chatted to a few people and watched a marathon of House and Family Guy before deciding bed was the most exciting option and attempting to sleep in the coffin....only we had a (female) room mate who snored like a train!! Needless to say, the trip was an "experience" but we couldn't wait to leave Magnetic Island/Townsville for Airlie Beach first thing in the morning!!