Cairns - I only came here because I love those namesake piles of stones that tell me I am on the right track in the lake district. Images conjured up in the old minds eye of a flask of milky tea and a tuna butty looking over the fells. Imagine Messner's horror then that the place is actually full of 18 year olds on heat marauding round like electric warriors. After an interesting first night in my hostel which involved me introducing a Korean guy to snakebite and black - which he downed three pints of in about 15 minutes and then duly collapsed, I headed North to some rainforest and took on some diving on the barrier reef... After going a whole 6 days without one proper conversation, as most of the young nippers haven't developed the art of social intercourse yet, I was seriously contemplating returning to the bosom of my beloved New Zealand. I'm so glad I didn't - like the trooper I am I stuck with it and have had two weeks of the most expensive but greatest banter of the whole trip. I fell in with a good crowd and hoovered down the coast stopping at nice beaches, spotting koalas along the way, before going on a 3 day cruise around the very nice Whitsundays. The going was hard, snorkelling during the day and drinking at night. The IQ of some of my fellow crew members was revealed when the captain of the ship gave a short talk on the stars of the Soutern Hemisphere. Tracy, 22 of Nottingham asked two questions that would have had Stephen Hawking's fusebox steaming up: * 'Are the stars still there at night and we just can't see them?' * 'Does the Earth go round the sun then?' Even just watching button moon as a child should have supplied the andwer to these Mensa entry questions! Drinking pretty much every night has been the norm the whole way down this 'party' coast. The lack of culture and history is replaced by the plethora of bars and booze. The most commonly used word is partying (e.g. I was partying all night last night) - a word that only conjures up images of walking around in a paper hat and pulling a party popper while doing the conga. If only.... Then onwards South - go and have a look at Brisbane for Part II Hot and sweaty Messner