The sleep in Darwin airport was not much fun. They had announcements every fifteen minutes about different flights so I did not get much sleep. The plane journey was not too bad though. After arriving at the airport I called Serpent Hostel's shuttle bus to get me but they told me the wrong place to stand so I ended up waiting over an hour before finally being able to get to my hostel. After getting to my hostel I had to wait about 3 hours before I could check in.

The following day I went and booked a lot of the trips I wanted to do around Cairns. In the evening I went to see Sam Powers (who is from Sydney) at the Cairns casino. He won magician of the year last year. The show was very good. There were no more than 30 people in the audience. He did some big magic tricks like swords through the box but put a twist into it as he opened the box to show no assistant was in there, closed it again, pulled the swords out and the out stepped the assistant, and he was turning the box the whole time so you could see she wasn't just behind it. He then did some close up tricks and went into the audience, being followed by a camera so everyone could see and did a few tricks to members of the audience, including attaching 2 elastic bands together and the detaching them. He then did a trick that involved a box that had been hanging above us the whole time. He threw a brick into the audience and asked the woman who caught it where she would like to go in the world, she passed it to someone else who was asked who they would take with them, they then threw it and the next question was what gift they would buy them and then finally what time the flight was. Sam Powers then pulled down the box and pulled out a jar with paper in. On the paper was the exact same story that the audience had come up with. After the show I had a 3 course meal at a 4 star restuarant that was included in the ticket and then had a look in the casino.

I chilled out for a few days and played in the Sunday afternoon Volleyball tournament at the hostel. On Tuesday 8th I went to Cape tribulation. I got picked up from the hostel very early. We then drove for a couple of hours to the Daintree River Ferry Crossing. On the way we watched a video about all the poisonous and deadly animals in Australia. While the bus went across on the ferry we went on a little cruise around the river spotting crocodiles. We saw 4 ranging from a baby about 30cm big to a 4 year old just over a meter long. We then met the bus on the other side and travelled to a bit of the rainforest we could walk around. Here we were taught about the plants including what not to touch and eat because they were poisonous. Our guide told us about another guide who had been gardening in black trousers and a blue top. She looked up to find a Cassowary staring at her so slowly went into her house. The cassowary followed so she hid in the bedroom and closed the door. Everytime she looked out the cassowary looked at her and then preened its feathers. After a while she realised what she was wearing and that the cassowary was trying to court her. So she changed clothes and left the bedroom. The cassowary looked around her a bit confused and then dissapeared.

We then arrived at PK's Jungle lodge in Cape Tribulation and got checked in. That evening I went out on a night walk. We didn't see much apart from a few spiders and I thought I saw a rat or mouse run past but it was gone by the time I got my torch on. We did find a cool log which had a fungus on that glows in the dark when it is damp. In the rainy season it is everywhere and the locals use it to guide them home. (The glowing plants in Avatar were based on this) The next day I went sea kayaking in the morning. I had a great time and there were only 2 of us on the tour. We started by kayaking around the headland which was really hard against the wind. We saw a few birds on the way. Just before we landed on the beach the other side the wind caught my Kayak and turned it sideways just as a wave hit and capsized me. On the beach we had a look for coconuts and had a few biscuits and a drink before going back again. This time it was much easier as the wind was with us and when we got back to the other beach the tide had gone out so we could see some of the reef. We paddled around a bit looking for turtles and fish. We thought we saw a shark and a turtle came up behind me and I saw it very briefly but it had gone by the time I got my camera. We then put the Kayaks away and our guide cut up the coconut so we could drink the milk and then eat it.

In the afternoon I went on an exotic fruit farm trip. We got to try 10 different exotic fruits including soursop, black sapote, breadfruit, pommelo, jakfruit, mamey sapote, dragons eyeball and west indian lime. After that we took a tour of the farm and then went back to our accomodation. The next morning I did a horseride. I had a horse called Ringer. Apparently he likes to mess around but was as good as gold for me. We walked through the rainforest and out onto the beach. We then went back into the rainforest and got to do some cantering. This was really good fun but I had a small horse so he was a bit slower than the others so I was at the back and the couple infront of me had never been on a horse before so they kept panicing and stopping so I had to stop Ringer too so he didn't start a race. (They were all ex-racing horses) We stopped at a waterhole and had some crisps and drink then carried on back to the ranch.

In the afternoon I got back on the bus and returned to my hostel in Cairns. I have today to relax and then I am going on a trip to the outer great barrier reef.