Hello from sunny Cairns!

Well what a few days this has been! Absolutely shattered, emotional, excited and nervous all in one really.

First, the flights! One piece of advice, NEVER try and do UK to Australia WITHOUT a decent stop-over! So we got to Heathrow T3 on Thursday 6pm, met up and excitedly checked in, pretty shocked by how heavy our bags already were! We said a teary goodbye to the parents, and promised we would take care of each other for the next 12 weeks. We got through security fine, (no x-ray body scanners there yet!) and sat excited and nervous in departures, waiting for our gate to open.

Our first flight was to Dubai, 6 hours 45 minutes. We took off at 10pm, really expecting to be able to sleep the whole way but sadly, this was not going to be our day for easy sleeping. Emirates is impressive by the way, 600 channels to choose from! I watched Twilight on the way out but dozed off at the crucial point (good timing Poole!). They were trying too hard with the food though, I don't like plane food and cannot understand how anyone can- who can stomach lamb medallions whilst flying 37,000ft in the air?! So that was avoided at all costs. We landed in Dubai, tired, but amazed at the luxurious airport, and also the dryness of Dubai landscape! We got through to our departure gate straight away, a bit in awe at the 'shopping-mall' likeness of airside Dubai Airport! With just a 15 minute breather, we waited to get onto our plane, which would be our home for the next 14...yes 14 hours!

We took off about 45 minutes late, and I counted that I watched 5 films throughout the hell-ish flight! Various states of trying to sleep though so yet again missed the endings. Finding Nemo cheered me up though, especially as it is set in Sydney! My mental block came at about 7 hours in, when everyone (well it seemed like it) was asleep and I wasn't! We couldn't believe we were only half way through the flight, it was painful. But anyway, we survived, just will definitely never put ourselves through that again.

We landed in Brisbane, greeted by rain! So that didn't really lighten our mood, but hey, we had got to Australia, our first stop on our round-the-world trip! With about 4 hours in Brisbane before our flight up to Cairns we had to pick up our luggage, get the train to the domestic airport (which cost $5 for the priviledge!) and made our first travelling friend- a German called Jan - along the way, he was on his own, with sketchy plans but there is a possibility that we may well bump into him down the coast - you just never know!

Our flight to Cairns was with Jetstar - pretty much identical to EasyJet without the rush for seats! Thankfully, I slept a bit on this 2hr20 flight, and soon enough we had landed in sunny Cairns - another relief! Boiling boiling hot though, but better than rain. We got picked up by the hostel shuttle, and checked in to our first hostel!

After spending holidays in hotels, I don't think I was completely prepared for hostel accommodation - it is a bit of a wake up call but I think it will only make us stronger in the long run! The bed was comfy, the pillow was decent, the toilets and showers were only down the corridor and we had air conditioning so it wasn't terrible! We got some tea at Outback Jacks - typical Oz food - they are mad about steak over here! I just had a burger, but just wanted sleep to be honest, we had been on the go non-stop for 48 hours and it was horrible! So we got back to the hostel, and experienced our first night's sleep at Bohemia Central Hostel, Cairns.

In our room was a French guy called Sayed (mad as a hatter) and his French girlfriend (we think) called Charlotte, they were both nice and we found that they had both been travelling for nearly 5 months! That made me feel like a proper amateur! Then we found out that Sayed had won $1500 at the casino the night before, then gone and lost it all, plus another $1000! Stupid!

We got up, got out and walked down to the coastline. The beach in Cairns is not nice, mudflats rather than an actual beach and the presence of box jellyfish mean that it just isnt safe to be on the beach really, so Cairns have created a 'lagoon' by the sea, which is like a big park running parallel to the sea, with a nice pool! We went on the Sunday, and the place was packed! They had outdoor BBQs and people were using them, and everyone looked pretty happy and relaxed - we were starting to understand why! Cairns is really nice, quite busy but in a good way.

Sunday night we had some tea from 'Fasta Pasta' - it really was fast, I ordered lasagne and I have never seen anything like it! It was a square of lasagne but covered (like custard does) in the mince! So the lasagne was practically swimming in mince! It was ok, but once again, we were both very tired so finished quickly and returned to our room, by which time 2 english guys and a nice girl (called Helen) had moved in. The guys were asleep at 6pm when we got back from the lagoon, so we moved around in the dark, that's tough! But by the time we got back at 11pm, we needed the light on to pack up properly as we were moving on the next day - proper hostel politics! In one giggle fit Amber had before tea (it involves vaseline...! ha ha) one of the guys made a comment in his sleep - something about being drunk - he was complaining about the noise basically! So we decided at 11pm we were within our rights to put the light on.So we did. And checked out at 7am the next morning before they surfaced

Right this has all gone funny so I am very sorry and will just have to post it like this till i can sort it out sorry

lots of love

xxxxxxxxxx!!