As soon as we arrived in Cairns, we heard on the radio in our taxi that Tropical Cyclone Larry was intensifying in the Coral Sea and might become a category 2 storm in the next few hours. At that time though Cairns was sunny and hot, unlike Darwin.

We can't afford to pay much for food in Australia. For lunch everyday we have bread and cheese and we get a free meal at a pub every night. We are meant to drink something with our meal but we just eat quickly and leave. We get a choice of 4 pasta meals in child size portions.

On our first day we had a look around for a Barrier Reef Trip. One tour agent told us that we would have to do it the next day or not at all. He said the cyclone had become category 3 and was expected to head west into Cairns the following evening. I didn't know whether or not he was exaggerating when he said that Cairns would get 3 feet of rainfall. (It turned out he was.)

The boat that we took out to the reef had more than 50 people on it. Katie took sea sickness tablets which made her really drowsy.

We went scuba diving for half an hour. Katie didn't like it at first because she couldn't relax. I didn't like it because we went too deep to see any fish or coral and most of the time was taken up with posing for photos with a sea cucumber (don't worry, I didn't eat it).

We went snorkelling for a few hours after and saw loads of fish and coral. It was much better because we had more freedom.

I made the most of the free lunch. I filled my plate twice. Out of 50 people, only three of us went up for seconds.

Later on when we saw the underwater photos, I was gutted because loads of people had been playing with a turtle and we had just been posing with a boring sea cucumber, which the professional diver from the diving company handed to me. Apart from the sea cucumber, I didn't touch anything because you are not supposed to.

The boat back was rough. The storm was starting out at sea and the islands and the pontoons were being evacuated. There were probably 100 people on our boat and it was extremely rocky.

When we got back to the harbour it was empty. Everyone had run away with their boats. When we were getting off, the boat captain said "Run for your lives, there's a cyclone coming! Only joking". The streets were empty too. Cyclone Larry was now a category 4 hurricane and due in 10 hours.

We packed our bags and made everything waterproof in case we were evacuated in the middle of the night and taken to a shelter, like in the movies.

It was really eerie that night. Very hot and very still, and no one was out.

Katie woke me up at 4 in the morning because she was worried that the rain was so heavy that our room would get flooded. I realised that being in ground floor room, 50 metres from the sea was probably not the best place to be in a tropical cyclone.

Tropical Cyclone Larry was now upgraded to a category 5 storm which is the highest category. It hit a town 50 miles south from us at 8 in the morning and destroyed 50% of the houses. It was the most powerful cyclone in Australia for 50 years, more powerful than Hurricane Katrina. Check out the photos of the really big trees that were uprooted.

Yesterday we went into the Atherton Tablelands on a scenic railway and skyrail. There were amazing views of the rainforest. In the afternoon we were supposed to do loads of cool things like visit a Banana Plantation, go whiskey tasting, swim in a big lake in a national park, but everything was closed because of the cyclone. Even the national park was closed. The Atherton Tablelands were badly hit by the cyclone. Every second farm we went past was destroyed: their crops were flattened and the roofs of the houses were blown off. We were in a tour bus that could seat about 30 people but it was just me, Katie, and an old couple. Our driver was driving around for a few hours trying to find something for us to do. At one point he said "I've never been down this road before, but let's see where it goes".

The roads have opened and we are leaving Cairns on Sunday and going to Airlee Beach for one night and then we are staying on a farm for 3 days. Check out the underwater photos that Katie put on the Cairns photo album. We had an underwater camera since Malaysia and almost all the underwater photos on our website we took ourselves apart from the first two of the sea cucumber and the clown fish.

Aidan.