I did it! I got up and was on the beach to see the sunrise by 5:30 am. I was not alone. My new friends from Boston/ Melbourne were there as well as about 10 other people. More kept coming until there was probably about 20 of us to greet the sun. It was not disappointing. The colours as the sun made its way were absolutely amazing. I learned how to use the time lapse feature in my iPad and got the whole thing. Check it out in the pics. Unfortunately there were a few people who kept getting in the pic but it's still beautiful.

After a hearty breakfast we got back into our bus and made our way back to Cairns. We stopped at a mangrove path to see if we could catch sight of a Cassowary. I walked the entire path only seeing the lush green trees and plants. No cassowary to be found. I was very disappointed. First I didn't see a clown fish or shark and now no Cassowary. We were waiting for the rest of the group so I decided to venture down the path a ways. OMG, guess what? Yup I not only saw 1 cassowary but a father and his baby! I was so stoked. I got back to the bus and they were all waiting for me. Oops! Vic thought I had dropped my iPad and went off the path to get it and got stuck in the mud or got eaten by a croc. All sorts of scenarios were going through his head. But when I showed them my pictures all was forgiven.

We carried on back to Cairns only stopping for lunch in a pretty beach town called Port Douglas. It's very touristy but very clean. The main street is a melange of restaurants, cafes and stores - mostly souvenir shops. There was a cute little church right on the water with a picture window looking at the sea and mountains. Very scenic.

We arrived in Cairns around 3:30. Caitlin promised that we would have a typical Aussie BBQ in the park for dinner. So we just chilled in our room (it was a scorcher) until it was time to meet. We all made our way to the BBQ and proceeded to have appetizers and then grilled sausages, kangaroo medallions, beef burgers and salads and grilled veggies Kangaroo is interesting. One bite was very much like beef. The second piece tasted a bit like liver. I had to try it but I wouldn't order it in a restaurant. We also had some be vies and lots of great conversations. One of the younger Swiss gals wanted to go out so I said I would go with her. I couldn't let her go by herself after all. We got back to the hotel and freshened up. I came back down to meet Nikki and a few other people decided to join us. We had a blast dancing and carrying on. I had a skateboard ride on the dance floor with a bloke and tried to get the young girls some good looking guys. I'm not great at matchmaking unfortunately. Vic, however, was quite pleased that a young girl asked him to dance. We were dancing on the tables and having sooo much fun. All the young kids came up and joined us. The DJ decided to have a contest so Caitlin grabbed me and we went to the stage. He proceeded to give us "tasks" to complete. Whenever you didn't complete a task you were eliminated. The first task was to dance dirty with each other. Ok task accomplished. Next was give each other a hickey!!! Well, we didn't get eliminated because we pretended to do it. So, on to the next task - make out. We were off that stage so fast......without even being asked to leave!! But we had a good laugh about it even though we didn't win. Then back to dancing on the tables. I couldn't believe they allowed us to do it. Here's us dancing and at our feel people are sitting and drinking. We started a new trend I think. We were going to have an early morning with a long bus ride the next day so we shut it down around 1:00 am.

A fantastic time was had by all. And I think Vic and I do have it goin' on ....at least to the kids in the group.

It was a good day. I saw the croc and a cassowary. Now my mission is to see "Nemo" when we snorkel the Great Barrier Reef in the Whitsunday Islands in a couple of days. Keep your fingers crossed for me.