Cairns

Flew into Sydney with a connecting flight to Cairns to begin our epic journey down the East coast. We had to have an overnight stay before the connecting flight so as to not spoil anything about Sydney, as we were to end our travels here, we stayed in a room in an apartment close to the airport... Very strange, but cheap and just a bed for the night!!!
We arrived in Cairns 4pmish and grabbed our free airport transfer to our first hostel, caravellas. Very nice, private room with aircon, shared bathroom with 2 other rooms, pool area, communal kitchen.... Whilst here we needed to get our Greyhound bus ticket to hop on and off along our way back down the coast. So we ventured out to check out the place, it doesn't have a beach but does have a lagoon... Massive free pool!! Lovely walking espandade with people chilling and kids playing, the town itself is set in blocks and easily navigated. Tourist and backpackers haven, lots of places to book tours, eat drink, shop etc. The greyhound shop found but no ticket purchased!!! Too much hard sell for other stuff!!! So we took our meal ticket from our hostel to the Irish bar to check out what 7$ meal and drink we could actually get, turned out anything off the menu... Lush and the drinks we like!!! That's our 3 nights meals sorted!!! We deliberate over dinner plans and decide to flow with looking at what we fancy doing and if available we'll do it!!! Next morning bus ticket booked via hostel (with discount!) and a trip to Fitzroy Island booked for the next day. Today we would venture around the shopping centre, sit around pool, go to lagoon too and then eat at our meal voucher Irish bar!!!
We wake up early ready to walk for our trip to Fitzroy Island.... It's going to be a hot one!!! We board the boat and set off for the 40 mins cruise across the coral sea! On arrival we grab the paddle boards for a first activity, this is much fun and I am able to stand up and paddle around the bay, I think this is good preparation for my plan to have a surf lesson further down the coast!!! Sarah decides that sitting is her best option, not because she can't stand but she is a little apprehensive of falling off in deep water. After our hours use we grab some snorkeling equipment and walk to an area where we believe there will be good reef to look at. Again this is just my thing and Sarah nearly let her apprehension get the better of her, but after some support and help I guide her out and over some amazing reef views busy with a wide range of amazing fish swimming and feeding off. Wow truly the best experience and a real life tropical fish experience... These are Sarah's words, so it is safe to say she was taking to snorkeling like a duck to water!!! Sarah also was hooked and wanted to venture more, but we stopped for some lunch before doing a little more in another area. We also had a trip on a glass bottomed boat as part of our day out, this was good because we got to go out a little deeper and really see the reef and learn about it. On our return we had about an hour before cruising back to Cairns.... You guessed it, we did some more snorkeling!!!
Back at Cairns we went back to the hostel, changed and grabbed our dinner ticket. We return to pack as we move on in the morning.... Our first experience of the Greyhound Bus!!!