We caught the greyhound from Cairns at one o clock, just. Wed been standing at the bus station for about twenty minutes, an obviously place for any bus to depart but suddenly realised we were in the wrong place and with only five minutes to go before departure (not Fiji time) we had to run across Cairns with our huge backpacks, fully clothes and in the heat to the right place!

We were very relieved to find the bus had working aircon and was only half full so we all got double seats to ourselves! Our first bus journey of the trip didnt look like it was going to be so bad... Then before the bus had even started going, a big bloke when into the toilet - right behind us - and layed down a big one that stank out the whole bus. He must have been in there about half an hour as well, it was disgusting!! Bleuegh!!

When we got to the Mussion beach -wongaling bus station we all piled out and into the jackeroo hostel shuttle bus. We had to wait half an hour or so first though as another bus was due to arrive so we jumped back out and over to woolworths (a supermarket, yeah weird to be called that) to stock up on food for dinner...another delish looking and tasting salad, this time with tuna not feta! Yummm!!

The Jackeroo hostel is settled in the middle of some rain forest and is completely idyllic, i understand why do many of the people staying here have extended their trip!! The hostel is a big wooden structure with six bed dorms, although we have one just to ourselves at the moment... Its communal areas are outside with just a roof over the top And the most spectacular views ever!

On the first night the guys there set up a projector and nailed a white bed sheet to one of the walls and we all got beanbags and huddled round a huge bowl of popcorn and sat and watched anchorman the movie. It was perfect!! I spent the following couple of days alternating between lying on the beach sunbathing and lying by the gorgeous hostel (almost) infinity pool, which view out across the rainforest, incredible!!

On Monday the girls did their sky dive, i was worried all morning about them, with my mind going into overdrive of what ifs but they both landed safely and i went to meet them at the skydive centre afterwards (they left at about 730 am!!) and were both pumped full of adrenaline! I was very proud of them but just watching their vidoes back at the hostel and hearing them recount the experience made me firmly believe that it was the right choice for me not to do it! The blokes here at the hostel called me a p**** but it would have been completely wasted on me... I have blacked out the second we jumped out of the plane (just the sentence gives me heeby jeebys) and then desperately waiting for the parachute to go up, still with my eyes closed and then waiting just waiting for my feet to touch land. My video would have been the most boring thing ever! I doubt if have even screamed id be petrified silent and that is a hard thing to do, shut me up!! In the evening on Monday I managed to get on the hostel managers laptop and skype B the birthday boy which was to see him as we havnt had access to wifi and therefore facetime and video calling so it was a good birthday treat for us both :)

Jackaroo had the most amazing views into the rainforest, gorgeous little swimming pool and lots of cosy areas to play games and read books. We spent almost our entire stay reading, Al's on her second iBook and playing our new favorite game that we traded in fiji - rummicub! We had a tournament going at one point with loads of people playing, it was great!!

We were due to be leaving Jackaroo hostel on Tuesday or Wednesday and travelling further down the coast to Townsville, but quite a few people have been talking about it as s***sville so as we loved Jackaroo and mission beach so much we extended our stay for another two nights, this obviously had nothing to do with the free, all you can eat bbq that we would now be staying for or anything!!

The hostel guys got Al and I special veggie burgers and sausages and cooked them seperately for us and we put together a delish salad of bery root, sweetcorns, cucumber and tomato (pretty much all veggies that are either cheap or tinned!!) sooo yummy!! And we were naughty and packed a full Tupperware box full of goodies for our greyhound bus journey the following day, down to Townsville, for the full moon party on magnetic island!