hello folks, had a cracking time since my last update, we got to a place called townsville about a week ago, had a pretty good time there at the billabong sanctuary (i think i may have told you about this bit before, if not it's a place where you can cuddle a wombat and see amazing crock shows, i even got a hat that had been chewed by a crock), we set off from there and then stopped at a place called mission beach. Mission beack is popular for sky diving (didn;'t do that as i'm waiting for my 30th to jump out of a plane), we did however book to do a nights crock spotting on the local river. The trip started out pretty uneventfully (with no crocks spotted), we went down the river then came back at sunset, the boat driver needed someone on the torch to spot the crocks so obviously i voulenteered. It must be due to watching steve irwin because i managed to spot two crocks (about 1 metre long, which is really small, they are mostly tail). Anyway on the way back in the bus the driver (also our fearless crock boat captain) slammed his breaks on and shouted sh1t!!!!! Obviously we wanted to see what had hapened, so as we looked out the window we spotted the reason he stopped. a 4 metre long carpet python sitting warming up in the middle of the road (i say the middle, it was more like across, massive). the driver was cacking himself and wouldn't move till the snake got off the road, jokingly he suggested i move it. Not one to decline a challenge i gave it a go (by grabbing it's tail, see above), i nearly had a heart attack as it swung it's head round and came for me (luckily i'm much quicker, i've never moved so fast or made such a girly scream in my life). Well at least i had a go. the next thing you know this ozzie rocks up in his ute, picks the snake up by the tail (a bit more forcefully than me) and pretty much leads it off the road like a dog. So no crocks but a bloody big snake. we're in cairns now and have managed to sell the campervan (for more than we paid for it no less), it went in one day. Good news but now we're stuck in a tent for a couple of weeks (and it's decided to start raining all the time). Ho hum, c'est la vie. thanks for calling me grandma and grandad, it was great to speak to you (and hear peggy in the background), i'm looking forward to finally seeing the caravan when i get back. hope everyone else is well. have a gooden, matt and nic