Yet another early start this morning. Our taxi collected us at 6.30am for our flight to Hamilton island in the Whitsundays. The flight was great and due to clear sky's the views were stunning. After 1 1/2 hours we were landing on what seemed like paradise. We had to get a ferry to the mainland which took an hour, through turquoise waters in hot sunshine. When we docked we hadn't any taxi waiting so looking at a map thought we could walk to our accommodation....

Forgot to say that of course it was the Great Barrier Reef we snorkelled on yesterday. Today the sea was dead flat whereas yesterday it was choppy. Made for a very exciting trip with less people so was good. This morning we were up again at the crack of dawn. Our bus picked us up at 6.50am for a trip north to Daintree Rainforest and Cape Tribulation. Catherine would have been bored with this, but we really enjoyed it. We started off getting 'smoked' by an ab...

Well we did it but I never thought we would make it after last night. Catherine was due to pick up her tour at 6.30am and I don't think any of us slept properly. The wind was very strong and was rattling the windows and between hoping that Catherine's trip went well and hoping the winds would abate so our Reef trip wasn't cancelled - a bad night was had by all. However this morning we went at 6.30am with Catherine to her pick up point then stopped off on the w...

Up early this morning to be collected for our trip on the Karunda Railway. Ross and Louise had to take the earlier train and have to leave early, as they are flying back tonight to be at work tomorrow. We went up on the train which was a great trip through the rainforest, as we got higher the clouds were starting to break up a bit and by the time we got to our destination it was sunny. Leaving the station we heard someone shout "hey grandad" and it was Ross an...

Well we are off up North to sunny Cairns. Wrong, we arrived and it was chucking it down with really low cloud. The hotel is superb and room vary spacious. Ross and Louise came over to see us and we went for a walk around Cairns and stopped for a beer. We continued around the marina then it was hungry o'clock. We found a good Italian restaurant and then continued on for a couple of beers after. Good night was had by all. Got to be up early tomorrow for our ...