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11/22/10

Early wake up this morning since I had to catch a bus at 7:45 am to Townsville which is located 6 hours south of Cairns by Greyhound bus. I found out the previous night that my roommate Guedo from Switzerland was also going on the same bus even though he would be on the bus twice as long as me to get to his destination. This was nice since I slept a bit easier knowing that the chances of us both over sleeping and missing the bus was pretty rare. I was up a little after 6:30 am and he was up when I came out of the bathroom located in our room. I was in a eight share dorm style room but we were the only two in the room. He was all packed up and I still needed to put my stuff together so we planned to meet at the lobby at 7:15 that way he had time to go down and have a quick cup of coffee. I checked the Internet quickly and saw that my Vikings were beaten badly by the Packers at home and upon seeing the final score I was not too interested in reading the game recap so I did not. I met Guedo down at the front at 7:15 and we started to walk the 15 minute walk to the Greyhound bus stop. We got to the bus at the perfect time just before they started to load up the bags for our trip. I was not looking forward to the bus trip, actually I was dreading it. It turned out to not be very bad at all, heck I kind of enjoyed it. First off I sat ear the back in the aisle seat and Guedo sat in the window seat. Guedo is not very large so we did not have the problem of being too close together. We also watched e a picture on my journey in the bus both of which I had never seen before. The first one was Amelia Earhart and the second one was a Hugh Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker movie called What about the Morgans or something. They were both entertaining enough to keep my attention for the most part and even though I would have chose something other than a romantic comedy for the second one I could stomach this one and even though the funny parts were very predictable I still enjoyed them. I found the sound somewhat hard to hear at times since it was just on the speakers and not too loud in case people wanted to sleep. I rained on and off for the entire journey so when it rained it made it that much harder to hear the sound from the movie. We stopped at some little town on the way for a lunch break and I found a place to get a meat pie and a coke so that was a very nice lunch. The rest of the bus ride to Townsville was uneventful but I did take a picture of Guedo and of the first Australian Greyhound bus I rode. I arrived at Townsville not having a clue of what to do or where to stay. I went and talked to the Tourist Information guy at the bus station terminal which was also the ferry terminal to Magnetic Island and that guy was as useful as a wet paper bag. I asked him about diving the Yongala Ship Wreck and about other things to do in the area while I waited for good weather to go diving and recommendations to for backpacker accommodations. He handed me a map of the city and gave me two random brochures and told me he was new and did not know much. Fantastic just my luck while looking at the map I saw that another Tourist Information center was four or five blocks away so I set off hopeful that I would get some better help with at least one of my questions. I arrived at the next place and was disappointed to find some older ladies that knew almost nothing about what I wanted to do and refereed me to the tourist information center in the center of town to book dive trips.
GREAT!!! Why not lug my 45 pound backpack another six or eight blocks into town to go to yet another Tourist Information center in the heat of the day. I sucked it up and made the journey and checked out the city and the accommodations that I went past. The town seemed absolutely vacant with no signs of real life besides cars going by. I still am not sure if this is due to it being a Monday or the fact that this is the wet season or something else I am not aware of. I did decide that I had no desire to stay in this city for even a single night unless I was going to go diving in the morning. The only reason I am here is I have the diving bug bad right now and I just want to go and dive again. Everyone that I have talked with has had rave review of diving the Ship Wreck Youngala. It sank back in 1911 and is only in like 30 meters of water and the ship is like 110 meters long. Notice how now I seem to use meters for everything it is almost like I am Australian. The third place was the right place to go and I put the worker Tracey on the task of helping me. First I asked her about my options on Diving the ship wreck, I knew the weather was bad and she told me that the companies were for sure not going on Tue or Wednesday but Saturday and Sunday was looking promising. I told her I could wait but if is was waiting around bored with nothing to do I would rather head south and find something else. I also asked her about maybe getting a special rate on a Whitsundays cruise but she told me with the "Schoolies" that everything would be expensive and full. The "Schoolies" just means that some of them have some sort of a week break or something and they go out and get crazy. She told me if I could wait until Monday that she might be able to swing me a deal. I asked her what the heck my options were to stay occupied and having fun for the next few days. Did she have any recommendations on day trips or places to go. She showed me a couple of things that I was not that keen on and more expensive then I would want to spend on something to just kill time. Then she showed me an offer at the near by island for round trip ferry ride two nights stay and a bunch of other extras for $95 dollars. Sold, that was the option I was looking for. I knew that a round trip ticket to the ferry alone was nearly $30 and the island seems very cool with some very nice walking trails. I believe it is also rated as the best place in Australia to see Koala bears in the wild. The only drawback is that I had to walk back to where I started and catch the ferry carrying my much to heavy backpack. I gathered my strength and made the voyage back and was thinking how wonderful it would have been if the guy at the ferry terminal would have been even remotely helpful I could have skipped all this extra mess and just hoped on the ferry. The ferry ride was only about 20 minutes long and it was a nice sized ferry. I was surprised how many bike commuters were getting on the ferry it must have been at least six or seven of them. My favorite bike commuter had a case of beer strapped to the back rack of his mountain bike, now if that does not scream extreme adventure seeker I am not sure what does. I then caught the bus on the island to my hostel. Upon arriving I had a good feeling that I would like this place and I went ahead and while checking in I booked a third night. This place is cool, I dig it. I am staying in a little bungalow type room with three beds a mini fridge and a fan. It is a step up from camping and is a triangle shaped small building. I have yet to meet my roommates but I am almost certain by the stuff they have laying around that they are both female. The hostel has a little bar and outdoor covered decking where you can use the wireless Internet so I was out to update some of my journal since I was a few days behind. I ended up meeting a couple from Holland "Peter and Rachael" at least that is the English versions of their names. He is 26 and she is 20 and they are on a 3 month holiday and have rented a camper van to drive from the north to the south. I had fun chatting with them and had a few drinks and next thing you know we are competing as a team in a competition at the bar in their own version of minute to win it. Neither of them knew what it was but I told them it would be fun so we went for it. We chose our team name as "Wii Not Fit" after Rachael did a search for funny team names. This was a blast and we had a silly good time. I am sorry to report that my team did not win the $30 bar tab. Out of 5 teams we finished tied for third place or if you look at it another way we finished tied for last place. A very good day and I am excited to explore this island in the next few days.