after my little hissyfit with this technology stuff i realised i haven't really kept you avid readers up to date lately! so i'll try and search through the haze of goon for some brain cells that may have miraculously survived and figure out what i've been up to for the last week or so!!! so after we got off the boat in Airlie i made a desperate attempt to earn myself some moolah - not prostitution - not yet anyways - but by Jelly Wrestling!!!! woo hoo some how i got convinced by the group that if i took part and won the 500 bucks i would share it with them and we'd be flush for the rest of Aus - i liked the idea of being flush although wasnt too sure about the sharing and being covered in jelly part but hey i'll give most things a go (particularly those with cash prizes!!!) unforunately i lost to a super feisty Canadian chick but i still gave it a good shot and got a few free drinks from it - which is almost as good as cash prizes in my view! another bonus was that something in the jelly must have been really good for my skin - its been silky smooth ever since!! lol the next day the four of us hopped on the faithful Greyhound and headed up to townsville for some tapas and chilling - Amber and Hol carried on up to Cairns hat night but Lu and I schooched over to Magnetic Island for a couple of days! the island was beautiful although the weather was lame so there wasnt much to do but thankfully the hostel was really cool so just chilled out really! although the locals werea bit mental - got some super cheesy chat up lines from old ugly blokes and just generally got teased by the bar staff - funny though i guess! one awesome thing about Maggy was that i got to go riding through the bush and on the beach which was awesome! the stable girls must have been telepathic cos i got the most aptly name horse ever - Sambucca!! yee haw!rode through the bush - saw loads of wallabies or as the french ppl on the ride called them - 'les petits Kangaroo' although was less keen on the cute little critters after one jumped out on me while i was cantering and made Sambucca completely freak out!! it was ace though cos at the end we round down onto the beach and went in the water bareback in our swimmers - very wierd but ace experience - cant say i've ever had the oppurtunity to drive off a horse into the ocean before!!! that evening we headed back to the mainland and after a bit of a spell looking like homeless people sat outside the bus terminal in our sleeping bags, boarded our last greyhound bus *sniffles* and headed up to Cairns. Got there to yet nmore crappy weather and the discovery that Amber was totally ridden with Bed Bugs -nice- so had to spend the whole day spraying and zapping just in case! - most of my stuff probably needed some fumigating and airating by this stage anyway!! our hostel in cairns was totally lush! the four of us had our own dorm so we could just spread out and chill - oh the joy of not having to fight over the bottom bunk for a change and the ability to actually unpack!!! plus there was a loverly pool and loadsof cool people! our first night was OZ vs Japan in the world cup which was pretty ace, plus met up with a couple of guys who Hol and Amb knew from Thailand, as normal drank too much goon and ate to much fast food on the way home!!! seriously got to get healthy!!!!!! chilled out for a bit after that and wandered around Cairns - pretty cool town very chilled out but lots of scary and mean aboriginals though unfortunatly - the women kept trying to start fights with everyone! thenon wednesdaywe hired oursleves a little car - Mavis - and drove up north to Port Douglas and cape tribulation which was really cool had a little picnic, attemptedto use Ambs bag as a kite tosomedy effect, sang very loudly and badly mostly to Oasis, walked through lots of rainforests and had enchaladas for dinner!! pretty cool day really!! when we did get back to Cairns Amb and I decided we'd go meet the boys for a few quiet beers - not quite sure how but those quiet beers somehow ended with power hour - all you can drink for 8 dollars and with us being up till 5am and me eating a kebab!!! yuk! good night though lol!!! then on thursday after just three hours sleep!!!!! we went white water raftin on the Barron river!! which was so awesome!! somehow i ended up being branded the cheeky one by the spunky river guides which basically resulted in me being at the front of the raft the whole tim and getting splashed and wet a lot!!!! also managed to be the first in the whole group to fall in and then nearly got proverbially left up s*** creek without a paddle when the stupid belgian bloke in our boat didnt even attempt to help me back in!!!!! he just sat there!!! walked away with a couple of really good bruises and achy arms after that!!!!! wicked good fun though - or as the ozzies would say - brutal eh???? just about manged to watch some of the footy last night before completely zonking out - i'm feeling pretty ill at the moment (possibly alcohol poisoning but i think it might be a bit of flu) so all i really want is my snuggly duvet and a lemsip!! instead i had to lug my butt out of bed this morning and jump on a plane to lovely tropical New Zealand - i'm really excited but i'd really rather it be warm!!!! lol ah well off to have a shower and use my free aveda hair care products and fluffy white towel (i'm gonna be living in a car for the next two weeks this will definately be my most luxurious accomodation for a couple of weeks!!!) then crawl into bed and hope i feel better tomorrrow before we began our big road trip around New Zealand its gonna be awesome!!! love y'all xxxxxx steffie