We landed at Mission Beach to some iffy weather and the next 3 days ended up being a bit of a wash-out. It rained on and off for the time we were there and with the wind blowing as well we decided to have a bit of a rest from our holiday. A day spent indoors watching some of the AFL footy finals and the purchase of some body boards to muck around in the chop in the bay was just the treat. The boys found some mates who they played with for most of the time we were there and Fi and I just sort of pottered around doing nothing much. I went and got a massage for my back which was starting to give me some jip from our really soft mattress and John, the old retired hippy, did his best to help. Fi kept up the exercise with her morning runs and chatting to Adam and Wendy, our neighbours who were from Adelaide. Adam had sold his electrical business for a zillion dollars and was just travelling around with Wendy his wife and their ginormous golden retriever, which was about the size of a Shetland pony. He was the most camping camper I'd seen and had all of the coolest stuff. We had serious camper trailer envy when he talked to us about his kit and it was lucky we were next to him as Meg's battery conked out overnight as one of the boys left the door open. Adam rustled around in his van/4wd and pulled out a special battery thing and started the car and got it charged for us so we were grateful. When it charged up we did eventually get out of the caravan park to look at the Museum of Sugar which was pretty interesting. I didn't really know the process of how it was made and the history in the region so that was a bonus. Australia is the 3rd largest sugar exporter in the world, which generates about $2billion to our GDP with Queensland making up about 95% of that. One of the things that we were astounded by was the slave labour that was rife in the area using the Kanakas, islanders from the Solomon's and that region. It was pretty dreadful what they did, ie deceive these people about working in Queensland in the sugar cane farms and then completely exploit them only to deny them citizenship many years later and send them back home with only a box of useless trinkets and clothes when they were done.

We left Mission Beach and called into Townsville for a couple of days to get the car serviced so took the opportunity to get some casting done on the pier…no fish again….and visit the Aquarium, which was pretty special. We stayed all day, watched the predator fish get fed and saw the turtle hospital. This was great as we got to understand these lovely creatures a bit more and even had the opportunity to use an "itchy stick" on the back of one of them. The turtle whose shell we were scratching was a classic. As you give his shell a rub he wiggled his body around and I swear you could almost here him purring with delight. He clearly loved it!!! Apparently one of the staff thought they'd see how long they could give the big turtle's shell a scratch before the turtle got bored, but after 45 minutes the staff member had to stop as his arm got too sore and the turtle was still wiggling away….

Bowen, our next stop, was looming large and in 5 days this little town was going to be great as we were getting there for the start of the Annual Bowen Family Fishing Classic. The boys were excited and we were working out how they were going to spend their winnings before they'd even thrown out a line. We pulled up to the caravan park in Horseshoe Bay and set up before heading to the pool to cool down. The weather was better here and we were looking forward to getting the rods out and maybe catching a fish. Bowen was wonderful. The main beaches were a little boring but where we were staying was beautiful. On the headland there were 4 beautiful bays within walking distance and they were practically empty of people all the time. The snorkelling was incredible with coral everywhere and tonnes of fish that turned out to be very well fed and very wary of our fishing hooks. We woke up early on the day of the competition and hit the rocks to get our winning fish. A couple of hours later, 3 lost rigs and some choice words between the boys as they crossed lines and generally got on each others nerves presented us with only one whiting 5 centimetres undersized and a bream, also undersized. We were a little disappointed but had our nomination cards regardless and were in the running for a couple of boats in the big prize draw at the end of the tournament. We washed up and headed down to the main beach to join in the party and get involved in the carnival atmosphere. There were loads of activities for kids so we started by watching the crawchie racing. A crawchie is like a yabbie (small fresh water crayfish) and we watched as these little crustaceans crawled from the centre circle of the "race course" to the outside. It was Number 21 that was the winner but I suspected there may have been a fix as numbers 3, 18 and 7 didn't move at all when the covers came off and were very limp when the judge picked them up at the end of the race and put them back in the bucket to cook up afterwards…… Next activity was a yabbie pumping competition. I'd never heard of it so when we were talking about this to our neighbours at our caravan park earlier the previous day they went into their caravan and produced a "yabbie pump". It was an aluminium pipe with a handle that you stick into the wet sand around the mangroves where these little critters live and suck them out. All very confusing as a Queensland yabbie is nothing like a yabbie we know in WA, they are a lot smaller and only have one claw. John and Cheryl said we could borrow their pump and away we went. Rocking up to the registration tent we were looking good as no one else had put their name in the ring and the $150 prize was looking to be in the bag for us. With 5 minutes to go I heard some bloke ask the lady what I was doing with the pump and when she explained the prize he said "$150!!.....Sharon, go and grab the yabbie pump!!! And pointed to his wife and then gathered his 5 kids around. Another bloke entered with a minute to go and it was now a 3 horse race. We had 10 minutes to suck as many yabbies' into our plastic container as we could, and with the hooter sounding we rushed to a secret spot on the beach that was pointed out to us by a lovely old man we were talking to earlier and set to work. It was hard but we persevered by running around sticking the pump into all the yabbie holes we could see and sucked and pulled as hard as we could. With the deadline looming we had found 5 of the critters when suddenly we hit pay dirt and 8 of them got sucked up and spat out onto the sand and the boys pounced. With our tally at 13 the hooter sounded again and we confidently strode up to the judge and presented our plastic container. It was a bit embarrassing as the two other entrants had already put in their containers and when we saw their payload we made a quiet exit. It took 10 more minutes for the judge to count out the other two entries and then the winner was announced. "First prize goes to Gary with 208…second to Barry on 145 and third to the Alexander's with 13….." I ran and put the yabbie pump back in the car as fast as I could….

The rest of the day was brilliant as we watched all the fishermen bring in their eskys full of fish. Some of these were massive, with a 27kg spanish mackerel and a 20kg cod being two big ones that had us all in awe. We stayed for the lollie drop which was a helicopter that drops lollies into the beach and all the kids run around and pick them up then spent the evening watching some bands play on the stage whilst sucking back a few beers. It was brilliant. Some absolute characters in the crowd and there was such a lovely atmosphere. I was quietly surprised at how some of these guys managed to get from the boat to the weigh in as they were so drunk when they came up to present their fish they could hardly talk. The guy on the microphone who was calling all the fish as they were being brought in to weigh pulled one bloke aside who had could a huge Trevally and asked "Mate, great fish.. Where'd you catch it?"…"uughhh….the Ocean" the bloke slurred. When the crowd stopped laughing the guy on the microphone then asked. "Fair enough Mate, so what did ya catch it with?"……."uugghhhh…a fishing rod..hic…..". We loved it! The next day was much the same and we stayed around to see the draw for the boats but unfortunately didn't win and left a few pennies lighter after blowing most of it on the 1kg bag of prawns raffle and 6 donuts for $5…bargain!!

The next 3 days were spent in and around the caravan park and getting to know the locals. John, one of the nicest people we've ever met, was a guy in his 70's who looked like the old man of the sea, all tanned and fit. We were out on the rocks the following morning with our fishing rods out ready to cast away when he wandered up to us and looked at the boys and asked if they wanted to come out on his boat! They immediately latched on and said yes, and so we spent the afternoon on John's 6-metre centre console fishing away with someone who actually knows what he's doing!! Despite his skill and wonderful hospitality we didn't get a nibble for 2 hours when all of a sudden Harry's rod got a massive hit and he hung on for dear life. John helped Harry as he fought what we suspected was a big spanish mackerel but at the last moment he bit through the line and got away. It was super exciting and had the boys now pestering us to get a boat instead of pestering us about getting pet snakes. John was such a gentleman and patient with the boys and his partner Anne was also so lovely and kind to us. She was into healing and had a bit of a "Zen" outlook on life and so I asked her if she wouldn't mind seeing if she could fix my back as it was still really bothering me. She sat me down and talked to my spine and told it to stop hurting and did some weird things with her hands in the air around me and asked me to imagine that I was my back and then told me we were all energy and not physical but just a part of the universe. Despite my extreme scepticism I stayed to listen as it was something rather bizarre to hear, but also a nice 30 minute break from the boys pestering me to get a boat. After her "healing" session, I actually felt about 5 times better and my back wasn't sore so I thanked her and Fi and I drank 2 bottles of sparkling that night to celebrate for no other reason than we weren't working and it was sunny and we were loving our gypsie lifestyle. The next day John invited me out for a final days fishing at 5am and we hit the water together with 4 fingers Terry. 4 fingers Terry was a great chap of about 70+ who has been staying at the park every year for the past 10 years or so and in fact had had a heart attack not 5 weeks prior whilst doing one of the long walks up to the lookout. After a lengthy stay in the hospital at Townsville he was back and raring to go. In a funny moment earlier in our stay when he introduced himself to the boys he shook their hands then pulled his hand away and accused one of them of stealing his missing index finger and demanded they return it and empty their pockets. The boys completely freaked out but 4 fingers Terry just laughed and told them he knew they didn't take his finger because he lost it at the beach about 3 days earlier and if they find it could they return it and he'd give them 10 cents for it. The boys contemplated this for a bit and said they would but later that same evening told me that 10 cents for a finger was a bit cheap so they didn't bother looking. Ahh…my little capitalist spawn… love it. Anyway, the early morning fishing trip was pretty typical of most previous trips, ie nothing happened for most of it. Even John, who's been fishing these waters for many years was astounded that we had been trawling around the bay for almost 4 hours without even a nibble. I was starting to feel the correlation of lack of fish and my presence wasn't just a coincidence when my line pulled and started screaming as something big hit my bait. A 10 minute struggle ensued which was bloody exciting before I eventually pulled my big catch close enough to the boat to see what it was. As the fish came closer we saw it was a hammerhead shark about 2.5 meters long!!! Awesome, but unlikely to land and display as you aren't allowed to take any sharks over 1.5 meters in Queensland apparently. We had 4 fingers Terry on the camera trying to get shots but as his camera trigger finger was the one that was missing he only managed to get one shot of the sky and then another of our feet on the boat so no evidence is available. Catching my first fish longer than 23 centimetres was a massive thrill and it only made me want to fish more, which means I was hooked…boom boom….