We arrived in Cairns and it was sunny and hot.  Our hostel 'The Asylum' wasn't the cleanest of places but it was cheap and seemed friendly enough.  We also got free meals  at the Woolshed, which is where we headed on out first night.  We had 'dippin dots' for dessert which is a crazy type of ice-cream over in the shape of tiny balls.

We spent most of our days at the Lagoon chilling and admiring the view.  On our first night out we met a Sailor who showed us around town and took us to the Casino where we placed our very first bet and lost .

We booked our tours along the east coast with a really great tour operator Zoe.  That night Lisa went out to Ladies night with Cathy and some of the other girls in the hostel, where she got free champagne and once again sang on Karaoke!

The highlight of Cairns, has to be Cairns Amateurs.  We both put our gladrags on and joined the locals at the races.  No-one would have guessed we were backpackers especially with the bottle of champers   We had a few bets and were quite successful, we were up $10 by the end of the day.  We met lots of great people, had a crazy bus journey home and went to dinner with some locals we had met earlier, Robin, Steve and John.  After dinner we headed to P J O'Brians for a wee jive and a few more drinks.  The 'Cheeko's' tunes were pumping!!!!

We decided to go to the Lagoon to recover from our previous night.  While we were relaxing in the sun, Lisa felt a huge slap on her bottom, she shouted 'Ouch what was that?'  Clair laughed as she seen a Seagull fly past and said 'I bet that bird poohed on you'.  And yes it had, right on her bottom, it was disgusting but hilarious .  Supposedly it's lucky, we shall see!!!!

After a day of recovering we went on our first tour around the Tablelands on Gus the Bus.  It was called the Uncle Brian's Tour but he had recently had a baby so Cousin Kai took his place.  We began the tour by visiting the Boulders, where we had Lemingtons (Aussie cake) and juice.  We then headed to the Josephine Falls, where we got to swim and slide down the waterfall.  The water was freezing but well worth it.  We had a nice chat with the guys in our group whilst drying off on the rocks.  There was Zoe, Elizabeth, Stephanie, Wayne, Dan and a couple of others.  Next stop was lunch where we met the worlds smallest cow called Chili.  We then met Gus the Bus' girlfriend Volvina and unfortunately Gus got a bit excited and had an accident!!!!  But we will save the details, for when we get home.  After all that excitement we stopped at the beautiful Milla Milla falls where the music video 'Mysterious Girl' was filmed.  Clair was very brave and swam over to the falls in the ice cold water while I watched and laughed.  Apparantly there had been frost there the past three nights but the view swimming back made it all worth while.  We then stopped off at a volcanic crater lake called Lake Eacham, it was so beautiful.  Clair was still cold from her last swim so Lisa jumped in this time instead!  We enjoyed a hot chocolate and muffins before spotting a couple of Turtles and wild Platypus.  Then we headed home watching the sunset and singing lots of cheesy songs.

Next stop Cape Tribulation. xoxo