Well a big g'day mate fae Cairns, Down Under! I am staying in Gilligans hostel (and would appear to be party central o' Cairns, sleep is not an option apparently...)! Get my free dinner every night here which is good, although it does generally consist of curried 'sausages' and rice (not sure I really believe they are sausages, yes mum I can see you squirming fae here)! However, I have been living the somewhat quiet life o' Cairns at night as I have been doing so much through the days! Met a lot o' really cool folk in my room with lasses fae Sweden, France, Germany, NZ, pretty much you name a country and I have met someone from it...well that's maybe a tad of an exaggeration but you know what I mean!

Okay, so what have I been doing with myself, let's see! First adventure was to Trinity Beach, just up the coast and really lovely although it was a bit windy when I was there but beautiful all the same!

Next, on Father's Day this year I found myself setting sail on the Passions of Paradise catamaran at 0800hrs (toooo early...but then it was totally worth it)! We sailed (I use that term loosely Dad), for a couple o' hours to Michaelmus Cay, which was basically a sand dune in the middle o' THE GREAT BARRIER REEF that was actually a bird sanctuary. if you stepped foot on the cay with the water lower than your shin not on the tiny section with a wee rope, you could get fined $9000! Anyhoo, here I had my first ever SCUBA dive and it was awesome!!!! Swam with a sea turtle for a bit which was insane and was just diving around the reef with all the amazing fish, and ye, I met Nemo!! We are best friends now!! lol! Got some amazing photos (just trying to find a computer that allows me to upload pictures, so irritating and very hard to come by)! Was pretty nervous though 'cos you are swimming so close to the reef and it is a well known fact here that the reef is dying and will probably be totally gone in next 50 years... The coral only grows 'bout 2mm every year so if you knock it with a flipper it could take 20 years to grow back to what it was! I managed not to damage the reef at all thank goodness as would have felt terrible if I had! I also got to do another dive later in the day at another reef spot that the company I was with had exclusive use of! Unfortunately I never gotta see the sharks, quite a few other folk did though, very jealous (they weren't big human eating ones, just a metre or 2 long). On the second dive I just kinda got left to do my own thing which was pretty cool! At the end o' the day we sailed back to Cairns and all the crew and a load o' us fae the boat trip all went to the local pub/club or happy hour! Great night and loving how social even the folk who were working the boat were! It's nice not to feel like a conveyor belt o' folk!

I never thought you could beat diving the Great Barrier Reef, however......then Uncle Brian came along!!!!!!! For anyone in Cairns this is THE MUST DO tour! I've recommended it to so many folk now (thank you so much Stewart for recommending it to me)! Basically got picked up at 0800hrs and this guy just jumped out Gus (the bus, dare not call him a bus though, he gets very upset and stalls continually if you do making for a rough trip) and was like 'hey, I'm your cousin Brad' and gave me a big hug (he did this with everyone, our family as he kept referring to us all day, that he picked up)! This tour was around the Atherton Tablelands and saw some amazing sights! First stop was the Boulders at Babinda which is a stunning set of waterfalls in the rainforest and we had a wander here and then had a morning snack (including licking the bum of a green ant...and as weird as I know this sounds, it was blinkin' yummy!!! more vitamin C in its bum than in 3oranges, there's a fact of the day for ya)! Then jumped back aboard Gus and headed to Josephine Falls where we had our first swim, so so cold! But there was this naturally made rock slide thing where you had to climb up over some rocks after flapping around like a seal to get up out o the water it was so slippy, min I did not look graceful...You then slide down this waterfall bit so we went down in a train of folk, backwards, on our belly! lots and lots o fuN! We then headed onto Mr. Lunches house to fill our bellies! Yum Yum! It was basically this cafe in the woop woop that only locals go to but was fantastic with even more fantastic views down through the valley! Next stop, was Millaa Millaa Falls, truly stunning place and we got in the water here too although if I thought the last place was cold it was nothing in comparison to this, i swear I looked like a smurf when I got out the water! These falls are particularly famous though as they are where Peter Andre filmed that infamous waterfall scene in his Mysterious Girl song video! Here, we all had to do the whole hair flick out the water Timotei stylee too and get photos, very embarassing!!! Shivering we went to the next destination: Lake Eacham, an 'asleep' volcano with a lake in it! Went for a swim here and it was much warmer thank goodness! Jumped outta a tree here into the lake which was pretty cool! Also saw more turtles here (which interestingly breathe through their bum)! Next stop (yes another!) was this wee place to look for Platypus' but couldn't see any of them unfortunately, they were feeling shy! Did see some fruit bats though which were cool! Shivering, we headed to a hostel in the middle o' nowehere for some showers and grab a beer, play the didgeridoo, look at the stars (which look funny fae Australia...). The drive home fae here was yet again fun filled as it had been every second throughout the day with Gus surfing, tambourine playing, passing polo sweets in record time via matchsticks fae person to person, singing (lots o' singing) and general giggling! However, we did have to go round 262corners to get home...o well, BEST TOUR EVER!!!

Another early start the next day to go white water rafting on the Tully River with Raging Thunder, grade 4 rapids although with it being dry season the water level was low and so I kinda felt like it was a bit on the dull side. After Uncle Brian's tour, don't think anything coulda really competed though!

My last excursion to update you guys on was up north to Cape Tribulation for the night! On the way north went on a crocodile tour and saw Rusty, a female crocodile in the wild just sitting on the bank cooling off! Also saw an azure kingfisher which was beatiful! Totally awesome as was staying in a cabin in the Daitnree Rainforest (the oldest rainforest in the world dating back to 140million years ago! It was one o' the only areas o' the world that didn't freeze over during the last ice age)! Magical place, especially as it is a world heritage site and so is very protected, only 700 folk live up there! So peaceful! Went a walk through the day along the Durobji boardwalk where there were warning signs o crocs being around but never saw any! At night ended up meeting some English guys and we went walking in the dark round bits o' the rainforest (following paths) to see if we could see some snakes. The guy on reception was saying the place was riddled with pythons and other snakes and he had never gone one night without seeing one...however, we unfortunately didn't see any, just saw a few tree frogs! In the morning went and did some jungle surfing which is basically flying around the canopy of the rainforest on a flying fox which was pretty cool, there was even an upside down section which was great! on drive back to Cairns, went to Daintree Wildlife Reserve where I gotta actually feed a wallaby and kangaroo (there was also an emu in here but I kept a wide berth from it - remember last time folks??!) Saw some big 6m long crocs here that were basically in jail as they had either tried to or had eaten people so had to be taken outta the wild...scary!

Otherwise I have been out in the Woolshed (that classic place everyone who has travelled and as I recently discovered, my big brother won backpacker of the year here...don't ask!!) Also been loving the sunshine (up until today that is where it is just raining and apprently will for some time now...)! In true Pockett stylee I took advantage of the AJ Hackett guys at my hostel on Sunday too and jumped off the roof o' the car park across the pool on a flying fox thingy! they do this for free every sunday night for folk staying here, thought it would be rude not to give it a go, hehe!

Unfortunately, even with all this sun I remain an albino look a like!! One day though, I'm holding out for that one day where I can resemble the more glamorous sun-kissed version of myself, yes people, it will happen!! Power o' positive thinking!

Have also discovered the extremely random Aussie, drive-thru off licence!!!!! Just drive in one side, get all the alcohol you want put in your car (and of course pay for it) and then drive out the other side!! Random!!

Anyway, take care all and hope you getting a bit o' sunhine at home! Hopefully haven't bored you too much with this gigantic update!!

Much love

Fi

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