Australia!

Back in Australia once again! Some people are only lucky enough to visit here once in there life but this is my third time now!

Over the next 2 weeks I had planned to travel between Brisbane and cairns in a camper van with a girl I met in Thailand, Shaira from Toronto, Canada.
I last saw her when we were on the peer together in Koh Toa over a month ago so it was a little strange to meet her in a hotel room in Brisbane in the middle of the night, but we should have a great 2 weeks together!

The following morning we took a ferry down the Brisbane river to pick up our campervan! This time we had decided to book a "Wicked Camper" which apart from "juicy" is the other big company here on the east coast.
Wicked are famous for having graffiti style vans and ours was no different, we had a big 4x4 van with "Charlie's Cocaine" and a picture of Charlie sheen on the side! This was certainly going to attract some attention!!

The first 3 days we really hit the road, we had only planned to drive a few hours each day but the first 3 days we really couldn't find any reason to stop! We passed through Fraser Island but the weather wasn't great and the cheapest day trip was over £200!! We did have a good laugh driving around playing stupid games and we always had a few beers when we stopped at night!

We finally pulled into Airlie beach in the Whitsunday's on day 4 but annoying it was raining so no beach again this day! We had decided to book a few trips for the next 2 days so we booked "Big fury" and a half day Kayaking around the whitsunday islands!

Big fury was a large speedboat which looked like a rib but was all steal and lucky it was too! The 4 massive engines on the back powered us over the waves and a few times we came right out of our seats and hit the sea with a Big Bang! We stopped just off one of the islands in the Whitsunday's for some snorkelling.
The water was cold, much colder than it had been in Asia and the visibility was also much lower, I saw a few large fish but definitely not like Koh Toa or Bali!

That afternoon we stopped for a great included lunch on the world famous, "Unesco" recognised Whitehaven beach with it's 95% silica sand the beach is nearly white! The sand was amazing, so smooth but it didn't stick to you either it made a sound similar to the crunch of snow when you stepped on it! During lunch we were joined by 4 large 1.5 meter long lizards who weren't bothered by us at all!
We climbed to the top of a a small hill on the island and had a great view out over the other islands! That night we headed out to a steak house not far fro where we were staying. There was only one choice on the menu for me... Both the kangaroo and crocodile steaks with chunky chips and salad... I can still taste it now! Perfect! Crocodile was a little tough and it was a white meat but it tasted good! I had kangaroo back in Sydney when I visited last year but this steak was as good if not better... Another weird food I can add to my list!

We had booked Salty seadog kayaking for the next morning which wasn't the easiest thing to have to wake up for especial after a few Jugs of beer the previous night!
I love kayaking but don't think I have ever been in the sea before so it was a real treat to get out on the sea and paddle between the beautiful islands! We saw turtles and sea eagles before heading to a tiny island with a small stony beach where we had a nice picnic and I went for a snorkel.
June 1st was officially the end of jellyfish season in the area but the guide still wanted us to wear the sting suites for our own protection which made me look like more like a Ninja than protecting me!

When we returned to the campervan we headed straight out up the coast! We made another few stops heading up the coast before we reached cairns. When we arrived I booked straight onto skydiving for the following day!

Skydiving was one of the main reasons I had headed back to Australia, of course you can do it anywhere in the world but over the Great Barrier Reef would be even more memorable and definitely a once in a lifetime!

I wasn't really that nervous at all when we were getting the briefing but when I was suddenly strapped up and heading higher and higher in the plane I did get a little nervous! I had first payed a little extra to land on the beach but it was too windy unfortunately so they gave me another free upgrade to jump from 15000 feet instead of 10!
I don't know why but I found it surprising when the others jumped from 10k that it was so high, we continued climbing for another 5 minutes up far higher than the clouds.

The orange light came on and we shuffled forwards towards the door! I was the last one out once the light turned green, just enough time to take a selfie before he leaned forward and the next thing I know we are rapidly accelerating into free fall! The plane made a sharp bank to the right after we left and went nose down racing us back down to the ground! It's a strange feeling to explain but it felt like a massive fan in your face whilst looking at a cinema screen below, it didn't quite feel real to me! The 60 seconds of free fall definitely felt more like 5 minutes but then suddenly I felt a break in the smooth airflow and then my feet shot down below me. I looked up and the parachute was slowly deploying above my head then everything went silent as we started to glide down.
Once we were stable in the air Ben let me take control of the cables and I pulled a few 360 spins and had a good feel for the parachute. It was surprising how hard you had to pull down on the controls to make a big turn.
Soon enough our decent was over and we were only a few hounded feet from the landing zone, Ben shouted to me to lift my lags as shown so I made a right angle with my body and we slid in comfortably on to the grass!
What a buzz and definitely well worth it!

We only had a few days left in cairns but we stayed in a hostel which was a welcome break from the campervan but we didn't do that much at all just relax...I'm on holiday after all!