Cruising in Cairns

Saturday

1 - Cairns from the Plane

Flight great again with fantastic views over N Territory and coming towards Cairns where the clouds started to arrive! Scenery coming into Queensland looks like home with green fields and hills. Got some good photos out of the plane window (I think anyway) and fly over Cairns and virtually land on top of it is so small. Is very humid here about 30 degrees. Get picked up by our hostel "Travellers Oasis" which is opposite the railway station ($48 a night twin room) and is lovely with a pool, clean room and kitchen etc. Talk to Cathy who works here and is a mine of info about all the trips down the E coast and we collect mountains of leaflets and feel very confused. Have a swim and chill for a bit before we go into central Cairns to find some dinner. Wander round the grid streets for ages to find a good dinner deal - are loads of pubs and restaus and eventually find a cheap food court where you can get a plate of Thai/Chinese food for $5 so we wander off to a bottle shop (which takes ages and by this time a thunder storm has started!) for some wine with our expensive meal! Have our dinner and wander back home and pass out into bed through tiredness/alcohol and lie in til gone 10am today (wow a late one for a change!)

2 - Dave doing a daytime BBQ

Today spent the morning sorting out bus tickets, diving etc and going to the supermarket for more supplies. Weather is clearer today but still bit cloudy but v warm. Walk down to the sea front where there are free barbies you can use next to a huge swimming lagoon (cant swim in sea now as there are stingers - although you can wear a stinger suit - v sexy). Cook a barbie on the sea front (have sausages at long last!!) which is great and then chill by the lagoon when the showers die down! We then head over to The Pier which is a pub by the Marina which does 2 4 1 drinks on a Sunday night. Is heaving in here and a great live band have a couple of beers before we go and cook ourselves and evening barbie by the beach. Have decided from now on we are not going to go out on Fridays and Saturdays (as we can do this at home) but Sundays instead and make sure we stay in bed on Monday mornings. How irritating are we?

3 - Em at the Nighttime BBQ