Hey, me and sarah are in scottys hostel at mission beach- nice hostel, nice pool and the beach is just over the road. We had a mad time catching the bus this morning- we realised we were waiting for our oz experience bus at the wrong place lol, and we had a runaround with our backpacks on to get right to the other end of the street just in time to catch it! First thing in the morn lol (about half 6 am, another night of not much sleep cus we stayed up planning our oz bus trip). Our bus was awesome- driver was Muddy, cool guy. He warned us straight away that we might not make it to mission beach cus of all the heavy rain that we had overnight here- the roads only just opened a few days ago after the cyclone and floading. He said as long as we saw other cars coming the other way then it was happy days :-) And he went on about the dengue fever outbreak (spread by mosquitos, about 300 people in cairns got it). He kept looking at me cus of course im covered in mosquito bites from my day trip to the rainforest at daintree NP where i forgot my insect repellent lol. Ive got about 25 bites up my legs and on my arms! No fever yet though touch wood..

The only thing about the bus though was a group of essex girls got on, and OMG were they bloody delicate 'ohhh... its hot, my hairs frizzy, can we stop for a cup of tea, can we have another loo break, can we listen to our music not the bus music' (crappy stuff they had). Theyre backpacks were the size of small houses and they scremed as little flies on the bus landed on them. f***ing hell why are they traveling if they cant cope?!

We drove to babinda, this little town competes with Tully town for the most rainfall in australia, and if they win they get a golden gumboot- they think its a tourist attraction, might not agree too much with that lol. We stopped for tea and me and sarah walked around, find a park where we then found some parrots in the trees and watched them for a bit, so cool to have parrots in your local park! We stopped off for a rainforest walk and Muddy told us some local aborignal stoires- one about a women who was scorned by a man and raised stones from the ground- making a gorge in the forest that we saw, and theres a whirlpool bit- legend has it this attracts men and then kills them. 14 people have died there, 13 of which were men. The women had short hair lol, as muddy put it. We saw a few little spiders, nothing like what i saw in daintree NP forest, but enough to panic the essex girls and give me a headache from all their wailing...

We then went to innisfall and stopped at a croc farm. The bus door opened and in jumped an ozzie guy holding a little croc (called fluffy). He went to hand it to a girl (yep it was one of the essex girls unfortunately) and she went mental. He then retreated a bit, not quite knowing what to do, and I put my hands out to take the croc- he gave it to me and I held it for about ten mins while he talked about the croc farm, she was so smooth and lovely. Carried it off the bus and everyone took photos of the little thing, then the guy took fluffy back so we could start our tour.

Hunting crocs was banned in the wild here as their population got so low, and they had croc farms to breed them. Any crocs still in the wild are trapped and brought to a croc farm (i.e. if they bit someone, ate a cow or ate someone- like yellowtail from daintree river who ate the 5yr old boy). When the farmed crocs are older and have bred, theyre killed for leather and meat etc. The ex wild crocs cant be harmed and are kept for life at the farms.

We saw a massive 5m croc, the oz uy fed quite a few crocs for us to watch, and we met Tank- an ex wild croc who they dont know why he was removed from the wild. Reason being is hes been round so many croc farms cus they havent liked him...he kills the females they try to breed him with. Hes actually killed 8 so far, he was very heavy for his size, a real strong one. He put on quite a show, lunging out the water at the farm guy!

Also at the croc farm, we saw plenty of kangaroos and wallabies- me and sarah fed loads of them and got plenty of pics. One of the smaller, redder type wallabies was a right character- flying about and leaping at people for food. I thought he was fab! He would run and grab (food), then leap off. The kangaroos were really friendly.

We also saw emu birds, some parrots, me and sarah held a python for a bit (at one point it rapped round sarahs wrist and didnt want to let go). We saw dingos too! I held a young dingo- about the size of a collie dog he was, and he just relaxed in my arms for a cuddle, so sweet!! Couldnt do that with a wild one lol.

We then drove from innisfall to mission beach and were now chilling at scottys beach house hostel, booking some white water rafting for tomorrow and about to hang by the pool and visit the beach. :-)

P.S.-UPDATE

Me and sarah spent a bit of the evening booking our entire bus journey down the east coast, so we know when were staying in each place, though will decide on hostels each day :-)

And we were given news by the women at our hostel, vicky, that the Tully river has been closed tomorrow and all white water rafting is cancelled, so no rafting for us tomorrow. The reason why is because a women died there today, and when they have a fatality they close it to show respect. The water has been higher than usual due to the floods and heavy rain, so it was a bit more dangerous than usual. Ive been told its been on the news on tv.

Me and sarah will go to Dunk Island tomorrow instead, and will be rafting in New Zealand.

Oh, and this evening me and sarah ate out and I tried Kangaroo meat (weve been feeding and stroking them all day...little wierd to then eat one). Sarah had chicken. I found the kangaroo to be some of the best meat Ive ever had- its rough but yummy, had a plum syrup sauce too and it was delicious. We got hit on by some random guys (its valentines day, theyre all trying it on today!).

We then went to see the beach (with torch and headtorch as its dark) and something pretty big took off ahead of us on the beach, kinda freaked us out as the locals have been talking about crocs on the beach. No more night walks on the beach here for us! Theres loads of debris on the beach too cus of the cyclone that come here before.