G'Day Everyone! So for Spring Break (Autumn Holiday here) I went on a 13 excursion through my program, Arcadia University, to the Great Barrier Reef! It was the greatest 13 days of my entire life! I will go day-by-day because I did something exciting everyday!

Day One: April 10th

I took the bus to the airport because the trains were on track work. I was with Jess and Nick, two kids in my program. We arrived at the airport and had dinner while waiting for our flight into Cairns. On the plane, I sat next to the rudest people I have ever met! They got up at least 8 or 9 times on the 3.5 hour flight. (Amateurs apparently.) Once we landed in Cairns I took a cab with Jess, Nick and Clinton (another kid in my program that was on a different flight) to our hostel, Gilligan's Backpackers. Once we arrived at Gilligan's, I went right to sleep because it was 11:30 pm and we had to be up early the next day.

Day Two:April 11th

We were all up early and drove to "Breakfast with the Birds", where we did just that, had breakfast with birds. I tried all different types of tropical and native fruit to Australia. After we ate breakie (Aussie for breakfast), we walked around the wildlife park and I held a koala and had my picture taken with it! He was so adorable and so soft! After breakie with the birds we drove into downtown, Port Douglas where we got lunch, bought food for the next three days cause we would not be anywhere near a grocery store when we got to Cape Tribulation (the rainforest). From Port Douglas we dorve to Mossman Gorge and went on a nature walk and went swimming in a lagoon but the tide was really high and it was getting dangerous so we got out! After getting dried off we got into a bus and drove to Cape Tribulation Beach House, which was right in the heart of the rainforest. It reminded me a lot of summer camp but in the rainforest not the New Jersey Pine Barrens - - cause we were in the middle of no where. We picked our rooms and I lived with Jess, Anthea, Jackie and Amanda. We all got into our bathing suits and went swimming in the ocean located right near to our accommodation. After about an hour of swimming we showers and ready for dinner. That night we just hungout at the little restaurant/bar talking.

Day Three: April 12th (Easter Sunday)

We got up fairly early and went sea kayaking! My partner was Lucille, who goes to Univeristy of New South Wales (in Aussie) and Villanova (in the USA). We flipped over two times because the waves were so powerful! I chipped my two front teeth slightly on the kayak when it flipped over on top of us the second time. After sea kayaking, we went on a beach walk right along the water's edge. We cracked open coconuts and drank the milk - - which was very good! (Survivor here I come!) We had an Easter egg contest and my team won! My team consisted of Matty (from RWU), Jess (from RWU), Anthea (from Northwestern), Kieran (from South Africa but goes to Uni of Vermont), and Ashley (from Penn State). We went to the pool after the Easter egg contest for about an hour or so. We had our showers and then Peter (from Bryant U.), Lucille (From Villanova) and all made pasta for dinner. Hungout at the restaurant bar and played never have i ever!

Day Four: April 13th

Today we did a full day hike through the rainforest! We stopped at a watering hole and played around for a while. I jumped off a cliff into the water (it was so cool)! After chilling out at the watering hole and having lunch we went on "a nice beach walk with a few small rocks" which turned out to be a cliff walk where we were hanging off of cliffs in order to walk by the beach to get back to the beachhouse. I was with Jess (RWU), Ashley (Penn State) and Jackie (Arcadia). After the lovely beach walk, we went swimming in the pool and then Peter, Lucille, Kieran and Anthea all made dinner and hungout.

Day Five: April 14th

We went to an exotic fruit farm tasting where we tried about 11 different fruit homegrown in Australia. Most of them are not native to Australia but rather introduced by the owner of the fruit farm. We went "jungle surfing" which is basically ziplining through the rainforest. We did 5 surfs all together and two of the surfs we had to have partners, mine was Alyssa (RWU). My jungle surfing group consisted of peter (bryant), rob (rwu), steph (arcadia), sara (bucknell), chris (rwu), eric (bryant), jess (rwu), nick (RIT), lindsay (smith), allie (rwu) and alyssa (rwu). For the rest of the day we just hungout by the pool and swam in the ocean and relaxed.

Day Six: April 15th

We got up early had breakie and drove to the ferry. We took a ferry out of Cape Tribulation and went on a croc cruise on the Daintree River (located in the Daintree Rainforest). We saw three crocs - - two males and a female. On the cruise, we learned about the importance of mangroves in an aquatic environment. After the croc cruise, we drove back to Cairns and checked into Gilligan's again. We walked around the town and rented an underwater camera to use for the next two days while on the reef. We all had dinner together and just hangout in our rooms. I stayed in the room with Kieran, Lucille, Clinton, Lindsay, Eric, Nick and Anthea!

Day Seven: April 16th

We got up at 6:30 am for breakfast and walked to our boats. My boat was called the VAGABOND!!!! The people on my boat were Chris, Nick, Rob, Peter, Lucille, Cat (one of the Arcadia staff), Jess, Anthea, Jackie and Amanda. We drove for about 3.5 hours to the first reef. I did an introduction to scuba diving course with Lucille and Jackie and we saw a sea cucumber, clown fish (nemo), a damsel fish (dory) and a lionfish (a poisonous fish). I went snorkeling while the other group went scuba diving and I saw a turtle! When I came in from the boat I got all of these little red bumps my back and stomach so the dive instructor pored vinegar all over me and told me that I had sea lice! Ew! Sea lice are little bugs in the water that bite, he told me just to lay out in the sun and the bits would soon go away! It was so painful and so hard not itch them! I got so burned because I had to lay out in the sun with the vinegar on and I couldn't put sunscreen on because it burned. The staff of the boat were so nice ... Rafi (the chef from France), Frank (the dive instructor from Germany), and Paul (the skipper from Australia). After we had dinner we went over to the other boat, the Rumrunner, where everyone else on the trip were staying. We got a talk about the coral reef which was very educational and informative. A few people in our group (Matty, Kieran, Clinton, Ted and Cam (Arcadia staff member) who were SCUBA certified did a night dive, which was apparently incredible.

Day Eight: April 17th

We got up at 6 am to watch the sunrise on the boat! It was so beautiful! We had breakie then drove to a new site known as "the canyon". I did another dive with Nick, Peter and Rob. We saw so many fish and corals - - it was absolutely amazing! When I returned from my dive back to the boat and I realized that I had a bloody nose from the pressure underwater - - ha ha - - I am a mess seriously - - haha! After I had the bloody nose I didn't want to scuba dive anymore so I just snorkelled around the reef and got to see a reef shark and another turtle. We had lunch on the boat which was so good and then we drove about 4 hours back to shore! The boat ride back was so relaxing and beautiful we all just layed out on the front of the boat listening to Jack Johnson, the Beautiful Girls and the Hilltop Hoods. As soon as we all were off the boat we definitely had sea legs for sure! We raced back to the shower and got ready to go out on the town (lol). We had a group meeting with everyone in my hostel room just to debrief about the excursion so far. That night we went to the Woolshed Pub because the owner of the pub was the skipper of the Rumrunner and he invited us to come and get free pizza and beer. I spent the night dancing on the dance floor and just hanging out! It was SO much fun!!!!

Day Nine: April 18th

We went white water rafting on the Tully River. My raft consisted of jess, jackie, amanda, anthea and steph. We named our boat the single ladies and kept singing the song as we we rafting down the river! Our guide, Freddie, was from Australia and was extremely nice and very funny! I got pushed out of the boat by one the other instructors as a joke, it was actually really really funny! We got out and swam at some parts and the other parts were rapids so we had to paddle through them! Lucky no one on my boat fell out - - by accident! [Only two people in the whole group fell out but they were in different boats (Ashley and Clinton).]

Day Ten: April 19th

ON OUR OWN (the end of the Arcadia excursion, on holiday without a schedule)

Matty (one of my best friends from Roger Williams), Jess (Bucknell), Anthea and I all got up at 8 am and went skydiving!!!!! It was the most amazing thing I have ever experienced! I went through a cloud and rainbow!!!!! It was completely unbelievable!!!! I never thought that I would jump out of a plane but I did it! And I am so glad that I did! I bought a video of the jump so all of you will have to wait and see it when I get home! After we went skydiving we were all so tired so we went to a little cafe and got something to eat. Jess and Anthea left shortly after lunch to catch their flights home! Matty and I went back to Gilligan's to check into our room! We stayed with two people, Katie and Ted (from our program), because they had days off from Uni as well. Ted's roommate from Adelaide, Australia also stayed in our room with us! We spent the rest of the day/night at Gillian's pool and restaurant/bar!

Day Eleven: April 20th

Matty and I got up at around 10:30 am - - mostly because we haven't slept in for like a week. We walked to Woolworth's (the supermarket) and got food for the next few days so that we could save money and not have to go out to eat! We came back to Gilligan's and ate our lunch and chilled out in the room for awhile. We went souvenior shopping and walked around the town until dinner time. After dinner, we went to the night markets with katie, ted and david (ted's roomie). We spent the rest of the night on our balcony overlooking the pool and bar area talking about what souveniors we bought and all of our travels so far.

Day Twelve: April 21st

Matty and I spent the entire day at the lagoon, swimming and laying out on the beach. We walked around the shops a little more after we ate lunch and had gelato (at dolce+gelati). We walked to the ocean and watched the sunset! As we were walking along the ocean we came across a little kid playground and of course because matty and I are still little kids at heart we played on it! It was seriously the coolest playground in the world, it was located right on the beach and it had a zipline and a little water park. We found a hammock and just sat on it for like 2 hours talking about how awesome Australia is and what esle we wanna do why we are here! It was great to hangout with him cause I hadn't seen him since December at school and we usually hang out a lot at school. We walked back to Gilligan's had dinner and just chilled with Katie, Ted and David!

Day Thirteen: April 22nd

LAST DAY IN CAIRNS! Matty and I got up early ate breakie and sat by the Gilligan's pool until my airport shuttle came to pick me up! I got the airport and while I was waiting at the terminal I met these two really nice Canadian girls who were on my flight. I talked to them to occupy my time while waiting! The reason we started talking is actually kinda funny cause I saw that she had an "I heart Edward" t-shirt on and I commented on it and then we spent the entire time waiting talking about Twilight and our travels around Australia. The flight was about 3.5 hours which seriously felt like nothing cause I slept for most of it!

So that is my entire trip! I hope you enjoyed reading all about it! I miss all of you so much! I hope that everyone has been getting the postcards that I have been sending! I will be coming home soon! Can't wait to see all of you!!! Now for the millions of pictures!

PICTURES

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