Hey hey hey!!!

Katie here!! This is going to be a long one so bear with me!!!!

Since Kate's last blog, we've been up to quite a lot! So we left Magnetic Island after getting bitten by bed bugs! Nice eh! And made our way down to a place called Airley Beach. On the way, our bus stopped at a lawn bowls club, because apparently it is quite popular in Australia! We were split into teams and shown how to do it! Granddad you'd be proud of me, I helped my team to victory twice! J

Airley Beach is where everyone does a boat trip around the Whitsundays. The Whitsundays are a National Park made up of a group of islands, and everyone travelling down (or up!) the east coast does these trips. There are loads of tour companies which offer different boat trips and we went on a boat call Condor, which apparently is a quite famous racing boat! Anyhoo, so we went on this boat for 2 days and 2 nights and it was so good! The boat had sails, so we all had to help out to launch the sails (or whatever the correct boating term is!) Including the 3 of us there was 16 people on the boat, all of travelers. The boat was able to hold 30, but I'm glad it didn't otherwise it would have been very cramped! All the other people were really nice and three of them were girls we'd already met on our Oz Experience bus, we had a really great time

We were able to go snorkeling again, however this time it wasn't as enjoyable L the captain on the boat kept throwing bread in to attract the fish! There were millions of them. Not nice, and I can now kind of understand where Kate get her fish phobia from!! On the boat all meals were included, and the food was so nice! I think it's the best we've been fed since we've been here!! We stopped off at some of the islands, and one is called Whitehaven Beach, which is in the top 10 beaches in the world. The water was so blue and clear and the sand was so white. Apparently NASA use the sand from there for their glass for their telescopes because it is so fine.

We also saw whales and dolphins, the whales came right underneath the both and you could hear the vibrations of them 'singing' through the boat, it was so cool! Then after (not to be out done..!) dolphins came right up to the boat and were swimming next to us!!

Next stop was Fraser Island!

So after our trip we headed back on our bus. Fraser Island is another National Park. It is the world's largest sand island. You hire a 4x4 jeep and drive round the island, with 11 people.

But more about that in a bit…. As the distance was too far, on our bus we had a compulsory overnight stop off at a cattle ranch in a place called Kroombit. Here we learnt how to crack a whip (which I was rubbish at!), lasso goats, round up a heard of goats on horse back (called mustering) and ride a mechanical bull! Now most people were rubbish at this but Becky was amazing at it! I think me and Kate only managed 3 seconds before we fell off, but Becky was on there for about 30 seconds and won! So we were all very impressed!

We stayed there for the one night, before heading off to Rainbow Beach for our Fraser Island trip! You could either choose to go self drive or go on a guided trip, we decided to go self drive and it was so much fun! We were there for 3 days and 2 nights in a group of 11 people all of similar ages and all got on really well, even though none of the 3 of us actually drove, all the others did. We were given an itinerary and map of where we could go and camp and what food to buy for meals etc. The first night's dinner.. didn't exactly go to plan… we'd found a nice place to set up camp on the beach and started cooking spag bol… however just as we were about to serve it, the table we were cooking on collapsed!! We managed to save some but it was a very sandy meal, over those days sand got everywhere! Because there are wild dingoes on the island, we were told that any waste has to be buried, so we dug a big hole to bury it in, but guess what, when we woke up all the food had been dug up by the dingoes!! What a wasted effort! However I am pleased to report that all following meals went smoothly!

Whilst on the island we were told that we weren't to swim in the sea because of the currents and because of SHARKS! So instead there are lots of fresh water lakes that we were told we were able to swim in. after getting lost quite a bit, we found one on the first day and it was beautiful! It had such clear waters, and despite being a bit nippy, we all went for a swim! On the last day however we got pretty lost trying to find another lake so we just stopped at the nearest one, and what a disappointment it was from yesterday, it was all murky so none of us went for a swim! We got back to the hostel on Friday afternoon, having cleaned and washed up everything that they'd given us, but minus a knife, tent peg and a headlight. We thought that we were going to be charged for it all, but luckily we weren't.

We did this trip last week (Wednesday to Friday) and our next Oz Experience bus wasn't going to be until Sunday (Kate's birthday!). But there were 3 guys in our group who are travelling around Australia in a Camper Van, who were leaving for Brisbane on Saturday and asked us if we wanted a lift! We thought it be a laugh so we said yes and gave them a bit of petrol money!! It meant we didn't have to waste a day in a hostel and meant that we now got an extra day in Brisbane AND it meant that Kate wasn't on a bus for her birthday! They were also planning on going to Australia Zoo on Sunday (which is just outside Brisbane) so they said that we could go with them and they'd give us a lift too!! We also then met up with another girl who was on our trip so there were 7 of us who went! It was really good fun, watching the crocodile shows etc, however having now seen the majority of the animals (kangaroos, koalas, elephants etc) in the wild now, it didn't seem as good. Australia Zoo, is Steve Irwin's zoo and there are pictures of him everywhere!! There's even a statue of him! And the road leading up to the zoo is called Steve Irwin Way!

We all went out for Kate's birthday last night, so we're off now to make bacon sandwiches for breakfast and then tomorrow we leave Brisbane for Byron Bay. Today, we're going for a bit of and explore around the city, gonna try and find something free to do! Maybe a museum or something!

Right that is all for now I think, I'm sure I've forgotten bits but I hope that made sense to you all!!

Speak soon!

Love Katie, Kate and Becky!

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