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Cairns 10/12/11 - 12/12/11
We spent the first part of our East Coast Escapades in cairns, after getting a flight at 6am (6am!!! Thank you for the lift Bruce) from Melbourne. Got to our hostel at about 8:30, just in time fpr brekkie. Our hostel was called The Asylum - very apt for us don't you think?!?
The hostel was brilliant as a) It only cost $12 a night each; b) We were put in a twin room which normally costs $50 each for no extra charge; c) Each night we got a voucher fopr a free meal at a pub called The Woolshed; and d) The owner looks like Joe Mangle from Neighbours!
Once we dropped the bags off we went for a walk to get our bearings which isn't hard as Cairns is really small. It is really lively though, with loads of bars and cafes, and loads of stuff aimed at backpackers.
After that we changed into our swimming stuff and headed down to the beach. The beach in Cairns is a manmade beach in the middle of the esplanade as the actual beach is just mud. It is basically a public pool that has sand all around it, music playing and loads of free barbeque stations. As we arrived these people started cooking, so we managed to get a free hotdog each courtesy of the cooking Christians who were "Spreading the word of God by one random act of kindness at a time". Or something like that - we were concentrating too much on our free food!!
Once we had done a sufficient amount of sun worshipping in the 35 degrees heat we went and booked a Great Barrier Reef tour with the campest man in Cairns and his assistant. This meant that we would have to get the boat at 7:30 the next morning - early night for us then.....
We thought we would just pop out for a few drinks, and our first destination was the Woolshed. However en route our ears dragged us into a cafe down an alley way where people were drinking , adding more graffiti to this already amazing wall of the stuff, all along to some awesome tunes on the decks. After we sat down with our cokes it dawned on us we had pretty much gatecrashed a locals party, so although the people were really nice we just drank our drinks and made a sharp exit.
Next stop was the Woolshed for our lovely free food. While we were eating some bogans joined us and were talking about our boat trip the next day. We were advised that we should put Vaseline on our belly buttons to avoid getting sea sick!! Funnily enough we didn't bother testing his theory.
After food we went to a hotel that had a massive outside area with a band playing. Almost as soon as we sat down these three lads from Perth asked if they could join us, introduced themselves, then we got chatting all night and ended up going clubbing with them! I think they were initially attracted by Hickey's "pow" shorts as one of the lads offered to buy them off him!
We went clubbing with the Perth lads and one of their cousins - a kiwi girl, to a place called Gilligans which was actually a hostel with a club in! The night was almost over before it began as everyone was getting ID'd and we thought we had none. We started to walk home, and then... ta da - Hickey produced the passports from his bag. The music was brilliant and we had a proper stomp. I have no idea what time we left but i know it was past our 12:00 curfew!
When we got back to the hostel there were a group of people outside drinking goon (really cheap Ozzie wine), so we ended up sitting outside drinking goon outside with a welsh girl; a guy with his front tooth missing; a girl who looked like Jennie Powell and a guy with a giant Kermit the Frog around his neck.
Next thing we knew we were woke up at 7:30 in bed - the time we were supposed to be getting on the boat! We legged it down to the pickup point (which, in the Cairns heat with a massive hangover is not pleasant) and just made it on time - phew!!
The boat took 2 hours to get to our destination on the Great Barrier Reef. We were both really excited about snorkelling, but both turned out to be terrible at it!
After flailing about in the water for a bit and not really seeing much we had lunch then went over to Green Island on little speedboats. The Island is beautiful, with white sand, really clear turquoise sea and loads of trees in the middle. We said on the speedboat that we were on Shipwrecked, and Hickey certainly looked the part with his newly acquired travellers necklace!
After a couple of hours on the island (and seeing far more naked Chinese women than we would have liked!) we went back to the boat and went for our second attempt at snorkelling. Luckily this time we managed to get the hang of it and really enjoyed ourselves - we saw loads of fish and coral, and even some small reef shark.
On the way home most people had drinks but me and Hickey just chilled out. Highlights of the boat ride home included a free cheese platter, free fruit, free cakes, and a bloke crushing a can with his forehead!
After our free meal we decided to call it a night as our coach was at 6:30ish the next day. We were very restrained and even turned down an offer to help drink the 20 litres of goon that was in reception! Go us!
Whitsundays 12/12/11 - 17/12/11
OMG where do we start. At the beginning i guess. After our 10 hour journey we get to Airlie beach at about 5pm and check in at our hostel - Backpackers by the Bay (BBB). We hoped to book a boat trip but all were full for the following day so we booked one for the day after - a 3 day 2 night trip on a boat called the New Horizon, we will get back to that later though! After checking in there was a quiz about to start so we entered that, it was free and a bottle of champagne was up for grabs and it was a great way to meet some more backpackers. We got into a team with a Swedish guy called Phillip who was really cool. We ended up coming second by ½ a point but the winning team shared their champagne with us and that's where the drinking began!
The barman Tom told us he would fill up any glass full of goon for just $3 so naturally we found the biggest beakers available in the hostel and true to his word he filled them to the brim! The bar also had a Nintendo Will on it so after a lot of beakers of goon extreme bowling was born - basically you had to do a somersault before you bowled, Hickey actually got loads of strikes. It was hilarious though and the whole bar was playing, including a couple from Stroud who we became good friends with and who we are going to meet back up in Melbourne for New Year.
God knows how the night ended but we both woke up feeling a bit rough, we found out from Tom that Hickey fell asleep in the corner of the bar! Hickey also fell out of his top bunk bed at 5am and this is where his nickname "Ninja" came from as he landed like a Ninja when he fell, combine that with extreme bowling and by the end of our stay the nickname had really caught on!
We headed into town slightly hungover, Airlie beach is lush, really buzzing but chilled at the same time, loads of bars and a quality lagoon where we chilled loads. We ended up booking another tour on Fraser Island whilst in town but we were so hungover we can't remember what we have booked. Only time will tell I suppose!
Anyhoo after chilling at the lagoon for the day we went back to the hostel, Tom informed Hickey that he had a left over beaker of goon which Hickey asked him to save. Hickey told him no way was he drinking. Now I bet you have already guessed that he did drink it. We ended up winning the quiz and once the champagne flowed the goon followed! Oh forget to mention there was a massive storm today and the thunder was ridiculously loud, we had to video it.
Ok onto day 3, again waking up slightly worse for wear we got our stuff ready to board the New Horizon and head onto our travels. It was BYO booze so we bought a crate of cider (cost about 35 quid!), food and accommodation on boat was already covered though. The boat itself was great, the crew brilliant and for the rest of the people on the boat absolutely amazing! There were 19 of us with 9 different nationalities. English, Welsh, Columbian, Swedish, Swiss, German, French, Brazilian and Canadian!! All with the same sense of humour, all spoke English and all up for a laugh (well except the Canadian!)
We set off to a place called hook passage where we stayed the night in the middle of Whitsundays. Whitsundays is a collection of 70 something islands and is a sight to behold. Our first night on the boat was quality, we had some dinner and then cracked open the cider. Everyone else had their own drink so we all got to know each other the more and more booze we all consumed. Needless to say we drank the whole create on the first night. The German had us in stitches trying to speak the Queens English, the Colombian guy was just pure entertainment, we all danced the night away. The highlight had to be teh dolphin who came to say hi. He swam around the boat all night showing off and jumping out the water. We were all mesmerised for hours we even named him Fitzgerald and gave him a back story!!
We were woken by the crew at 7am for breakfast and then sailed to Whitehaven beach. The beach was incredible, the sand was nearly pure white , so fine, people use it to clean jewellery with and even their teeth. It was like no other sand we had ever seen. There was a look out point so we headed up through the forest and went to the look out. It hard to find words how to describe the views it was just mind blowing. Postcard-esque you might say. After admiring the views we went to swim with the sharks (only tiny ones that swim next to you ) and we also saw some turtles. We then headed back to the boat for lunch and a snorkel.
We both were rubbish at snorkelling to begin but by the end of the trip we had got the hang of it and for people who don't really like water they couldn't get us out of it. Saw so many fish and the corals were just incredible, we both really enjoyed it and can't wait to do it again.
After dinner the crew had planned some drinking games for us which pretty much included a tub of veggie mite, licking, blowing, spanking and nudity (not from us!!). Oh and we all dressed up in nasty women's clothing, everyone was on top form and we all had such a laugh. Helped by the fact that the crew gave us 8 litres of goon to drink! After a few more standard drinking games like 21's and "I have never" we finally called it a night about 2.30am.
Back up at 7am for brekkie and one final snorkel at Caves Cove..again incredible. Then it was home time, we felt quite sad coming back to land but the crew had organised a didgeridoo lesson and a night out at a club in Airlie Beach. We went back to the hostel and fell asleep so missed half of our lesson, however did get a really cool video of the teacher playing the didgeridoo. After some dithering we met all the people from the boat at the pub/club for a free pizza and drink. The French guys then suggested we all head down to their campervan for a party as it would be cheaper, so after stopping off at the Thirsty Camel (off license) and buying 8 litres of goon and 2 litres of tequila we headed to the camper park where we had one hell of a party in the park. We met more people at the park who partied with us, the police came as we were not suppose to be out drinking but they were fine with us and said we could carry on just needed to be slightly quieter!
After this we all headed back into town for a dance. Lorry had a box of goon on her head and a litres of it in her bag. Somehow we got in but as soon as the bouncer spotted the goon he was having none of it and we got chucked out so we thought we were going to go somewhere else. Just at that point a fight broke out near the pub so as the bouncer was sorting that out we dumped the goon and ran back in. Danced the night away with everyone and even got a drink bought for us of one of the bouncers!!
Called it a night some point around 2 and got a McDonalds, this is where some tried to buy Hickeys shirt of him, the second time this has happened. After politely refusing to sell we went to bed. Checked out at 10am, and chilled for the rest of the day as we had a 15 hour bus journey to embark on at 6.55pm, the 5 night of heavy drinking was taking its toll so we fell asleep on the hammocks before catching our bus.
We have fluffed it a bit with timings so now will have to miss out the Gold Coast and only have 1 night in Byron Bay. All a learning curve though and wouldn't change it, although if we do it again will have more time on the East Coast to do more things. Although money is running out faster than the speed of sound!!!
- comments
Laura Smith This all sounds bloomin' amazing. Thanks for keeping us updated, I'm loving reading your posts, just wish I could be there with you. xx
Jan Hickey Hilarious, loving it. xxx
Hannah So funny guys, i'm again smiling away to myself at work. Pictures are lush and you both look so happy, I knew you'd both be a hit with everyone you meet. My last day at work today until Jan so off to the Thank Folk it's Xmas at The Vic tonight. You'll be there in spirit. Lots and loads of love and hugs, Hannah xxx
Irena Sitting here freezing my butt off and feeling really jealous. Your trip sounds absolutely fantastice. Have a great Xmas and New Year
natalie Love hearing about all the places you have been, brings back so many memories! x