Hello everyone
I'm still in Australia, still scared of being bitten by sharks and snakes. But having an amazing time anyway. So after the close encounter with a shark at Cairns, me and my fellow travellers headed south to a small town/village/street called Mission Beach. Its about an hour anyway from Cairns so a short ride, where I slept in the back. We arrived and it was baking hot and pretty much fell in love with the place straight anyway, firstly because it was very cheap to stay there and secondly because it has the biggest beach I've seen. After exploring the main street which took all of 5 minutes we spent the day fooling around on the beach and playing with this giant beach ball these Dutch people gave us (but it popped). The amount of free stuff we have taken off people is quite extraordinary. The next day we did alot of the same, generally chilling out after all the driving and exploring. We did a rough timetable of where and how long we were going to stay in places and found out we could stay another night in Mission Beach which was koala ('koala' is the new 'wicked'...we have alot of time on our hands) That night we went out for a really posh meal at the fish and chip shop which made a pleasant change from pasta. The following day Steph showed us this little beach which was hidden behind aload of trees where you could swim and sunbath (the sand on the main beach was abit hard) so we spent alot of time there and I went for a swim which was cool. In the evening we did what we normally do and that playing card games non-stop untill we have to sleep. The previous evening we actually played Trumps for about 5 hours untill 1am. It was a marathon.

The next day we started to head down to Airlie Beach which is the main stop off to go to the Whitsunday Islands, which is a World Heritage site I believe. Airlie Beach itself is a pretty good place, abit of a party town so I was looking forward to the next couple of days. The main town consisted of a main street, a harbour and man-made lagoon. The lagoon was huge and for the two days before we go on our yaught around the Islands we sepnt most of our time in the sun round the pool. The nightlife was good, but not as good as Weymouth, I miss cheap pub/club crawls alot. But we went out one night and had a pretty good night. Anyway, the day of the cruise came and we had to be at the harbour at 2ish. We had a few problems with getting on a boat on the day we wanted to leave so we had to upgrade to a rather posh looking boat, but then that broke so they brough our original boat forward, which meant it was cheaper but not as nice, which didn't really bother us that much. Our boat had 2o other people on it and it was quite small, it certainly didn't look like it slept that many, but luckily for us you were allowed to sleep on the deck which made the trip for alot of people. On the first day we sailed alot and got to know everyone on the boat. For the first time Me, Steph, Chris and Robin were the only British people in the group, which is a rariety when travelling. That night we all had a few drinks, and sadly to say I passed outand so, of course, people got the gaffa tape out and started sticking mugs to my face haha. Ohwell it made some pretty hilarious photos I must say. The next day we were all waken up far to early (6am!) and had breakfast and then (slightly hungover) made our way to Whitehaven Beach, rated one of the top 10 beaches in the world woot! I have never been to a beach like it! The sand was pure white sand. It was actually cold because it just reflects the light and doesn't warm up. The water was clear and the sun was out. It was pretty perfect. After that we went diving on some coral. On the way we saw a massive turtoise swimming around and a group of dolphins which sent everyone running frantically for their cameras. Oh and the captain caught a fish and started chopping it up infront of us which was interesting to watch if not a little gross. The diving was good, we had to wear stinger suits because stinger season has only just finished (lots of jelly fish come near the coast between feb and may). My suit had a massive hole round the arse area which made it pretty much pointless. But it was all fun nonetheless. The next night most people went to sleep early because they stayed up the previous night drinking, so in a little bit of payback I stayed up late playing music, playing cards and talking far to loudly.

We got back to Airlie Beach the next day after another dive at around 1. We were going to go out with everyone from our boat in the evening but sadly we had to start driving straight anyway because our next adventure was about 900km away and started the next day at 1pm. So after a quick dip in the lagoon we drove like madmen down the Bruce Highway (yes it's actual name is Bruce). Along the way Chris decided to ignore the feul level untill it was dangerously close to running out and a petrol station half an hour away. Luckily a very kind couple drove us to their house and gave us a bit of their petrol and drove with us down to the nearest petrol station just incase we ran out. Luckily we didn't but we were extremely thankful. Walking in the dead of night down a motorway to find gas really didn't appeal to any of us. We found a campsite at aorund 10 and crashed out straight anyway. The next day we set off early for Rainbow Beach where we had to get to a meeting at a hostel at 1pm for our trip to Fraser Island. Luckily we made it, and it was a good drive. Lots of windy roads and huge dips in the roads. We got to the hostel and checked in (we got parking and two free nights accomodation as part of our deal). Fraser Island is the biggest Sand Island in the world and it has rainforest next to huge sand dunes and ocean, pretty stunning stuff. We were renting a 4x4 truck with 6 others for 3 days and two nights around the Island, with the freedom to go wherever you want.

ARGHHHHHHHH I'm running out of time so I will finish soon...sorry x