Hey
I'm making up for that very long delay in blogs with two in a row! Ain't I nice! I'm in a place called Airlie Beach now. Which is the main port to go to the Whitsunday Islands. About 1000km up from Brisbane where I started.
So after I met up with Steph, Chris and Robin in the airport and I had untangled Steph's arms from me, we headed out to the train station to get the train into the city. I had already had a bed booked but the others didn't so they phoned and booked in the same place as me which was awesome, except for the fact it was a Base Hostel, which generally means your in for a rough night. We got there and checked in, then decided to head for the downstairs bar for some food. We looked round the streets briefly and then decided to go out drinking (my favourite pass time). We went back to the hostel to get ready and I made friends with a guy called Jay from Korea. He had a bottle of whiskey and offered me some shots so I invited him out with us, which turned out to be a big mistake or the funniest thing ever depending on how you look at it. First off when I introduced him to Steph to which he said in a very Borat-style voice "Verry Niiice!" And he kept repeating it all the time! He had drunk a bottle of whiskey before we had even left and in the bar he kept downing his drinks, which inevitably lead to him falling off his stall and throwing up everywhere! Then these two local women started talking to us (and they were probably abit too old to be in there in the first place) so we kinda dumped him on them and legged it. Other notable highlights include me ordering ice-cream and when asked what I had been drinking I replied "BUBBLEGUM!! I WANT BUBBLEGUM YRRRRRRRR BUBBLEGUM ICE-CREAM!" And Steph has the best picture ever of me in the place which I really can't describe to you, but I'm sure she'll put it on Facebook at some point. We went back to the bar and Jay had vanished, we didn't stay that much longer but when I went back to my room there was a trail of sick which Jay had left! Gross.
The next day we headed off to Travellers Autobarn to sort out our campervan. But we had quite a few problems with credit cards and stuff, so after a few calls and forms signed the next day we managed to pull away, which went another night in Brisbane, so we changed hostel because there was no way I was staying in Base another night (another highlight of base was the dirty toilets which had porno all over the floor!) The other place was much nicer and had a pool. That night we had a box of goon. Goon is basically wine with egg, fish and meat stuff in it...lovely! We played card games we had learnt on our travels, which included Kings, which was bad for Steph because she ended up having to jump into the pool (it was very cold) cos she lost hahaha. The next day we picked up the campervan, I was first to drive. We had to go back to our hostel because we left our bags and Steph there. Getting back was fine, but it was trying to get onto the highway our of the city which was a nightmare. It took about an hour or so but once we were out it was fine. It's literally one big road up to Cairns (nearly 2000km's) where we were going to start. Our campervan is pretty cool. We had a sink, fridge, stove with two hobs, a grill and a microwave. We had two beds, one is a double and the other is supposed to be a single but it can easily sleep two. They gave us sleeping bags, camping gear, gas and loads of other stuff we would need. One thing that is annoying is that Robin lost our kettle of the first night! But other than that its fine. The driving is great, but we see alot of road kill kangaroos. I will definetely leave Australia seeing more dead than alive kangaroos. The roads are great for over taking and speeding (drink driving is always a laugh! :P) but it's pretty flat out here so not the stunning scenery you get in New Zealand but alot better than the motorways of Britain.

Cairns is the main stop off point for the Great Barrier Reef. So after a day of just resting and catching up with internet and laudry we booked a trip on the reef for the next day and our boat for the Whitsunday islands and Fraser island abit futher down the coast. We had abit of trouble with Steph's card when booking it (i.e it had no money on it) and we are all abit conscience of the amount of money were spending now anyway. The next day we got up really early and headed to the marina. It took about 2 hours to get to the reef. I decided just to snorkell but the others decided to do the introductory dive lessons. The snorkelling was great, the reef is so colourful and there were loads of fishes but even better I saw a shark! Like a real life shark! It was a white tip reef shark about a metre long and even though I knew it wasn't a dangerous one I still was abit freaked out. I just froze and watched it swim past me. It was about 5 metres away from me and then is swam into the reef and disappered into the blue. The water was warmish so long as you kept swimming, but conditions were abit rough so I only swam in short bursts cos the current was so strong, and I thought I was a strong swimmer but that was abit too much at points. After that site we went to another part of the reef. Steph had problems with her diving so couldn't take part so she came snorkelling with me. Later on Chris and Robin joined us and it was so much fun just swimming around the boat. We took off our masks and flippers and were jumping off the back of the boat which was nice (the flippers were killing at this point). All in all a pretty good day I'd say! We got back to land at around 4 and ate. I attempted to go out clubbing but miserably failed because I was so tired (apparently I was falling asleep at the bar) But I didn't care that much. The next day we packed up and started the 3500km journey south!