The ending point of our east coast tour....cairns!

We arrived in cairns in the early afternoon, first impressions were it looked like a nice town, looked like a normal town!

....getting off the greyhound for the last time!

We got off the greyhound bus for the last time! And i used a payphone for the first time in a few years to call the hostel to come and pick us up, the hostel we was staying at was the one furthest out of town but there was a shuttle to town every hour from early morning to about 3am! And in anycase it was only around a half hour walk! It was nice being out of the town a bit ! Some piece and quiet! We were staying at a nomads we had booked back in december with a money off voucher we got in queenstown! We were a bit nervous about it as we had had bad experiences in oz with nomads hostels but when we arrived it looked ok it wasnt busy and we had booked our own room so even if it was bad we had our own room! Upon checking in we was greeted by the rudist girl on reception who hadnt a clue what she was doing and was clearly being trained she was talking to another member of staff about us as if we werent there ! I was fuming and said something but she just continued to be rude! It was all over a voucher ...we had booked online and she said we needed to print our voucher and give it to her! But we had no internet so we would of had to buy some just to email the voucher to them! I quickly told her we were not doing that! And she was fuming! I think it was because I said no to her she clearly had a attitude problem! Another more experienced member of staff came over and there was no problem at all like i knew there wouldnt be we had had no problems before booking online and not having a print out! But anyway this girl continued to be rude to me through out our stay! Even when she wasnt working! She clearly had never worked with the general public before and had a a bee in her bonet ! She was only working to get free accomodarion at the hostel ! She needed to get down off that pedastal and fast! She is the sort of person that gives hostels a bad name! Anyway we were used to people like that it seemed that the general population of travellers were like that!

We went to our room and it was ok, smelt a bit but that was because it had been empty for a while, we were right next to the bar but on the next floor so thought it would be super noisy but it was fine and there was aircon! Which the recpetion controlled. We got on the shuttle bus to town and went to target for wifi and a cheap chemist to get our last bits for fiji, and then for some food for dinner, luke was going to cook me chilli com carne again :) it was great & it lasted us two days :) anyway we needed to get a pack lunch for a tour we had included in our ticket for monday....atherlon tablelands tour....we decided on roasted veg tortellini with mushroom sauce and brocolli :) our food came to $30 so that was 3 days worth of food for $30 ! We was eating good food and we was only spending $10 per day average! And all our food was fresh :) we headed back had dinner and had a chilled out night! It was a saturday night but the bar wasnt loud at all :) we were pleased :)

....luke cooking me dinner :)

The next day we had a sleep in and then spent The day by the pool catching some rays :) i had a headache by 4pm even tho i had been covering my head up :( so had to go and relax in our dark room for a couple of hours :( and luke very kindly massaged my head and got me some water :) 

There was a girl staying here called victoria and it was a girl i went to primary school with! Random! Meeting someone you went to school with half way around the world! So i chatted to her for a while by the pool that was interesting!

We had chilli con carne left so we ate that and luke cooked some sweet potato to go with it and while he did that i cooked the pack lunch for the next day :) we are a good team when we get going, we were used to wanting to get in the hostel kitchen cook as quick as poss and get out ! This kitchen wasnt to bad, it was small and obviously there was flies everywhere! But it was ok! There was a hostel cat called horlicks and he or she was the cutest thing it actually looked like a tom cat it was huge & cuddly ! It might not have been the hostel cat it did look very well looked after and the coat was really soft and well kept! I gave him our left over cheese! He loved it! We chilled out again that evening we had to be up early the next day for our tour, we started sorting our bags out for fiji.

The next day was a bright and early start being collected for our tour at 7.15am, today we were going on a full day tour of atherton tablelands.....i have wrote a seperate blog post on this as it was such a lovely day....we had a great time and returned at 19.30pm knackared!

We had a wonder around town the next day and spent the afternoon by the lagoon on the esplanade it was a huge public pool that overlooked the sea, there was loads of places to sit and there was free wifi  :) .....

....it was a lovely place to spend the afternoon

We also got dominos that night as it was $5 night :) only two more days now and we are off down to sydney :) cant wait :)

The next day it was overcast and not so warm so we went to town again and i had to get some pictures printed to send my nan and we had a look in the kathmandu store as we had recently discovered we needed sleeping bags for our america tour so we were on the hunt for a bargain! You could rent or buy them from the guide but it was $60 american dollers! Which is £36. We found some in kathmandu and they were in the sale! But unfortunately the sale didnt start for the general public until the next day so we would return tomorrow ! It was time to head to target for the internet! And also luke fancied a curry for dinner! So i went to coles to get bits for that, it was a good idea as it would last us 2 days :) It rained so hard that evening non stop! And all night :(

When we woke up the next day it was still absolutely chucking it down :( but we had to go out we had to get the sleeping bags and go to the post office so we braved the weather ! It was awful but we had our raincoats and umbrella! We were in kathmandu quite along time! We are in decisive ! The dilema was there was two sleeping bags we were trying to decide from..... They were both bargains one was $59.99 knocked down from $149.99 and the other was $79.99 knocked down from $200 so thats £32.50 and £43.44! That was a good deal and they were good sleeping bags, the differences were size, weight and the temperature it could with stand, i decided on the cheaper one because it was lighter, smaller and it was all i really needed but luke got the slightly more expensive one becuase it is one that he could use for night fishing at home so killing two birds with one stone really, his sleeping bag at home had gone mouldy and he was going to get one when he got home anyway and would have been paying at least up to £100 for one! So his really was a bargain! I would have got the same one but the size difference and weight difference was to much for us both to have as they wouldnt fit in our bags! Lukes one can withstand lower tempuratures, however we both have sleeping sheets which add 5-10 degrees on the tempurature so our bags would both withstand minus tempuratures! I could also use mine fishing but i wouldnt be going as often as luke especially night fishing so i think we made the right decision, at least it would save us buying them In the usa and at least we had loads to choose from! We were really pleased with our bargain! We headed back later that afternoon for the dreaded task of packing! And it was a night mare it took hours and lukes suitcase was so over weight :( but we couldnt do anything about it i just couldnt be bothered anymore with the stupid packing! We would have to send more stuff back home from sydney to avoid over the limit charges :( and what was so annoying was that the case wasnt even bulging there was so much room in there! And we hadnt boughgt anything new! It made no sense!

After a late and stressful night we proceded to have a shit sleep! But who cares we were off to sydney in the morning! 

Off to the airport for 10am our flight was at 11.25 it was with virgin australia, when we checked in the lady said we would have to pay $70 for our over the limit bag i nearly cried on the spot that was £40 :( we both had a 23kg allowance and i thought as long as we wasnt over that combined weight between bags we were ok :( sadly all airlines do it differently :( thank goodness she let us off the charge! I was so pleased :) the flight was ok, we got to see some of the "great barrier reef" on the flight over and i have got to say it didnt look like it did in the pics! But neither does the rest of australia! We were most pleased to be heading back to sydney :)

Verdict of cairns is we enjoyed it here especially our tour we did, the hostel was ok apart from the rude arrogant girl! The town was good, the lagoon was nice, I do feel our judgement was clouded slightly by  the fact we couldnt wait to get out of australia ! We were both stressed about it and it was coming out in our mood :( only a few days until fiji :) 

I wont do a verdict on australia as i am doing a comparison of new zealand and australia and as you read it you will see that is our conclusion!