I had written part of a post when the internet cafe's connection crashed. No charge to me, but it's annoying because I have to write it again.

We arrived in Cairns Sunday evening. The heat and humidity hit me like a brick wall when we got off the plane. It was kind of nice actually, like a much needed sauna after exams. I wasn't so pleased about it the next day though, when I was walking the Esplanade feeling sure that somebody would have to collect me in a bucket when I finally melted all the way. The hostel was great value for money. I actually felt perfectly safe wandering around in bare feet, it was that clean. We spent Monday being lazy and recovering from the stresses of exams and packing and goodbyes.

Tidal mudflats caused by stupid humans dredging and wanting boats in the harbour may be unsightly and not the original natural state of the shore, but the are home to an amazing number of shorebirds and crabs and mudskippers. I almost fell over the railing watching mudskippers (fish that can 'skip' over the mud from puddle to puddle). The afternoon was spent floating in the (artificial) lagoon and sunbathing at it's edge. There's nothing quite like swimming in the tropics, with the heat, and blue skies and palm trees and rainforest covered hills, and blue ocean, and tanned bikini clad bodies everywhere, and workers putting up Christmas decorations...

Tuesday morning we rose early for our cruise to the Great Barrier Reef. We visited Saxon and Hastings reefs. The weather was gorgeous at Saxon reef, but towards the end of Hastings the icky weather caught us. Not soon enough to spoil the snorkelling though. It was amazing. Swimming over coral formations with zebra striped fish brushing past my arm, reaching towards a giant clam and having to pull my hand away before it closed on my fingers (wouldn't have hurt, but it's better not to touch), seeing cucumbers and nudibranchs, watching an listening as a parrot fish scratches a the coral and then seeing the little cleaner fish dart in to help with the cleanup... incredible. Ching even saw a sea turtle. I'm jealous. But not too much, I saw too many cool things to be upset. I have the oddest shaped burn on my back, which makes no sense because sunscreen was repeatedly applied to those spots... So much for avoiding a tan line. Apart from the reef, which I cannot properly describe, the food was great, the staff was great, and the entertainment was hilarious even though he made fun of Canadians.

Tuesday was Atherton Tablelands day. The tourgroup for the day only had 7.5 people: an older couple from the Sunshine Coast, a guy from Japan, a couple from Guam and their little daughter (the half), myself and Ching. This was wonderful because it meant the tour was a lot more personal and we could do more of what we wanted. It was pouring rain, but as Nathan our tourguide pointed out, rainforests are great to visit in the rain. The first stop was the Babinda boulders. When I have time, ask me about the Aboriginal legend that explains their existance and why you should be extra careful there if you're a male of about 18-35. After the boulders, we went to Paronella Park. Years ago a man by the name of Paronella built a Spanish castle by a waterfall in the rainforest. It was splendid for a while, then forgotten and rundown. Now they do tours there. Somehow I managed to pick up the first ever leech in the memory of the people who were working that day (at least a couple of years). No worries though, it was tickled off and the only side effect is a tiny little bruise on my leg.

I need to speed this up.

We had lunch at a biodynamic dairy. Their Lemon Aspen yogurt is reeeally good. Then it was off to Milla Milla falls, famous mainly for the commericial in which a bikini clad model tosses back her long hair. Would have been nice if it was a sunny day because then I could have gone swimming there. But no such luck so we got back on the bus and went to Crater Lake Barrine. It was created by a volcanic eruption and is entirely filled by rainfall. At Lake Barrine, the adults of the group went on the wildlife cruise around the edge of the lake (which cost money), and the Japanese guy wandered off on his own, so Nathan took Ching and me on a personal guided rainforest walk. We saw and learned about the ancient Kauri pines which have been growing since Gondwanan times, and had fun ducking the wait-a-while vines that kept snagging our umbrellas, and Nathan spotted what we're pretty sure was a bettong, which is endangered and not something you expect to see, but hey, if the tour guide says so, I'm willing to say that's what it was.

We discovered that Nathan watches the OC when we checked what time the tour would return to Cairns because we wanted to make sure we wouldn't miss the season finale. This led to an animated exchanged of "I can't believe he PUNCHED him!" "Oh I know that was the best thing ever!" etc etc. When everyone was on the bus he was saying how he was going to be rushing home to see it on his big screen TV, at which point I jokingly asked if we could see it at his place. Made the tour laugh, hahaha. Yeah, so Ching and I ended up watching the OC and then "How to Lose Guy in Ten Days" at Nathan's flat. He claims that the movie is his girlfriend's (she's moving up from Melbourne this week) but we're not sure we believe him. I do however believe that the majority of the bathroom contents are his girlfriend's. And may I just state for the record that I AM NOT ALEX MACK! I come to Australia and STILL get that.

We're heading to Mission Beach tonight. We're going to stay there for a day before going on to Townsville. I need to post this before I go $2.50. Oh yeah, there's no daylight savings up here, so the time difference changed again.