Cairns to the Outback

Hello all

Cairns was a yet another great Aussie town. The swimming lagoon in the town centre was massive and we enjoyed a day chilling out there. Cairns was also the base for our little excursion to the Great Barrier Reef. We took an excellent day trip (we highly recommend the Seacat) which included an hilarious introduction to the day and to snorkelling, lunch, and 5 hours at 2 dive sites: Saxon Reef and Hastings Reef. We were totally amazed at the colours of the fishes and the coral as it was much better than we expected. Definately one of our best days in Oz. We got an underwater camera so there are a few pics to give you a hint at what we saw. Unfortunately we didn’t get a shot of the Nemo family we saw in an anemone. It was so cute because the baby ones were the size of a stamp!

We have since gone outback! We stayed in Ayer’s Rock resort which is little more than a ring road with 5 hotels on it. There is nothing else anywhere near so it feels very desolate. We then joined ‘The Rock Tour’ for 3 days. Again, highly recommended. We visited Ayer’s Rock, The Olga’s and King’s Canyon and surprisingly we were more impressed by each stop in that order. We camped for 2 nights under the stars in nothing more than a ‘swag’ (a waterproof sleeping bag with a thin mattress in it). I thought I would not sleep a wink for fear of spiders and snakes but actually I slept like a baby. It was very peaceful with nothing but the stars above.

We saw lots of wildlife – wild horses, wild camels(!), kangaroos, Matt saw a rock wallaby, huge eagles, a thorny devil, a tame dingo, and about ten billion flies.

We are now in Alice Springs where we went out for dinner with most of group last night – a great bunch. Looking forward to flying to Darwin this afternoon and then Bali in 5 days for the start of our South East Asia leg – a relief for the budget!

Laters x