Day Eight – Cairns – Rafting and Grafting

Today was quality. I had booked myself into the Raging Thunder white water rafting trip with the boys. It was good cause Owain and Paddy had gone to Mission Beach and came up from there and Tom, T and I came from Cairns. Unfortunately I couldn’t get in a boat with them cause there were only six to a boat but it was better that way cause I got to go in a boat with a girl called Megan from England. Finally I was making girlfriends. We had such a good time. The rapids were pretty low and if wasn’t too hard but it was fun and just nice to go swimming in the rivers in the rainforest. My boat consisted of me, Megan, Janika, Bob, Sven and Janice, who was hysterical. We all had a good laugh. I wasn’t a huge fan of bob, he was about forty and really creepy. We couldn’t get back on the boats so the guys had to pull us in an everytime he would put his hands on my bum. I was not amused and actually had to tell him off.

After the rafting we had a few beers in the pub which Bob bought so I forgave him a little. The other rafting trip joined us too and Megan’s friends Josh and Tom came over for a drink. I’m starting to see a pattern with the people I chat to, they’re all English. It’s such bad form and after all the time I’ve spent bagging out England it seem ironic. But it’s just easier and the English like to drink so we all get along.

After a long bus journey back I cooked myself dinner and got myself ready to go out. But I felt so tired I was sure I wouldn’t be going out but the boys twisted my arm (not that hard) and I got back on the goon for another night.

Megan came over to drink with us and brought Krystale, Liv, Bill, Gerrard and Deano with her. It was so nice to have some girls to go out with and just girls who want to have fun and don’t care. We went straight out to Woolshed which was nice because Gilligan’s is getting a little old. We got suitably pissed and danced on the tables which I fell off having the bruises to show for it.

I’m really glad I met these guys and hearing someone tell you their glad they met you is the best feeling in the world. Everyone wants to be liked but to feel like you might have made touched someone made them happy happy and made them feel good, that’s the ultimate goal.

Day Four – Cairns – Living the Rainforest Dream

I woke up at hourly intervals all the night before and that combined with a hangover wasn’t well welcomed by an early morning start but the others seemed to be having a tougher time than I so I sucked it up and got ready.

I went down to meet my group to go to the Uncle Brian’s tablelands tour. We hopped onto the bus and got going with a rather enthusiastic guide. It was nice because it got everyone involved and introduced. We played games, sang songs and it was pretty fun making me feel like a child again.

This whole day I was barefooted, ‘going native’ as they say and it was so nice. Donna turned to me and said she could feel the electricity from the earth through her feet and I kind of know what she means. There’s a certain warmth you feel from feeling bare feet on bare ground.

The first place we went was a river with boulders in it where we jumped off the rocks into the river it was so lovely and so natural. After that we went to a natural rock slide in Josephine Falls where we were able to climb up and slide down the rocks. Next we went to lunch which was pretty nice lasagne.

After lunch we headed to Millaa Millaa Falls which is the place where they filmed Peter Andre’s mysterious girl video so we all had a go doing the famous Peter Andre hair flick. This was pretty hilarious because our guide, Sid, a really cute, slightly overweight, middle-aged guy properly briefed us on how to flick our hair.

After capturing the perfect hair flick picture we swam in the falls for a bit before heading on to see the curtain fig tree. It’s a pretty cool tree which plants it’s seed in another tree then as it’s vines grow around the other tree it pushes it over and kills it before moving onto another tree creating a curtain effect with its vines.

After the fig tree we headed to a section of the river popular with platypuses. I’d been there before and not seen one so it was pretty exciting when we saw one pop it’s head out of the water a few times. After this the day was coming to an end and we headed home. We stopped at a hostel for toilet breaks and such. It had a really nice garden where we all played table tennis and it was so nice to see the bus all getting on so well. I felt that if we spent more time together it would have been really nice. This has got me pretty excited for the kiwi experience which involves a lot of bus journeys with the same people.

After this I came upstairs to drink with the boys again. There were so many people in the room and also a lot of goon. The room has now been christened the goon room and ha become famous. Hannah from England and Donna from Mexico, two girls from the trip today joined us and we had pre drinks. As soon as we went downstairs into the club I lost Hannah. About 15mins later after looking for her I saw her come onto the stage as the pole dancing competition starts. She had the support of the whole goon room behind her and of course she won the show giving her 50 dollars on her car tab. The rest of the night was pretty blurry but I can safely say it was fun. We move onto the Woolshed and spent the rest of the night dancing away on the tables. It’s days like today that I know I’m not wasting my life away.