Back to the mainland, Townsville

Unfortunately the bad weather has moved south and caught up with us and yesterday it rained all day. We were lucky to have left Cairns when we did because there have been floods that have cut the far north off from where we are now, making travel impossible. Apparently this bad weather is going to continue moving south, so I think we might have more rain for the next week or so, but oh well!

Luckily our guest house had a 4x4 with a roof so today we took that out to see the rest of the island. Horseshoe Bay is the main resort area, but it was all very quiet with it being the low season here. We also went back up the West Point road which is only accessible by using a 4x4, although 20 minutes up the track the puddles started to become so deep that we had to turn back.

Luckily today we've had no rain while getting the ferry and checking into our new hostel on the mainland in Townsville. Along our travels people have kept telling us that there isn't much to do in Townsville, but I completely disagree! It doesn't have as many tourists, shops and nightclubs as Cairns but that wasn't really what we were looking for so we've been enjoying it here. There is a beach, although the sun hasn't been shining so we haven't been on it. We did go and visit the 'Reef HQ' aquarium which has a 2.5million litre tank with the world's largest living coral reef in captivity. They also have recently opened a turtle hospital to care for sick and injured turtles that are occassionally found along the local coastline.

Tomorrow morning we are getting back on the Greyhound to move further south to Airlie Beach - the main access point to the Whitsunday Islands. Apparently this bad weather is going to continue moving south, so I think we might have more rain for the next week or so, but oh well!

Arrived In Magnetic Island, Australia

We've had enough of the rain and left Cairns this morning in search of sunshine. We took the Greyhound coach  around 6 hours south of Cairns to Townsville where we could catch a ferry to Magnetic Island. On the way down we stopped off in Cardwell for a lunch break and got to see some of the damage from the recent Cyclone Yasi. Most of the way down from Cairns you could see damage such as buildings' roofs ripped off and strewn down the road and flattened rainforest. The driver of our coach gave us a bit of commentary on the way down, and was saying that part of the rainforest near Cardwell was so dense you could only see about two metres into it, but now it is completely flattened, even the leaves and branches have been ripped off the trees that were still standing.

In Cardwell many of the buildings, including people's homes, were totally destroyed. The cyclone stretched several hundred kilometres along the east coast from Cairns to south of Townsville, with the eye of the storm tearing straight through Cardwell. Some of the buildings in the town were 50 years old and had stood up to years of storms and cyclones, but had been flattened by Yasi.

By the time we got to Townsville the sun was shining with a small amount of cloud, which was so nice to see! The ferry left about 30 minutes after our Greyhound coach giving us just enough time to sort out the tickets and our accommodation on the island. We chose somewhere on the recommendation of Rich & Sara (who we met at our hostel in Cairns), that to our surprise came with a free collection service from the ferry terminal in a classic Rolls Royce Silver Shadow!

A lot of the island is best explored by 4x4 because many of the roads are dusty tracks, so after having dropped our bags off to our room we hired a Suzuki Vitara 4x4 to go for a drive. Apparently you can sometimes see wild koalas along a stretch of track heading north, though we didn't see any this time so we are going to go for another drive there in the morning.

Geoffery Bay, the beach opposite our guest house, is famous for its wallabys that visit the rocks near the shore at dusk. Our resort kindly gave us some wallaby pellets and said that quite often they will eat out of your hand! They were surprisingly tame and friendly, when you hold your hand out with food it would gently lick it off your palm.

Raining in Cairns

We've been in Cairns for a few days now hoping that the bad weather was going to blow over, but it doesn't look like it is! I didn't go snorkelling the other day because there were torrential storms and although it may have been better out to sea, it still wouldn't have been sunny and when I'm paying $150 to go snorkelling I want it to be sunny and colourful, not raining and grey. We will have other chances further south in places such as the Whitsundays so fingers crossed it will be better there.

All the rain is right over Cairns!

Tomorrow morning we're taking the Greyhound coach about 6 hours south to Townsville and Magnetic Island. I'm unsure if the weather will be much better there, but hopefully there will be some more things to do if it's not. An English couple we have met here in Cairns recommended that we hire a 4x4 on Magnetic Island, I can imagine that would be even more fun in the rain! Townsville also has a huge aquarium so there should be enough things to keep us busy for a few more days until the sun comes out.

Arrived In Cairns

So we've completed our Asia part of the trip. According to google we've covered 3684 miles, mostly by plane but a large amount by coach. My two favourites have got to be Chiang Mai and Ko Lanta. Chiang Mai had loads to do and see. The food and the markets were amazing, not to mention the elephant trekking at Patara. Ko Lanta was equally amazing for different reasons, it was such a great place to chill out, although a lot of this is down to the people we met. We couldn't have asked Lek and Malay to be more welcoming to us so I really hope we get to see them again. I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you go to Ko Lanta stay there and you will learn more from the about Thailand then anywhere else. Blue Moon bar was a great place to chill out at night in the hammocks, helping ourselves behind the bar all because of the trust of the owner, who had some great stories to tell us! Lanta Welfare centre also was a key part of Ko Lanta for us with the people there and the dogs they look after, miss them loads!

Now we're in Cairns and onto our next adventure. The climate is really different here, it's still just as hot but a lot more humid. We could live without air conditioning in southern Thailand but here it is a must! I haven't got any photos of Cairns as yet because it's a really uninspiring place for photography (after having spent months in Asia it is anyway!). But, I'm off on a snorkelling trip to the Great Barrier Reef in the morning and I'm armed with a waterproof camera again so I should hopefully see some interesting coral and wildlife. Fingers crossed I don't see any big jellyfish or sharks!