Hey there, in Cairns now. Arrived two days ago and booked into an 8 bed dorm with 4 girls from Niederoesterreich and Zuerich who speak English with each other ALL THE TIME! But well, they’re young … and then there’s this slightly smelly guy sawing trees at night, I think he must have cut half of the rainforest already! Still haven’t really found out who’s in the last bed, a girl is all I can tell. Have only seen her sleeping.
The hostel itself, Gilligan’s is rather a resort than a backpackers with huge pool, hundreds of nice rooms (with their own shower/toilet), a beauty salon downstairs, in-house club (with interesting body-paint competitions) but the kitchens are really poor. Stoves don’t work properly, no cutlery nor pans and pots, and people pinched half our food last night.
Having a good time anyway, went out pretty much each night, sitting downstairs listening to live guitar music and chatting to other people. Everybody here seems really young though …
Cairns itself is somehow not quite as nice as Darwin, not sure why, maybe cos there are too many backpackers, that’s basically all you see. Gonna explore the lagune (a nice pool directly by the sea) today and also check with the Dep. of Immigration to sort out my visa.
Really looking forward to get out of here – tomorrow we’ll pick up a car, quite a downgrade actually. Neither Jucy nor Wicked had any Campers available before the end of next week – too long for us to wait! So we decided to get a little Thrifty instead, got a tent anyway so we’ll get to use it finally!
Heading up north tomorrow, Cape Tribulation and then back down to the Athertons Tablelands which is basically the hinterland of Cairns and has lots of lakes and waterfalls. Then further down the east coast and by the end of the month we should arrive in Brisbane. I’ll keep you posted!
Cheers