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Hey all

Sorry for the long gap between instalments of Taggies Travels but I've been really busy these last couple of weeks as some mates from uni swung by cairns so have been doing a lot of catching up.

Rick, Sarah, Ben and Pete arrived on the 24th of May and within a hour of landing I'd picked them up, sung some karaoke and taken them to the lagoon for a look round and a 'cool blend latte' (this is an awesome drink, its frozen coffee, an ideal pick-me-up after a long flight). Anyway the guys were pretty tired after being on the road for over 24 hours so after the lagoon I took them to their hostel for a rest and went off to do my own stuff. That night Pete arrived from Brisbane so we went out for a "quiet" drink and told stories of our journey's so far. During the night I introduced everyone to RUM as you cant come all this way and not have some rum, I don't think they were too keen on it though, to be fair it is an acquired taste but it makes you dance f**kin' awesome!!! Alas by the end of their time in cairns I'd managed to get Pete and Ben drinking the good stuff. The rest of the week was spent job hunting as the original plan was for them to stay in Cairns until they had enough money to carry on their trip, this wasn't too bad as the weather was pretty awful with heavy rain every day but on the Friday it picked up so we decided to load up the Honda and take a drive to Port Douglas. This was a fantastic day, hot, sunny, I looked cool as hell driving with sunnies on, window down and the arm resting on the ledge hehe. We got there and after dinner headed straight to the beach for the afternoon, I got them to teach me how to 'boogie board'. This was mint, it cost $5 to hire one for an hour (we were gonna steal it but the bloke came back - bugger!) and basically you lie on the board until a massive wave comes the kick as hard as you can to stay on top of the wave, and to be fair I must say I was rubbish at it, I seem to have the buoyancy of a concrete post sinking or times than floating, I'd get on the board, get wiped out stand up and turn round just in time for the next wave to smash me full on in the face.  Needless to say I gave this up as a bad idea and stuck to what I wasbest at - drowning, still it was good fun. Pete bought with him his video camera so we decided to do some beach Olympics which basically involved some kind of stunt diving into the sea and watching the reply afterwards. As it got dark we decided to head back, it was tricky driving as my eyes were stinging from trying to stay a float and also my belly was hurting from all the sea water I swallowed.

The following week again was spent looking for work, its soo hard here as all the back packers take up all the temporary jobs, but I managed to wangle an interview after drunkenly asking a hotel manager for a job on a night out, unfortunately I was rejected yesterday as they are looking for a more permanent position so it looks like I'll be taking the job at McDonalds next week. Pete's girlfriend arrived a few days later and after more bad look in finding work we went for a day out to Karunda which is a 30 minute cable car ride from Cairns over the rain forest. This was awesome, the views of the trees and the Baron Falls were magnificent (check out pics by clicking here).  Karunda is a small place full of Abbo's but it had a wildlife sanctuary which was only $14 so we thought what the hell and went for a look round, I got to feed some animals and we got a group photo with a koala, I have a new respect for them as I found out eucalyptus trees are narcotic and have the same effect as wacky backy so they sleep all day because they don't get much fluids and they are also STONED!!! On the way back we stopped off in the rainforest and had a walk round, you wouldn't believe it but its so cold under those trees, even though it was 27 degrees once you got in the temperature dropped to about 10 degrees.

After we got back from Karunda we got some coconuts off the back garden and started smashing them open with a claw hammer, these things are impossible to open without tools so next time you see castaway are something like that you know its a load of rubbish.  After half hours perilous smashing I finally got into mine and drank the milk, which I now know had gone off, it was horrible but the chewy stuff inside was still ok so it wasn't a total loss.

The next day they guys went the separate ways to find work fruit  picking in other parts of Queensland so last Saturday as there was no games due to the Queens Birthday public holiday me and Tim got a carton in and played some back yard cricket with a few mates as it was a hot day. This was the 1st

 

official ashes game and sorry to say but England (me, see the pic I'm a mile away from the ball!) lost, a few beers later we implemented some rules and coz Tim was pretty good he ended up batting on one foot, with one hand and one eye closed, finally we managed to get him out. The other guy in the photo is a bloke called Namok, he's a 142kg pure black man... who hates blacks, but he's a good bloke and we never get any trouble in town. We also have table tennis set up in the kitchen (the best $4 ever spent) which is also fun to play at any time day or night, drunk or sober.

Anyway that takes you up to today, I haven't played a game for 2 weeks due to Vidgin Cup (Cairns v's Townsville) and last week being a bank holiday. But we still train twice a week, last week I put a tackle in on one of the guys, he fell over and dislocated his finger, made me feel pretty bad as well as sick because when he stood up his finger was bending the wrong way and I can't even watch casualty without feeling ill!

Hope you're all well, write back and congratulations to the mixed squad on winning the national tournament.

Taggie