It has literally just sink in. After getting back from my last tour of a hectic 3 weeks I suppose tomorrow really is the time I leave Australia. Everyone always asks you when you're close to leaving whether or not you're 'ready' to go home and I still don't know the answer. Of course I miss everyone at home and of course I want to see more of the World and so the answer has to be somewhere in between I suppose. Either way, I'm 100% confident that this won't be the last time I travel and so maybe that's why it hasn't seemed to hit me yet.
Anyway... Why focus on the negative (the end of the trip), and focus on the positives. The last week, or however long it's been I truly have no idea, has been full of tours, starting with Fraser Island.
I won't lie to you, before the tour I had no idea what was happening due to the blur that the trips been but I'd spoken to a few people and knew that 4x4's and camping were involved with a few lakes in between. Despite that being my response since the event to fellow travelers who have asked me the same question - it is so much more than that somehow.
Fraser Island is the largest sand island in the World and our 3 day/2 night tour saw us self drive through the sandy beaches and bumps to several crystal clear lakes, 96% silicon sand, waterfalls, creeks, lookouts and springs, featuring the odd dingo, stingray and shark (maybe).
This all included 7am wake-up calls and a fair bit of driving which, admittedly, I was lucky to do considering you had to have held your licence for a year and I've been driving for 13 months now.
The trip itself was just incredibly well done. Not alone do you have time to see all the sights but due to the fact you are thrust in a car with 7 other people, no tour-guide's in the car, forced to cook for each other and share the snacks etc it just made for a tight family-style environment, made even better by the fact that I was the only guy which meant I never did any of the cooking - touch.
I was, again, very lucky in that the people in my car were a pretty awesome group to be fair, and featured its fair share of Europe. I think the final tally was 2 English, 3 Finnish, 1 Danish and 2 Irish - probably the only ever group not to have a majority of either English and German people. My theory is that 90% of all travelers are from either Germany or England and that's not even an exaggeration.
After an amazing 3 days which ended in a pub quiz back on the main land (which once again, I didn't win.) we had actually a semi-relaxing couple of days which mainly included a 17 all-round coach journey up the coast and yes, this does count as relaxing in my book.
This culminated in another tour - the 3 day/2 night tour of the Whitsunday Islands... It was absolute luxury. The weather finally decided that it was going to get rid of all the clouds and be simply beautiful - ideal conditions for a boat.
To sum up the trip simply - we snorkeled 5 times over the 3 days and went to arguably the best beach in the world. In between we chilled out, drunk some goon and sunbathed on a boat - this is what Australia is all about. I genuinely don't think I need to explain this trip anymore... It was as simple as that with awesome food and some amazing marine life featuring spending half an hour snorkeling with a turtle.
It's also pretty impossible to put into words just how stunning Whitehaven beach is, I'd recommend Googling it to save me the embarrassment of failing to do it justice - simply amazing.
After another awesome 3 days and meeting more amazing people it was time to part ways with Tayla and make my last coach trip up the coast solo. Time boundaries were starting to come into play even more than usual and so this meant that I ended up getting back from the boat at midday, chilling until 8pm to get my overnight bus that arrived in Cairns (my last stop) at 6am - before skuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef at 7am.
Even though I ended up falling asleep on the boat a couple of times there was nothing that could stop me from enjoying such a fantastic experience. This day, surprise surprise, was another long day and included spending about 9 hours out on the reef itself and included another couple of snorkeling trips and a glass boat tour so despite my lack of sleep I still took the most of my opportunities and it's definitely another thing ticked off my bucket list and is the second of seven natural wonders of the World that I intend to see.
This brings me to today and yet another fantastic tour, this time to the rain forest region about an hour east of Cairns. It was yet another 7am wake-up call (I'd like to point out that I haven't woken up before 8 for at least a week and a half now so pity me???) that included stunning waterfalls with natural slip-slides, as well as being the home of the famous herbal essence adverts several years ago now which, of course, prompted an attempted hair flick from yours truly. Other stops included stunning rivers, lovely rainforest walks, volcanic-created creators, and huge lakes.
This trip was, not for the first time, made even better by a fantastic tour guide (probably my favourite in Australia - shoutout Jim) and meeting even more great people. It was a tour that I wasn't expecting huge things of but it really put the cherry on top of a fantastic trip and I couldn't be more thankful.
Even writing about how much I've done in the last x amount of days is making me ridiculously tired and I now look forward to a lay-in tomorrow!!!! Although this does mean checking-out of my hostel at 10am - bad times. I then have a few hours to kill which will give me time to actually explore Cairns a bit before flying over to Brisbane in the evening which has the luxury of being my home for the night (the airport that is) and then catching a 6am flight to Auckland where I will start my 2 week holiday - I cannot wait.
I hate saying goodbye's, more out of awkwardness than anything, but it has to be done unfortunately so I would like to say goodbye to the following...
- My last remaining hoody (my fault - left on a boat)
- My GoPro (my fault - took into water with the wrong case on - was absolutely gutted, sorry guys!)
- My laptop charger (Gunna put this one down to travelling taking its toll - not my fault - yes!)
Not long to go now guys - I guess I'll see most of you all June time.
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