Cairns and Cape Tribulation.

In Cairns I went on a live aboard, anchored off a Cay in the outer barrier reef and spent the night out on the ocean while i completed 4 1/2 dives (first one out of the 5 didn't go as planned, i jumped in a rough ocean - i'm used to calm swimming pools, and my weight belt decided to come off, follwed by my fin on my right foot. I splashed my way back to the boat shelf and sat there pretty spooked, contemplating not getting back in. I slapped myself around the face a bit and jumped back in for a snorkel. The other 4 dives went pretty much to plan (apart from using my air too quickly and having to share air so i could stay down longer). I did my skills and was qualified after the 4th dive.
Lesley and I enjoyed a night out at sea and drooled over the starry night sky (amazing what you can see without light pollution), we were also lucky enough to have one of the passengers on board serenade us with his acoustic guitar!.
The boat was pretty rocky and although i didn't puke, Lesley did. Strange though as she waited until we were in calmer waters before barfing!

The next few days we went upto a place where Reef meets Rainforest - a place called Cape Tribulation.
Inhabitants included - Natures top predator, Saltwater crocs (known man eaters and of which there were many, along with many warning signs)- they can grow upto 8 metres and can chomp down with such force that each tooth exerts a pressure on the victim of 6 family cars! - we saw a 5 metre croc by the name of Scarface
Numerous spiders - most venomous and most bigger than my hand
Snakes - again, most are venomous (and slippery little barstewards) - the snakes in cape trib included the brown snake (not the type you find in the toilet!! - read about it!)and the inland taipan (it can strike you 6 times in a second and inject as much venom in each strike as the deadly sea snake!)

In cape trib we went horse riding with two real ozzy cowboys (named Mick and Buffalo!), managed to get my horse (Popeye) up to a canter, but i kept getting blocked by Lesleys slow horse (Red) up ahead. Night times in cape trib were spent curled up in a ball, with the fear of god that something was going to eat/sting/bite us!

After that crazy ordeal, we came back to reality in a nice town called Port Douglas, had some beers, ate some food, caught a plane to NZ ................