So, the big spring break whirlwind trip. I decided to do this trip in 3 separate posts so I could get it all straight. The first one is Cairns, then The Whitsundays, and finally Hervey Bay and Fraser Island. It is in chronological order so it was a lot easier for me to type it all out.
We started the trip in the Sydney Airport. We scored cheap tickets because the flight was for carry on bags only. We could bring only 10 kilos of luggage with us. As you read on, you'll notice we 3 are not backpackers, and this was not easy. We stressed and stressed about how to pack right, but it was all for nothing. We got to the airport and checked in at a self check in kiosk and went through security with no problems. In fact, no one even checked our ID's. Not once. Not even at the gate. I could have been God knows who getting on that plane and no one would have been the wiser. Chrissy and Laura got on with razors in their bags. Comforting, Sydney Airport, really comforting. I was pleased to discover that Jet Star is much like Southwest (just for you mom). The seats were nice, large, and leather. I got stuck sitting with a mom and her kid, but it wasn't too bad. I enjoyed the 3 hour flight right up until the end where we hit turbulance so badly some people actually screamed. I don't know if I've mentioned this or not, but I hate planes and I hate flying. Whatever, we landed all in one piece to horribly hot, rainy, typical tropical weather.
We took a shuttle over to our hostel and attempted to check in. We had booked 5 nights in an 8 person share room, but ended up only needing 4 nights because the bus to the Whitsundays would be leaving at midnight the 5th night and there really was just no reason to pay for that night. When we tried to check in however, we came across a problem. They had put each of the 3 of us into 3 seperate 8 share rooms for all 4 nights. Clearly, this wasn't going to work. Like I said, we aren't really backpackers. After basically a stare down with the girl at the counter she upgraded us to a 3 person hotel room. Thats right, not a hoStel but a regular hotel. We had a cleaning service, our own bathroom and balcony, a fridge in the room and even a TV. We were living better than most people there. The best part was that while those rooms normally go for about 125 a night per person, since they screwed up the reservation they gave the room to us for the price of the room we thought we were getting, which was 25 a night per person. It was less for all 4 nights than it should have been for 1. Pretty sweet deal I think.
After settling in we headed down to the HUGE bar and resatuarant that are part of Gilligans (our hostel/hotel). You could recieve a "free dinner" here if you paid the price of your drink: usually $3 for a soda or $5 for a beer. We agreed that we were trying to save money so we would all do this. After the first and second meals we decided we certainly were NOT going to be doing this. It wasn't horrible, but we just arent backpackers. The bar there has amazing drink specials everynight and its basically the place to be for people our age who were in town. That night the special was "hour of power" which means you paid $10 to get in and got a wristband, and you drank WHATEVER you wanted for an hour. After having already drank in our room, its pretty obvious how that night turned out. We had a freaking BLAST, and since we arrived a night before anyone we knew would be there, we had a nice girls night together.
The next day there was semi good weather, but apparently in Cairns you do not go to the beaches becaues of sharks and stingers. We spent the day shopping and getting to know the town better while waiting for Jenna (!) and some of our friends from Newcastle to arrive. Jenna got in around 9 and met us in the bar, and the boy from Newcastle ended up having their flight delayed a whole 7 hours, so they missed everything. This was the night before Good Friday, and for some odd reason EVERYTHING had to be closed by 12. No alcohol could be sold on Good Friday and almost nothing would be open in town. We had to buy everything ahead of time because if we wanted anything to drink the next day we had to buy it then. It was a little weird, espeically since Easter was a huge party night, but whatever. Its an Australian thing I guess.
The Lagoon in Cairns
Me, drunk, telling everyone they don't know how to dance and I can show them anything. Yes, I pulled out "the shopping cart" and yes, Chrissy has a video of the whole thing.
Looking semi normal!
The next day, we decided it was time for our first big adventure: Bungee Jumping. I figured: no big deal, start off small, work our way to Skydiving. This was going to be cool. It was the first commercial built bungee tower on earth and it was in the rain forest of Cairns overlooking the Great Barrier Reef. It would be amazing, right?
God ho wwrong was I?! I was calm the whole night before, the morning of, and even the drive to the bungee sight, but as soon as we started climbing those 50 meters(about 164 feet) to the jump site on wet wooden steps, I broke down. Like I said before, I am terrified of heights. I have never in my life shaken or had as hard a time breathing as this. Seriously, its embarassing to even remember right now. Once we got to the top, I decided I definetely could not look over the edge. After calming myself down for 20 minutes, I figured I was as ready as I would ever be. Chrissy went first, thank God, and I got to watch. As soon as she jumped I considered whimping out and just walking back down but I couldnt: I was already strapped up and I was next. I told myself to just suck it up and do it. As I walked to the edge I can't even explain what was going through my head. It was awful. Just thinking about the drop before feeling the releif of the bungee saving me was enough to make me pass out. No backing out now, I was standing there with my toes over the edge....
Where we ended up
Thats the drop.
I was a happy camper!
The guy told me to let go of the handrail and counted down "5...4...3...2...1..." I have no idea how I did it, but I jumped. Well, not really. I watched my video and bought the pictures after and I really didnt jump out gracefull like youre supposed to. I really just fell, feet first. This was the stupidest thing I could have done because I only fell feet first until the bungee whipped me as fast as possible upside-down and dropped me about 5 feet from the water, and then bounced me back up, and down, up and down. I don't mean to make this sound in any way like I hated it. At no point did I ever actually think I wasn't going to go through with it (hell, I already paid) and I knew it was something I HAD to do to get over my fear. In the first 5 minutes off the cord I vowed I would never, EVER do that again. After waiting 30 minutes and watching Laura jump I decided I didn't do it how I wanted to and I could do it again if only to try to remember how it actually did feel to look out over the rainforest and all of Cairns and experience what I thought I had missed the first time. An hour later I decided I was absolutely, positively going to bungee again, just not today. Laura and Chrissy, however, enjoyed it so much they paid a cheap $35 to go again, tandem. They jumped together. I got the offer of doing a 3 person jump with them, but I just couldnt go again, not the same day.
just hanging out
I still get a knot in my stomach looking at this and remembering the feeling.
PANIC sets in
All in all, I couldn't be more glad I did it. I am not an adrenaline junkie, so it didnt get me all hyped up wanting more, but I would do it again for sure. I love being able to say I actually did it and I genuinely enjoyed the experience.
The next day we chose to be more relaxed, so we booked a day trip out to the Great Barrier Reef to snorkle. Here is Laura in her sexy stinger suit (Chrissy and I got regular wetsuits thank GOD):
This is where we snorkled. Sadly, the day wasn't the best so the visibility wasn't as good as it could have been, but it was still an unreal experience. How many people really get to do that? And apparently there was a shark swimming down near the scuba divers, so I can also actually say I swam with a shark! How cool! We borrowed our friends underwater camera so we were able to get some amazing shots of the reef, but he hasnt sent us the pictures yet. As soon as we get them I will put them up as well.
Now comes Easter Sunday, and my favorite day of the trip. We went skydiving. I know, I know, I said I hated not only heights but also planes so why would I go jumping out of one at 14,000 feet? Because why the hell wouldnt I?! When else am I going to be in Cairns Australia with time to kill and (some) money to spend.
We got picked up at around 11 am and headed an hour away to the jump site. Once again, I wasn't nervous at all. Only this time, I never got nervous. I kid you not, I think after bungee jumping I could do anything. The thought of jumping out of a plane with a man attached to my back didn't scare me at all. This guy wasn't suicidal, he didn't want to die either. He was going to take care of me. We were the third group to jump so we also got to watch 8 other people get in the plane, fly up, fall out, and safely land.
When it was finally our turn we put on our gear, hopped in the plane, and began our accent. I still didn't particulary like the plane ride, but I had the best tandem guy ever who kept showing me sights all over Queensland, including the reef we had just snorkled in the day before. It all happened so fast I never even had time to get scared. We had carefully worked out the order before getting on the plane, and in about the first 2 minutes on the plane they told us that wasn't how we were doing it. Chrissy was first, Laura was second, I was third and Mark was last. With a minute left before the jump they opened the door. To really visualize this since I don't have pictures from the plane, you need to know the size of the plane. It wasn't big. It BARELY fit the 8 of us jumping. We all sat on our instructors laps (we were attached to them) and Chrissy was pressed against the "door." They opened up, let us take a minute to realize what we were doing, and Chrissy was gone. Lauras instructor didn't do what they had to us we were to do and he took her out backwards. I got to push Laura out of a plane at 14,000 feet. Next up was me. I had no time to think. I scooted to the door and the next thing I knew I was outta there. We had 60 seconds of freefall at about 200 KPH before the shoot was pulled. It was oddly calming falling that fast. The instructor could talk to me, pointed things out for me, and told me everything as it went down. We pulled the shoot at around 8,000 feet and floated back to the earth. I even got a chance to drive the parachute for a little bit. It was truely one of the most unreal experiences of my life and I would do it every single day if I had the chance. I loved EVERY minute of it.
Laura and I just hanging out
Here I come!
That tiny white dot is the plane RIGHT before we all jumped
heading on!
our plane
I look so lazt here. just floating
we did it!
yea chrissy!
I will never forget that day as long as I live. I loved it so much I will never be able to put it into words. If I hadn't before I had definetely now faced and overcome my fear of heights. After everyone else had gone we headed back to Cairns. We had almost 8 hours to kill before our midnight bus ride to Airlie beach. There wasn't much to do since we didn't want to drink, so we just hung out around town and waited until midnight. Laura and I took a walk down by the water and checked out the Lagoon which was a lot cooler than I was expecting it to be. It was a very relaxing way to end a very high impact weekend. Then we hopped on the bus and headed to Airlie...
this is at about 3 pm, and i should have been told to go home THEN.
andrew and i. no, we didnt plan this picture
we all lost our bets :o(
the whole horserace crew
the gang
yes, we actually saw horses
alex and i so excited to win! (even though we didnt.)
i wanted money!!
right before chrissy and I finally called it a night
kris and i!
seriously, someone should have put us in a cab.
seriously.
mark and i!
Clearly, it was time to call it a night much before we actually did so.
Alex, Chrissy, Mary Catherine, Shay and myself at Finnegans
Laura "resting" at Alex's after the horse races.
I have no idea who this is, but we danced together. A lot.
A view of the stands from where we were dancing.
