Lions. Mermaids and The Best Man Ever!

Hello everyone!!!!

It's 8:32pm on Saturday July 10, 2010.

Technically this is starting my third week of the great adventure and it has been a blast so far!!! Last week we moved to Toomulla Beach, which is a 45 min drive from Townsville, and camped out in an RV campsite. Tents, sleeping bags, portable showers, and campfire meals all included! The volunteer work we did there was move a fence line back a few feet to prevent crazy people from driving their cars too close to the vegetation growing between the parking lot and the beach. This was really fun because we got to dig up 6 ft posts that were cemented into the ground, drill new holes using a fancy drill and then re-cement the posts back. What they thought would take 3 days took us 9 hrs. Go us! At another site, we put in low metal railings to prevent ATVs from again, driving on vegetation. We actually watched one turn around a few days after the job! :D

Because we were such hard workers, we got a free day off on Thursday. So, Terry, one of the CVA supervisors, took us up into the mountains (not even a 15 min drive away from our campsite) and we hiked through the rainforest at Paluma National Park. It was absolutely incredible! When we entered the forest, everyone went quiet as if we had entered a cathedral. The awe of the trees and creatures were breathtaking! We saw a couple of waterfalls and further down the mountain, went swimming in the mountain stream! It was amazing! That night we had a bonfire on the beach, and Terry told us stories of Lions, Mermaids and The Best Man ever, which happened to relate to the different animals in the area :D

Friday, we packed up camp and headed back to Townsville. A quick goodbye to Alex, our project leader, and all of the CVA staff, and then we were on a plane to Cairns (pronounced like "cans"). We are now currently living in Gilligan's Backpackers Hotel & Resort, which is huge and awesome! There's a club downstairs and a short walk to the beach. Here's the link if you want to see some of it: http://www.gilligansbackpackers.com.au/

There are 7 other projects here that have traveled from all parts of the east coast and there are 59 of us total on the Adventure Tour. Kip is our Tour Leader and she is a ball of energy! She's Australian born and bred, a surfer, forensic science major and has a need to not settle down! ;)

This morning we had our orientation and then headed to the Tjapukai Aboriginal Cultural Park, where we learned how to throw a boomerang (which I'm HORRIBLE at), play didgeridoos (I couldn't get the breathing thing right), and learned about the culture. It was really incredible to see the how they used the land and to hear the language. Then in the afternoon we had a Reef Teach to prepare for the GREAT BARRIER REEF tomorrow! I'm such a nerd, I wish I had my bio notes to review all of the creatures I might see tomorrow. I've rented an underwater camera and the beginners scuba class so I think I'm ready!

I'm sorry there are no pictures this time, the computers in Gilligan's don't have USB connections which is weird. I'm hoping to get back on either tomorrow night or the night after and see if I can upload some stuff for you to see! Until then, I love you and miss you all! Cheers!