Too HOT!

Up about 9:00, slept awesome. Had breakfast, showered, then Court and I and two German guys in our room walked the Licuala Walking Track through the Tam O'Shanter State Forest. We had to walk 4km to get to the start of the track, then almost 6km along the track, then the German guys left us and continued to the Lacey Creek walk, Court and I walked to the town of Mission Beach, then walked along the beach back to Wongaling Beach, where our hostel was. We walked more than 15km in about 5 horus in 40 degree weather. It's too flippin' hot and humid here, it's unbelievable!!!! We got back to the hostel about 3:00, then we went to the supermarket, I got some minced hamburger for the BBQ at the resort. Then I phoned Malaysian Airlines and confirmed my flight to KL, then used internet for more than an hour, booked a flight from Cairns to Sydney on Virgin Blue for $199AUS, then back to the room, BBQ'd my burgers (DEEEEEELICIOUS!), then Court and I went to the casino at the resort. It was Court's first time ever gambling! All the machines are only penny machines, so we played for a bit, Court started with $9 and left with $11. Beginners luck. I played with a dollar of hers and lost it. Then we played a game of darts (she beat me...she's good!), then back to the room, Court went to bed about 8:45. I stayed up reading and went to bed whenever.

Mission Beach

Up early, about 7:30, showered, packed, lounged, about 9:15, walked to the bus stop with Linda for her 9:30 bus, then I used the internet, then back to the hostel, Court and I headed to the bus stop and got on our 10:30 bus. We got to Townsville about 3:00, ran into Linda at the station (she was heading to Magnetic Island), had a bus change, then continued up to Mission Beach, got there about 7:30.

Six of us on the bus were booked in to Mission Beach Resort, and they didn't have a minibus waiting, so one of the other girls called, and they sent a bus to pick us up.

Mission Beach Resort is NICE! It's a Comfort Resort (of the Comfort hotel chain), that has a backpacker village. So we get to mingle with all the highbrows, upper class in the casino and the classy, expensive restaurant. The restaurant does a buffet every day for breakfast and supper, and all the rooms on the backpacker village have discount cards, so backpackers can get the buffet for $4 cheaper than the regular hotel room people. Hahaha!!

To bed early, about 9:30. Only had about 2 hours sleep the night before!

Pole Dancing!!!!!

Up about 6:30, motored to Black Island, where we snorkelled for 45 minutes or so, then breakfast, then started sailing back to Airlie Beach. Got back to Airlie Beach about noon. We walked back to our hostel in the blistering humidity and heat, I had a couple of jam and peanut butter sandwiches, then crashed for hour hours, got up, showered, used internet, was all sweaty again, showered, then about 7:20, we headed over to Magnums becahse the boat had a table reserved for us. I bought a two for one pizza, and gave the free one to Court and Linda, then lazy-assed Courtney went to bed. I entered a pole-dancing competition at Mass nightclub (part of Magnums). $500 first prize for the best pole dancer!!! It was an equal competition between guys and girls. They needed me up in the blue room at 9:30, so headed up there about 9:20 and mingled with the other pole dancers. Before I headed up, I made sure everyone who was on my boat was going to be in the bar making the most noise for me, so I could win!!! About 10:00, they had 10 contestants, 5 guys, 5 girls. They always do it with an equal number of guys and girls. They gathered us together for some instruction, pretty much you can do whatever you want up there, with only two rules. You are the only one allowed to dance on the stage (i.e. no "backup" dancers or anything) and you MUST keep whatever you're wearing on under your pants (or if you're not wearing underwear, keep your pants on). No genitals allowed, but topless is ok for women. We were also told we'd have about 3.5 minutes, about one song, to dance, use the pole to do whatever and get the audience going. We were then lined up in a hallway and taken into a small concrete room, sat down, and told the format, he would ask the audience who they wanted to see, a guy from Canada, or a girl from England or a guy from Germany or whatever. He also said it was his job to get the audience all riled up, and he'd make comments like, "Do you wanna see those pants come off? Make some noise, and they might drop!" I admit, I was very nervous, but also totally excited. I couldn't believe I was going to do this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In the little room, one of the girls, who was looking pretty green, put up her hand to ask a question, she wanted to know if she didn't want to do it, could she back out just before she was to go on stage. He said no, if she wanted to back out, he needed to know RIGHT NOW. So she said she's out, right there. That meant a guy had to drop out as well. No one was offering. He looked at his sheet, he had two guys from Denmark, and told them one of them has to go. They argued with him, and finally he backed down, then pointed to me and a guy from Australia and said one of us has to go. I looked at him, waiting for him to back down, he didn't, I didn't, he didn't, finally I said I would step down. STUPID ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What was I thinking???? It would have been so much fun!!!!!!!!!! I know I never would have won the money, but it would've been a blast anyway. Oh well, I didn't have my special "Oh Canada" (Thanks Scott!) underwear on anyway. He told me he'd get me a couple of free drinks from the bar, then asked me and the other girl to leave the room. The other girl pushed right by me, and made a mad dash to the washroom, probably to throw up. After retrieveing my drinks, I went back downstairs, found my group and had to explain what happened. They were disappointed. Anyway, we watched the pole dancing competition, some were good, some were bad. One guy had a g-string on (he borrowed from a female friend), and stripped down to only the g-string. One girl danced for a minute or so, then cut it short, she chickened out. Another Dutch guy was dressed at St. Niklaus (traditional Santa Claus figure in Holland...he even had his helpers, the Black Jacks, with him). St. Niklaus just danced around, didn't take anything off. A Canadian girl from Vancouver did very well, she took second place. The guy that I backed out for, the Aussie guy, he got up there, and took off everything, wearing nothing but a grin. What an idiot!!!!!!!! He was immediately ushered off stage and disqualified. He had my frickin spot, and he got naked and disqualified! UGH! Doofus! The winner of the $500, though, was a chick that really knew how to use the pole, obviously not an amateur, but a professional dancer, who also took her top off, which of course got huge noise from the guys in the bar. She should've been disqualified too, for not being an amateur.

After the competition, a bunch of us danced at Mass until after 2:00, when it started to die, then we headed to another nightclub, The Juice Bar, for more partying. I headed home about 4:15. Linda had went home about 9:00.

Whitsunday's - Day 2

Up about 6:45. I remember the motor being started up about 5:30, though. When I went up to have breakfast, we were well away from Hill Inlet. We motored to Whitehaven Beach, a different part of it than the last boat trip, this part not nearly as nice...well, the girl scenery was nicer, many of them went topless, but the beach itself wasn't as spectacular. The two Israeli guys had a video camera and were going up to the topless girls trying to get video of them, much to the girls' dismay. We spent three hours on the beach, sunbathing and swimming. Nina and I built a BIG sandcastle that kept crashing in because we did it in too wet of sand. Court and I took special Christmas photo's that I'm going to send as Christmas cards (probably e-mail xmas cards) to everyone.

Back to the boat about 11:30, had lunch (pizza), then motored to Blue Pearl Bay, and got there about 3:15 and snorkelled and sunned until about 6:00, then back to the boat and had hot garlic bread for an appetizer, then pasta for supper.

Everyone was totally lazy after that, way too much sun, no one was really interested in partying tonight. Nina and I and Linda and Malcolm talked for a while, Linda and Malcolm crashed on the deck, and Nina and I talked for a bit, then we hit the deck too, about 11:00, think.

We had a small shower, then it stopped, then perhaps 1:00AM, a big shower hit, and everyone on deck ran below decks to sleep.

Whitsunday's - Day 1

Up about 8:30, Court and LInda were already up. I showered, had breakfast, we went for coffee, I used the internet, then had lunch, then we waited around until about 12:30, then we walked to the marina, bought booze for the trip at the bottle shop and waited for our boat crew to take us to the boat. Crap boat compared to the other boat, not much deck space, and the sleeping quarters under are cramped. Nina, a Dutch girl, her bed is only about 4 feet long (and she's about 5'10"!)

We motored and sailed to Hill Inlet where we got supper (steak, pretty good), then we had a party on the boat, drinking, dancing, etc., a merry old time. To bed about 11:30, I slept down, Court and Linda slept up on deck.

Lounging Day in Airlie Beach

Up about 9:30, showered, made breakfast, boiled eggs and cereal.

We went to the lagoon/swimming pool along the waterfront for a bit, then I hit the internet, bought a few groceries, then back to the room, lounged, then went back to the supermarket and bought a hot chicken and some pasta and cooked chicken pasta for Court, Linda and myself.

We all vegged, Court and Lin to bed about 9:15, I went for a walk along the waterfront boardwalk to the marina, and on the way back, a chick (girl, not chicken) was laying on the grass beside the sidewalk, staring up at the stars, she said Hi as I approached, I said Hi, then she propped herself up and asked me where I was from. I told her Canada, she's like Where in Canada, I say Saskatchewan, she's like, No Way, where from, I say Moose Jaw, she's like, "Get out of here, I went to school in Caronport!" She's from Regina, and she's travelling Australia with her brother, who works in Sydney for a company that's based in Regina. We talked for two hours, then I went back to the hostel and to bed about 11:30.


Sheena, a girl from Vancouver we met on the Fraser Island trip thought Dingo's were cats!! Behind her back, everything was laughing at her.

Airlie Beach

Got to Airlie Beach about 6:30. I didn't sleep a wink. Linda (one of the girls on our Fraser Island trip) was also heading up to Airlie Beach on a different bus company, and we waited for her bus when we got there, but it never came. So Court and I checked in to our hostel (the three of us booked a 3-bed room from Rainbow Beach), and walked around, back to hostel, Linda called and left a message for us, her bus had broke down, and she was going to be late. I went to bed, so tired. Linda showed up during the morning, and her and Court did things.

I got up about 1:00, went to free internet place, but it was full, so got my haircut, back to free internet place, still full, so went to another internet place and payed for it, then to supermarket for groceries, back to hostel, had lunch, shower and a shave.

Made supper for Court and Linda, then sat around hostel and to bed.