Having already visited Mission Beach to do our skydive, we left Cairns to start our journey down the East Coast and headed back down there for a second time. This time we had planned to do another adrenalin filled activity in the form of white water rafting. We made our way to the Tully River where we met the Raging Thunder team and our Chilean guide, we got kitted up with a life jacket, helmet and a paddle, then got briefed on the basics of white water rafting. We set off down the river quite slowly, but as soon as we hit our first rapid, the fun began. There was 8 in our boat including the two instructors, which meant we all had to work really hard with our paddles to make sure our raft kept on the right path. During the 12km course we crashed into a few boulders, bounced our way through rock gardens and even got flipped out of the raft at one point, but it was all amazing. The highlights were going down a vertical rapid, then plummeting in the water when we couldn’t hold on, getting into the river then letting the current take you downstream and getting out of the raft half way down to jump off some really high rocks. It was a very tiring day, by the time we got to the end we both had sunburnt knees and were ready for a nana nap. There wasn’t much left to do at Mission beach, so the next day we sat around the pool and played some volleyball, then caught the bus later that day to our next destination.
Getting off the bus at Townsville, we went straight to the Sealink ferry terminal to catch the next boat over to Magnetic Island. After a 25 minute ferry ride we arrived and caught a bus to get to our hostel in Nelly Bay. To our surprise, the hostel was really cool, it was positioned right on the beach, had a swimming pool, a few hammocks and most importantly, a huge bar area. We played boozy bingo on our first night to try and win a room upgrade or the jackpot of $250, we were so close, only waiting for 1 number, but got pipped to the post by an english girl. We did get free snorkel hire for the following day, but the water wasn’t very clear, so we decided to take a trip to the Koala Sanctuary at Picnic Bay in stead. We took the midday tour and were really lucky that only 5 of us turned up. The tour wasn’t only to see koalas, but a whole array of animals that we were allowed to feed and hold. We began at the fresh water crocodile, then worked our way around the black and white cockatoos which we were allowed to feed from our mouths, a very fat wombat that wouldn’t leave it’s air conditioned hut, a lizard, a tortoise, a super cute koala, some overactive pythons and a scary looking tarantula. Right at the end, Vic paid to get a cuddle off a koala, she had to stand very still, mimicking a tree, so that it didn’t get scared and start scratching her (not as sweet as you think eh?). Afterwards, we decided to do one of the walking trails near the sanctuary, it was called Fort’s Walk and right at the top you could see some of the old gun posts from WWII. The views over the surrounding bays were beautiful from certain lookout points on the way up and by far the best part of the day was when Alan spotted a wild koala sitting on the ground right near the path. We had been told we might see a wild koala whilst on the walk, but we were told to look high up in the eucalyptus trees because they like to hide, well not this little fella, he was out in the open watching us walk right by him. To top the day off, on our way home we walked through Geoffrey Bay and spotted some wild wallabies. Loved it!
We nearly there yet? 