August 24th...

Up and at ‘em at 8am. Checked out of our rainforest home and piled into the station wagon toward Cairns. It was a lovely drive and with some good music finally. We made it to the wake boarding lake at 10am. It was a blast. I couldn’t really manage the wakeboarding too well so I stuck to knee boarding. It was tough but fun. The guys were much better at it than me. Afterwards, we made it into Cairns for lunch and had the best burger I’ve had in Australia (which actually isn’t saying much but it was good). We all checked into the most fabulous hostel I’ve EVER seen, Gilligans, and then we cruised around Cairns, shopping and whatnot. It was a cool little city. We had a dip in the amazing pool back at the hostel and then I had a much-deserved late afternoon siesta. Ken and I had a really great dinner at a Mexican restaurant and then went back for… drinks with the soldiers. It was a good time. We said our good-byes with a dance (or as they said ‘make shapes’) and a celebratory shot. And then I made my way to the lovely bed in the lovely hostel to end my trip.

It was fantastic.