The three girlies hit OZ!!!!

Hello everyone!!!!

Hope you are all well and that you all had a lovely Easter!! So us three girlies are back together again, and are now experiencing the wondeful world of OZ!!! We arrived in Oz on the 17th March in Alice Springs as all four of us had booked an Ayres Rock Trip for two days one night!! Nat and Rob arrived slightly before us but we all met up at our first hostel Heavitree Gap! This was a really nice hostel and our first hands on experience of the 'real' outback!!!!! Had a really early start the next day 4:45am!!!!!!!!!! We travelled for 3 hours to our first stop which was called Kings Canyon. When we got here the weather was around 38 degrees which was HOT HOT HOT!! We were only allowed to do the short walk round the canyon because of the weather which was a slight dissapointment. Laura got attacked by flies as she cut her leg!! There were sooo many flies all the time and they always buzzed around your ears and nose not very nice at all!!! We all really enjoyed it here and were all looking forward to getting to Uluru (Ayres Rock). We faced another 3 hours from Kings Canyon to get to Uluru and we had to hurry to catch the sunset. We finally arrived at our campsite and the first thing we did was watch the sunset which gives the illusion that the rock changes colour which was really impressive!! We had the best night in our campsite, first we had a proper Aussie BBQ dinner with sausages, steak and salad (veggie burgers just for Nat!!). After dinner we all had the oppurtunity to sleep in authentic Aussie Swags (a mattress attached to a sleeping bag that you can zip completely up!) under the stars. This was a totally amazing night as you could see soooooo many stars and even the milkyway, they were so clear we could almost touch them. Another early start as we wanted to watch the sunrise at Uluru, this was another amazing sight as was the base walk that we did after the sunrise! The rock was so impressive and we all got a little snap happy, Laura got so excited she had to hug the rock! We werent allowed to climb the rock as it was a pretty scary and dangerous route up with only a rope to pull yourself up! we didnt realise how vertical it was and apparantly over 30 people have died attempting to reach the top! Even daredevil Laura decided that she wouldnt be able to do it!! After we left Uluru we visited Kata tjuta which was another huge rock but very different to Uluru as it is made up of 36 different boulders! On the 5 hour jouney home we stopped to look at the salt lakes, this is where Nat decided to swallow a fly!! or it decided to make home in her tummy!! The next day Rob caught a flight to Melbourne (nat was very sad to be leaving him after sooo long :( where he was going to go camping with some Aussie mates and us girlies caught our flight to Cairns!

CAIRNS- Arrived at Gilligans on thursday night and had our first experience of sharing a dorm which was quite exciting!! The next day was Good Friday and the whole of Cairns turned into a ghost town. Everything had shut, we werent allowed to drink or buy any alcohol only if we were having a meal, they wouldnt even let us have a coke!!!!! So quiet night for us!! Saturday night was far from quiet we booked ourselves onto a party bus which was amazing over 150 people were on this double decker open top bus and it took us too 5 different bars around Cairns! We met some amazing people that night. We also saw hundreds of bats that night (Becki was not too impressed) we never new Cairns had sooo many and they were huge!

The next day (sunday) we had booked a Cape Tribulation trip which took us on a river cruise along the river Daintree, a baby croc, a 5 metre croc called scarface, a tree python and some owls. We then did a rainforest walk which was really interesting, we saw some weird looking trees and some massive golden orb spiders which were bigger than our hand!! We also visited Mossman Gorge which was like a waterfall which you could swim in! We then visited Cape Tribulation which is a beach where Captain Cook first landed and lastly we visited Port Douglas, which is a small rich town. Our tour guide for the day was called Lisa and was off her rocker and made the day very amusing! Monday night we had another good night at the Woolshed. This is where we witnessed England actually win something...we came first in GOlDFISH RACING!!!! haha was quite an event! Wednesday we left on the Greyhound ( OZ bus ) our first stop was Mission beach and we stayed here for a few hours. It's a really nice beach and we watched some skydivers which got us all excited about doing our own one! We also saw wild dolphins and swam in the stinger net, the water was lovely and warm (stinger nets are huge nets set up which allows us to swim safely and not get stung by the hundreds of jellyfish that swim in the seas) on every beach they have loads of warnings about the marine stingers and have constant supply of vinegar on all beaches. We then carried on travelling and spent the night in Townsville. We planned to stay here but then saw brochures about Magnetic Island and it sounded a really nice place to visit and we ended up staying here for 2 days!

The island reminded us of Thailand as it was so tropical! Our first night we stayed at a place called bungalow bay where they had a koala sanctuary in the grounds. Here we were able to hold a baby croc called Barbie, a carpet python (which Nat stayed well away from), cockatoos (Becki stayed well clear of these birds), lizards ( Nat became one with the Lizards!) and a koala called Dexter. Laura was the only brave one who held everything!! The next day Laura and Nat had a lovely time riding horses for 2 and a half hours through woodland and the bush and there were lakes, creeks and streams which the horses rode through. They managed to do a trot and a canter (Becks is very impressed). They then rode on to the beach where Becki met them to take photos as they rode the horses right in to the sea (geared up in stinger suits) this is where they did tricks on the horses, like around the world and a back somersault of the horse into the sea! Nat didnt do these tricks but Laura was a pro!! Then we decided to do the fort walk (something to do with world war 2) which is a 1 hour n half trek up to a lookout where you can see the entire island. We did this walk at the totally wrong time of day (midday) it was all up hill and all 3 of us were really really really sweaty!!! (YUK) we did see some wild koalas which made up for some of the sweatiness. That night we went to Australia's own full moon party (which was a total rip off of the famous one in Thailand!) This was another really good night, we even met some ppl we had been on the party bus with in Cairns! We also bumped into people that had seen us in Thailand (Koh Phagnan, Koh Samui) Singapore and now Oz (its a small world). This night Becks decided to get as many pictures of different hats as she could ( I got 24 different hats in total not too bad).

On Saturday after only 2 hours sleep we got the Greyhound to Airlie beach (6 hour journey) at the moment we're just relaxing here. Preparing ourselves for Wednesday when we go on our 3 day sailing trip round the Whitsundays which will be really good!

Darwin Australia, Kakadu National Park!

When me and rob got to the airport i had my bag searched at customs! although we think it might have just been for their training purposes, not sure! they searched my bag completely taking everything out and then they found my badges that i got to put on our rucksacks, which are wrapped in newspaper which we think is why they searched. Anyway darwin is such a pretty little town, it has a main road with mostly bar/restaurants and seating areas outside and other shops down it, it is about 35degrees here! its tropical this time of year is the end of the wet season so not as much rain but is perfect for our trip to kakadu! because the flood plains are smaller and not completely flooded waterfalls and roads, but then with the wet there is more wildlife and wetlands and plenty of crocs mate! we went on a jumping crocodile tour! it was a cruise down the adelaide river, so beautiful. There are crocodiles and marshlands down and off the river. The crocs know the boats now they come out if they here it (sometimes as they are shy animals and they have to be very hungry) and they hold sticks with string with meat at the end and splash it in the water the crocs watch it for a while and then they lift the stick so they have to jump for the meat and u get a fantastic view of the croc! the biggest one we saw was 4 meters long! but they can get up to 6 meters usualylly if they are old. we learnt about the history of crocs in oz. and then we went to a snake farm and rob held a black headed snake really ugly thing, i just stood tkaing loads of pics! then we went on our four wheel drive adventure! which drove over 3 rivers, the adelaide river, mary river andsouth alligator river (called that coz of something to do with explorors to oz as there are no alligators in oz). there is 3 bridges which go over each river, we drove over each bridge, at this time of the year all rivers were submerged! and on some parts the river overflowed on the road but the 4wd made it through! we saw a rare type of heron birds feeding in the river which there are also crocodiles in we couldnt get out of the car incase the crocs jump out as they can jump very quickly and fast and to the side! we had lunch in the park. then our leader told us a story about a tribe "waramol" who are now extinct because of the arrival of white men in (the coal mines in kakadu which take up 2thousand km of the 20 thousand km national park) they needed the aboriginals to work for them in the mines, and as they could not offer them money, food or land they offered them opium, alcohol and cigaretts. basically this is evil in their culture but eventually it took over the tribe which culture of hunting etc quickly fell apart and there was only one person "baramundie charley" who did take any opium and he was the last survivor. as the culture is that when the tribe dies, the knowledge stays with the tribe and goes back into the land forever, as only people who gain the respect of the tribe can know about them. he did not say hardly anything about the tribe but he did do aboriginal rock art of the stories that were important to the tribe to preserve the stories forever was most important to him. some of the paintings we do not know what they mean, it can only be guessed at. they are so beautiful, some are 20,000 years old. 2 paintings baramundie charley said were done by the spirits the meemee spirit, if this is true it wud be up to 50,000 years old which skeptics and some scientists say is impossible as as the painting was done in white paint it wud not be able to last that long as white paint is the least durable. there is one of a gun which is 150 years old when white man arrived in kakadu killing the animals. there is also x-ray rock art which is e.g a fish skeleton and insides to keep knowledge of how to kill and eat food etc, then there is decoratiove such as head wear, and detailed, and descriptive which is art that tells the story of a significant event in their tribe. but it also tells moral techings for the tribe. there is also handprints which are left by visiting tribes who may need food from other tribes land, or generation hand prints., tere is one rock that has 85 hand prints on it (generational) as it is everytime a boy turns to man his handprint is put on it. They would put the paint in their mouth and spray it out like spray paint. We also learnt about kinship laws as incsest was very wrong to them and forbidden in the tribes. They carefully planned who to marry by keeping generations in their mind, as no written language and it was never recorded by baramundie charley who beleived it dies with the tribe. Then we went to nourlangie rock, which was beautiful. Out of a group of 12 people only 4 people made it to the top, i was the only girl to make it to the top! We camped in "yellow water" we had nice tents. Where we were camping was right next to one of the rivers where crocs are found. Our leader once got in the river for fun and pulled out a 2 meter baby croc! he was crazy!we drove in the moring and it took us 2 hours to get to Yurmikmik in kakadu. We went to the marrawal plateau the area of stone basically, huge stones! cant really describe, and we went trecking for an hour to find a waterfall, we went through kurramundie creek, to get to motar car falls and motar car falls creek! A HUGE WATERFALL! We all got in and had a swim! it was pure freshwater you can actually drink the water is a it is so pure.we had to climb over huge rock boulders to get there. We then went to another waterfall that one was a bit dirty water only because there were trees roots in the water as they grew up from the lagoon at the side. that one was called marlins rockhole which is not on the map as they dont want people to know about it! but everyone seemed too! it was funny as i took a pic of the sign outside the waterfall area which said caution crocodiles!!!!!! but our leader said he doubted there would be in that bit coz they wouldnt go over rocks they preffered marshlands! at this point we were right at the south point of kakadu and had to drive way back up north of kakadu to get transferred back to darwin. on the way back we stopped for petrol and there was a wallaby (a smaller kangaroo) at the side of the road. as everyine was waiting at petrol station, i snuck over there and got so close to it i just sat there while it munched on grass and i took pics of it, it was a young one and was so cute!!!!! then rob came over and got close but it got scared and hopped back into the bush! that was amazing to be so close to wildlife. then on the way to see termite mounds in the bush our group leader got out his diggeredoo and played it while driving!!!!! he was very good! slightly scared, but the roads are so straight that it wasnt hard for him! then we saw termite mounds which were huge!! and learnt about them. then our leader started eating them saying they tasted like pepper! yum yum! haha rob had one so did a few others. we took pics of each other by the mound. then justin the group leader went into the bush looking for green ants to eat saying they tasted like lime!!! he came back and ate a few then so did a few others and rob did it was funny. While waiting for our transfer 4 wheel drive back to Darwin our leader played the diggereydoo for us, he was so good at it! We leave tommorow for Uluru Alice Springs!

Singapore!

Mine and Robs last day in Singapore was amazing, in the words of Steve Irwin "Singapore Zoo is the best Zoo in the world" and it sure is!!! It is like no other zoo i have ever been too as the animals are so free. They are not in cages at all, aprart from the snakes and there are some animals that cant be totally free. It is such a big zoo and as you walk around it feels like you really are walking around the jungle as it is set pretty much in the jungle! There is even a lake there that is so big you can hardly see the other side, it is so beautiful. We saw polar bears which are kept in an ultra cool tank with a big pool to swim in, and asian elephants which we saw bathing in a huge pool. We saw monkeys baboons orang utangs giraffes, tigers , lions (which were practically walking around the park) i was a bit cautious! And there is an australian outback section so they even had kangaroos! They had a reptile section with frogs in it and snakes, this lead to a bit about the environment which explained about how the worlds jungles are under threat and the animals in them as some are close to extinction. There was an amazing part of the zoo which lead to a jungle experience! It is a huge jungle area under a canopy so you are enclosed with all the animals! There were brids and all kinds of little critters that kept brushing past me! then it lead up some stairs to the top of the canopy where there were parrots flying around and there were bats hanging of the top of the canopy. We videoed it as some bats were fighting! We left the zoo as it started to rain like a monsoon and had to rush back to our hostel to get the flight to Darwin!

malaysia!!!

Me and Rob left thailand on the 6th march for malaysia. we got a night boat which was about 100 people on the boat, about 30 lined up along the floor on thin mattresses on each side. it was like being in the army! it took 9 hours to reach surri-thani from ko tao, then from surri-thani we got the bus to penang island malaysia which took 12 hours! we had to change busses alot. and i was scared for my life as the driver was driving like a maniac! and we saw 4 major accidents on the motorway of crushed cars and busses. We stayed in Chinatown in Georgetown. penang was so different from thailand. it is like a bowl of ingredients of chinese, japanese, indians, and thai, there didnt seem to be as many malaysians there as in singapore. There is such a mixture of cultures, for example Harmony road is a road in penang which has mosques, temples and a huge anglican church down it. It shows the diversity of cultures there, and the fact that everyone is at peace there i found really amazing. It rained sooooo much when we were there!!! We went on a tour around the island, we saw where the first chinese settlers built houses in penang on sticks by the river and saw fort cornwallis and other english buildings and there is a lot of history between english and penang. We went for a curry and had a good talk to an indian man about the history between india and england, people love the english there!! We went up ''Penang hill'" which was over 7000 meters up! ( i got a bit sick and nearly blacked out on the way down!) There were indian girls who asked us for a picture with them! they must have thought we were celebrities! and people kept stopping us to ask us "where are you from"? People are so interested in you, and i find that really endearing. We visited a snake temple, but i wasnt scared as i think the snakes were doped up or fed a lot as they didnt hardly move! And also visited many temples high in the mountains which were beautiful and very moving, one with 10 thousand gold buddahs in.There is a statue being built high in the mountains which we saw up close it is of such religious importance we felt privelaged to see it. We left penang on monday the 10th and got the bus to singapore (another 12 hours)! We went during the day so got to see kuala lumpar!! It was a very busy place, in some ways similar to singapore. Today we went into the heart of singapore, and realised there is one thing they love to do here and thats shopping! There are hardly any westerners here either, but they dont stare at you like they do in malaysia. It is very modern here and seems to be a lot like america. Tommorow we are going to hopefully go to singapore zoo and on a wheel that is just like the "london eye" to see all of singapore! We fly to Darwin on the 12th march! Lots of love to everyone, from nat and rob x x x x x x x x x x x x x

Thailand!!!

Hi everyone hope you are all well! We are all very good and loving Thailand! Sorry it's been so long since last blog but we have been non stop moving about so we have now made time to update it!! Heres the story so far Nat and Rob arrived in Thailand on 10th feb spent four days in Bangkok where they saw the grand palace, got a tuk tuk around bangkok where nat had to hold her nose all the way as the fumes are baaaad!! They stayed near Ko San road which is backpacker heaven although its also quite dirty and very noisy!Its an experience jus walkin down it!! They also went to pat pong famous for the lady boys of bangkok!! They then travelled down to Krabi where they done kayaking elephant trekking through the jungle and stayed in a hut in the jungle! Rob held this massive spider which made a web outside their door!! They then went to Phi Phi where they had beautiful beaches but they werent majorly impressed as since the tsunami the land has been taken over by Americans so its very americanized! Rob dived in Phi Phi they then went to Phuket for couple of days then travelled to Koh Samui to meet becks n laura!! whoo!!

Me n becks got to Bangkok on 17th feb we were met at airport by my auntie Pauline and cousin Allen! We had a fantastic week with them we saw the grand palace, ancient city, MBK shopping mall, snake and crocodile farms, temple of dawn, boat ride along the canal, Pat Pong, a theme park and a water park on top of a shopping mall!! Auntie Pauline made us the most amazing food i had pancakes every morning!!! YUMMY!! GOOD roast potatoes too!!!! After Bangkok we travelled down to Koh Samui to meet nat and rob!! After missing the night train we had to get on a motorbike taxi half way accross bangkok to get to the next stop with big backpacks and all!! I loved the ride but Becki was not so impressed!!! haha!! After arriving in Samui we had a great meet up party that night where i stubbed my toe and half the nail came of!! oh dear!! We visited the waterfall. We only stayed in Samui for two nights then we travelled to Koh Pha gnan (the party island) In Koh Pha gnan we had a pool party on our first night which was interesting!!!!!!!!!!!! the next day it started raining very heavily so our uisland tour was cancelled! When we finally got to do the tour the got stranded on an island because our boat engine blew up!!! It was so funny we made friends with a great bunch of people two canadian men called Paul and Brandon, A Canadian girl called Megan and two english girls called Jo and Chaz After ghettin back on land we had our own little pool party and ended up having the most amazing day! We went to the half moon party which is a rave in the jungle its amazing partying on a dancefloor that is surrounded by the wild jungle!!! made friends with an aus called mark, we were a little disapointed though because of the rain the island practically closes down so we couldnt visit Ang Thong national marine park which is where the beach was filmed! Me nat and becki went exploring 1 day when rob was diving and found the most beautiful secluded beaches AMAZING.

We then left for Ko Tao which was not the orriginal plan but we heard so many good thing about it we had to go! Me n becks enrolled on our padi scuba diving course which we have now completed!! WHOO!! we have seen sharks, barracudus, sting rays, angel fish, pirate fish, sea snakes and nemo fish and loads more! Its amazing down there its another world! Rob has done 4 dives here ko tao is known for its great diving Rob managed to see about 12 sharks all swimming around him! Whilst we were diving nat was with the the rest of the group (canadians) and she went around the island on a motorbike and saw some beautiful beaches. Nat and Rob left for Penang islands last night and me n becks and the group went to an amazing party on the beach to celebrate our scuba diving! We are leaving tomo for Krabi. Hope everone is well miss you all xxx

(more group pictures too come in the next few days so keep checking!)