Darwin and everything after

Ok, well, I am finally back in Adelaide since last night and I leave for K.I. tomorrow at 6 am. I finally have internet access for the first time since Alice and I have heaps to update you all on. I will start with Darwin and move through the last 8 or so days, it will most likely be long, so if you get bored and you still want the rest i advice either taking a break in the middle or stopping right now to go get a snack before you come back (I would do it if this was someone else's blog that i was reading).
Darwin- Ok, I arrived in Darwin after saying goodbye to Emma and her mom in the airport and I immediately went to my hostel. It was a Sunday and Darwin is a small town, needless to say, everything is closed except the parks and the beach. After taking a shower (it was so hot that I was disgusting after walking around to the beach lookout and back in 45 minutes), one of my roommates walked in and in asking him what there was to do in Darwin (to which he replied drink- hence all the people downstairs drinking already at about 3 or 4 in the arvo (that is afternoon to all those Americans out there)), we woke up our other roommate, Bruce, my new friend. In talking to Bruce I more or less invited myself to take a walk with him down to Mindall Markets, a nighttime outdoor market set up right next to the beach that happens every Thursday and Sunday. After making him promise me that he didn't mind taking me with and that he wouldn't ditch me anywhere there, we took a walk where he proceeded to tell me that he worked as a marketing person for Adventure Tours, the group that I booked my Cairns, Darwin and Uluru tours with. After the half hour walk to the markets we watched an awesome didgereedoo band which was the first time I have actually seen a didgereedoo played. Then we walked through the stalls and looked at all the eccentric and ordinary booths. There was a booth there that sold croc paraphenalia- croc foot good luck keyrings, croc hand backscratchers, tails, skulls and more, that was pretty crazy. Then Bruce and I got food and sat on the beach to watch an absolutely amazing sunset, possibly the nicest I have seen, and I have seen quite a few since over the last 10 days or so I have seen either a sunrise, a sunset or both everyday. Then we bought some fresh orange juice, listened to a jazz band and took a shuttle back to the hostel where we hung out while he had a beer and then I packed for an early rise and the four roommates slowly went to bed since we all had to be uprelatively early (though I was the earliest) the next day.
I woke up at about 6 so I could be downstairs to checkout, store my bag and meet the tour group by 6:45-ish. We got in a 4WD (4 wheel drive) bus thing which reminded me of a vehicle from Jurrassic Park, as we were driving I kept expecting velosiraptors or something of the sort to come running out from between the trees to attack us. We started on our way to Kakadu, a national park a few hours drive from Darwin. We stopped on the way to see the Cathedral Termite Nests, the largest in the world. We drove by the large gay boxing croc (it is a giant plasitc croc that is boxing and was used on a float in the gay/lesbian pride parade a few years back) and we stopped at a croc cruise on a billabong. The crazy thing about Darwin and Kakadu and that whole region is that during the wet season everything floods, so all the places that I went to in Kakadu can't be reached during the wet seasons and we were driving on what would be the floodplanes and the river when it isn't dry season. Ok, back to the croc cruise I saw heaps of crocodiles and brids and the billibong was surounded on all sides with lilies and lotus plants and it was really nice. After that we continued into Kakadu and saw caves and rocks with paintings done by Aborigines thousands of years ago. After that we watched another beautiful sunset over Yellow River and then went to the electricity-less campsite and had dinner and bed and then we got up early again the next day and headed out to Twin and Jim Jim Falls. We had to go off-roading to get to these two amazing places which was a lot of fun. After we all got jostled for about 45 minutes we arrived to Twin Falls where we had to do a smile hike and then take a boat across croc infested waters to get to another hike to get to Twin Falls, but it was absolutely amazing. Though you are no longer allowed to swin in Twin Falls, it really looked like paradise (minus the crocs of course). After Twin Falls we headed over to a place where we could swim, Jim Jim Falls. The waterfall doesn't actually really flow during the dry season, but the pool is still there and it is absolutely beautiful. We are allowed to swim there because the crocs can't get there during the dry season since it is seperated from the rest of the river by rocks which during the wet season when the water floods the crocs can swim over, but they can't get over during the dry season. The water was so cold, but really refreshing and there I met only the second group of Israelis out of the 3 or 4 groups that I have seen since I got here to Australia (the first being with Sarah* on the bus in Sydney). After swimming and lunch we headed back to Darwin where I caught up with Gaz, Jen, Marta and Claire from my Uluru trip while getting a free meal at the Vic (a local pub). It was great to see them all again and we all exchanged email addresses and we will hopefully keep in touch. The next morning I was up at 4 to catch my 4:30 shuttle to get to the airport by 5 for my 6 am flight to Cairns.
Cairns, like Darwin, is also a very smile city with little to do by drink, shop and sunbathe. At least it wasn't Sunday when I got there, though on Sunday Cairns is actually open. At this point I had reached the last leg of my travels before heading back to Adelaide and K.I. In Cairns, after being checked into the hostel by the Canadian receptionist Jeff (he was having a rough morning poor guy), I went for a walk to the mall and then went to the Lagoon to read and relax. The Lagoon is a giant shallow pool with cool fish statues and bits that look like the beach and it overlooks the ocean. You would think going to Cairns that it would have a great beach, the truth is, it doesn't, the beach is mud that you aren't allowed to walk on because of crocs. However I did see a large group of pelicans out there which was pretty cool. That night I went with one of my roommates and some of her friends to the Woolshed where we had a free meal and then I stayed to meet up with Liv and Heath (a girl from college and her boyfriend who is an exie) for a drink and right as they were leaving I ran into Dave from my Uluru trip and his friends Seb and Nikko from Denmark. They were really awesome and I stayed up all night haning out with them which was silly of me since I had to meet the tour group at 7:30 the next morning to head up to Cape Tribulation. Needless to say, the next day I was tired as and I had no voice which decided to take 3 days to come back. On the way up to Cape Trib we stopped at an animal park to see some of the animals of the rainforest and I got to feed kangaroos again. The guide Scotty or as he preffered to be called, Rocky, was really cool and he taught us heaps about the raisforest and the area around Cairns and Cape Trib. We also stopped for another croc cruise, but this one wasn't nearly as cool as the one in Kakadu (though since Kakadu has been my favorite place so far I guess I shouldn't really compare) and we got to lick the bum's of the green ants (it tastes like lemon-lime and the Aborigines use it as a flavoring). That night I went to bed early and I got up early for the 7 am pickup the next day to go snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef. The crew on the Rum Runner (the boat and company name) was really cool and I got a chance to do an introduction dive which I really wanted to do, but my sinuses hurt to much so even though I took the short lesson I couldn't go down with the other 5 people in the intro dive which I was pretty bummed about. The Great Barrier Reef is amazing and the fish and life down under the water was undescribable. I unfortunately didn't see any sharks, dolphins or turtles, I think I am cursed, but I will get to that in a minute, but the fish were really cool to watch. After a long day out on the reef I came back and several hours later, after dinner and a half hour nap, I went on a night walk through the rainforest. The really cool thing about Cape Trib is it is the only place in the world where two world heritage sites meet and touch. You literally walk out of the Daintree Rainforest on to the beach and if you go out a bit there is the Great Barrier Reef. It is really cool, not to mention absolutely beautiful. During the night walk we were supposed to see heaps of animals that only come out at night including tree frogs, striped possums, forest dragons and pythons and several more. All we saw were some huntsman spiders, 3 caine toads, some crayfish and some sleeping birds. This is what I meant by me being cursed, everywhere I went up there we didn't see any animals. Apparently a feral pig (wild boar) and her kids had been through the area earlier and after that it takes the animals a few days to come out of hiding. After the night walk that ended at about 11 I went to bed and woke up the next morning at 6 am for a sunrise paddle. According to my curse I didn't see any turtles or dolphins then either even though the two mornings before the groups saw dolphins. I was the only person out of the 6 of us who went ocean kayaking that morning to have been silly enough (or stupid enough) to spend all day snorkeling on the reed (which is exhausting), then to stay up late from the night walk through the rain forest and then get up at 6 for the sunrise paddle. Anyways, they woke us up at 6 and took us out to the beach where we saw the first part of the sunrise and then were sent back to the hostel because the motor on the rescue boat wasn't working and we couldn't go out without the rescue boat. After missing the majority of the sunrise and being driven back to the hostel, I laid down in bed for maybe 10 minutes when they came to get me again to say that they got the motor to work, so we loaded back onto the bus and headed back out the the beach. Through this little experience I had already become good friends with the 3 English people who were going on the paddle with me, Phil, Helen and Rob. I ended up sharing my kayak with Rob and we had water fights with Helen and Phil and it was heaps of fun. Rob sat in the back and steared while I paddled which was very hard and tiring work. Meanwhile our guide, Seb, got to laze around in the motor boat zooming ahead and stopping until we all acught up. Rob and I led the group of 3 kayaks because we were more efficiant than the others. When we got to shipwreck bay we got to snorkel and then ate a breakfast of exotic fruits (not too exotic: passionfruit, pineapple, orange, watermelon, cantelope/rockmelon, honeydoo, etc) and went on a small hike to see the shack on the beach. There is a really cool story about an old woman who lived there and hiked through the deadly rainforest twice and got a satellite phone to show for it, but unless you all post comments requestining the story I am not going to bother to go into details since it will take up another 10 lines or something. After we kayaked back to the main beach we all went back to the hostel and showered and then I went with Rob, Helen and Phil to an exotic ice cream parlor where we bought 4 scoops of the flavors of the day: plum (on the bottom), wattle seed (which tastes like mocha), macadamia and another fruit that I can't remember the name of but it is known as the chocolate pudding fruit or something. As we sat and ate our ice cream we listened to the ladies give this same speech over and over again to the customers who came in after us. Then after enjoying our ice cream we headed to the beach and chilled there for a few hours and then we went back to the hostel where I kicked butt in connect four and then we all played scrabble with an American from Colorodo who we met there and I don't know who won since Rob had to take my place since I had to catch the bus back to Cairns at 5:30 and the game still had a bit left in it when I left. Hopefully they will email me the results when the email me the kayaking pictures. I was off back to Cairns where I checked into the hostel, met up with some friends for dinner and then yesterday I walked around the city and sat at the Lagoon again and then got on a plane to come back to Adelaide. That is where I am writing from now. Tomorrow I head out to K.I. and then back to Adelaide and home.
If you made it all the way through this email, I admire and commend your dedication. In order to not make this any longer than it already is I will end this now and write more after I come back from Kangaroo Island. I'm out!