Cairns to Townsville via Wongaling

First things first; I will be doing a post on our day snorkelling the Great Barrier Reef yesterday, but I need to charge my gopro first to download the photos. I will hopefully do this tonight or tomorrow.

This morning we left the tropics of cairns to travel to Townsville, about 7 hours south down the coast. 

Firstly we boarded our first greyhound bus; which we have to say, is pretty cool! All the buses have WiFi, charging ports, aircon and reclining seats, which makes the journey much easier! 

So we boarded our luxury bus and 3 hours later we were dropped off at what we thought was Mission Beach (as the stop is called "Mission Beach"). Turns out Mission Beach is a 5 minute car journey north of this stop. We were at Wongaling Beach... with our huge bags, no water and we hadn't eaten in over 12 hours. We weren't happy. We weren't near a beach at all, so we hitched our bags on and used google maps (thank god!) to walk towards the sea line. It was a gruelling walk in 30 degree heat as we slugged towards the shore. We were both knackered when we got to the shore, it was ridiculously hot and our bags weigh a ton! We were hoping that we would be walking towards a choice of delicious beachside cafés and bars. Instead we were in the middle of nowhere and everything was closed. And to top it off there was a tropical storm rolling in from the horizon! But at least the beach was picturesque! 

We walked round for a while, trying to find somewhere to eat- but instead we had to retire on a bench on the shore. It was blistering heat. I summoned up the energy to take my top off and make a suicide mission to Woolworths (it's a supermarket here) and grab some food and water. In hindsight we are glad we didn't find any cafés because we sat and ate a picnic lunch on the shore, with the sea behind us and a storm in the distance, it wasn't too bad! 

We had to catch our next bus at 3.10pm so we hurried back up to Woolworths and got a quick drink in the cafe there before boarding our next bus to Townsville where we will stay for 2 nights. Oh and Courtney actually had a salad! Chicken and avocado, danky dank. (And a milkshake which was apparently served in a vase.)

We say a few cool creepy crawlies today too!

No exaggeration those ants are HUGE! 

On our way to Townsville our bus stopped at a cute seaside town called Cardwell. It was founded by a British politician and proved to be more scenic than than Mission Beach! We got a quick chai latte then boarded again- now we are about 1 hour away from Townsville where we will check in to our apartment and have a much needed nap!