Yesterday was our last day in Cairns and as we had to check out at 10am and our shuttle to the airport wasn’t until 11.30pm, we had a long day of waiting ahead with no room to chill in.
The weather was (obviously) pouring again and so after sorting out all of our plans at the travel agent and sneaking our way back into the hostel so that we could use the kitchens there to make lunch, we went off to the cinema.
After watching Bad Neighbours a new film with Zac Efron (who we all obviously adore) we headed back to the hostel in the pouring rain to chill for as long as possible, trying to make dinner as late as possible.
There was a live band in the hostel and it was nice just chatting, eating our $3 dollar meal, listening to music.
The rain was torrential and we (bizarrely) decided to run to another bar and have a dance, we got soaked and soon came back to Gilligans, just in time to watch the catwalk going on in our hostel bar. We were so exhausted and fell asleep in the airport waiting for the check in desk to open! Then we slept again in the departure lounge and luckily as the flight was hardly full we all had three seats to lie down on.
At 5am we arrived in Melbourne and got a taxi to my friend Sylvie’s house. She’s my roommate from Whistler and it’s literally so nice to see her and to stay in her beautiful house in the centre of Melbourne. She’d woken up so early to welcome us and had the spare room with a massive double bed ready for us. The house is beautiful, full of aboriginal art and so clean – the complete opposite to a hostel!
After a very needed morning nap, we woke up, showered, breakfasted and then Sylvie got out google maps and showed us around and suggested where we should go to explore this afternoon. We got on our first Melbourne Tram and headed to Chapel Street, a famous street for shopping visited by celebrities! We found a cute little sushi shop, that sells massive sushi rolls for $2 dollars and then headed off to shop!
A girl that Juliet worked with in the pub in Harpenden is from Melbourne and has invited us out for her birthday tonight, so Sylvie is going to show us this city this evening and we can head of to celebrate Juliet’s friends birthday with her.
So far so good Melbourne!

It’s such a bizarre feeling to have left the East Coast now, as ever since Sydney we’ve made friends and met people who we know we’ll see again as everyone is travelling upwards, doing the same thing. We’ve made so many friends and there’s been a lot of them who we have got so close with and travelled a long way with. As Cairns is the top, everyone was there and it’s been a great week seeing people from home, old friends, making new friends and catching up with roommates from previous cities. However now we’ve left Cairns, and the east coast, we’re back at square one, in Melbourne and it feels like the start of a new adventure. It’s weird to think that the people we left in Cairns we will probably never see again. It’s even quite sad, but now we’re in a completely different place, a 4 hour plane trip away, with new people, in a new environment, so we’re excited to explore and see what this part of Australia has to offer!