Wow, how I`m going to cram 5 months in cairns into one entry I dont know, but will give it a go!

For all that dont know what I have been up to since leaving sydney.............

I arrived in Cairns on the 18th April, to meet up once again with Judith.  We hadnt seen each other since Costa Rica in Jan, an dto be honest I thought we would miss each other in Australia - being so big and all, and also due to the fact that she was sup[posed to leave Oz in April to head for her last leg of her trip to South Africa, though as has happened so frequently with our travels - the plan changed!  She had got to Cairns and found herself a job working on one of the dive boats as a Purser (said to be the 2nd most important person on the boat in serving the passengers!!) and was loving it, so had decided to extend her stay.  I decided to come up and join her from Sydney, and semed to completely land on my feet as wll when I got there.  I arrived on the wednesday, saw an ad in the newspaper for an Underwater photographer and videographer, gave the company a call the next morning and ended up getting the job by that afternoon!!  The next week Judith and I had found a share house to live in and by then it hit us that we may be staying in Cairns a bit longer than just a couple of weeks!

The job was great fun!  I still think it was the best job on the boat!!!  My morning before reaching the reef would consist of setting my gear up and then getting to know the passengers (which involved me sitting on the sun deck, chatting to whom ever i liked!!  (you`ll know if you know me, that I didnt struggle with this at all!!!  I loved it, meeting new randoms every day!).  Once at the reef the job got even better!  I got paid to go diving and take photos of people whilst doing so.  Dont get me wrong, it wasnt always easy, you really do come across some muppets! Put those muppets in water and the job of taking a photo of them can become somewhat difficult!!  Not only do you have to make sure that they are looking at you (which believe it or not isnt always easy, even when you are directly in front of them!), but you have to wait for them to breath in so you dont get all the bubbles in front of their face in the photo, make sure they arent blinking when you take the photo, as well as making sure that the settings on you camera a right (not too dark, that the strobe has gone off, that its in focus, to name just a few.........), but if it didnt have those little challenges you know I wouldnt have liked it as much as I did. 

I also got to go out on Taka and Direct and film the passengers trips to the Cod Hole and Osprey reef.  The Cod hole trip involves a Potato Cod feed and the Osprey trip involves the Cod feed plus a Shark feed!!!!  It was awsume!

All in all I loved the job.  Judith also loves her job and so we decided that we arent quite ready to call in quits and come home in November as originally planned, for good anyway!!    Judith is looing into getting sponsored by her company and I have decided to go of and do some seasonal work for 3 months, which will entitle me to another years working visa in Oz.  Seasonal work I hear you ask, whats that involve?  Wel in short, I basically have to go work on a farm for 3 months, probably picking bloody fruit!!!!  Glamarous eh!!!!  Have to admit I cant really pretend to be excited about it, especially since I will be doing it in the height of summer (which is also their rainy season!).  Apparently when I come to go fruit picking it will be the season for mangoes and lychee - apparently its going to be hell, but I am sure at least I will have some stories to write home about!!!

Even though Im not coming home for good in November I am coming home, in fact I am on my way already!  I have left Cairns (yesterday) and am heading to Souh Africa tonight!  I am joining a safari tour group in jo`berg which is travelling round Southern Africa for 3 weeks (Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mosambique and then back to South Africa), then I am travelling through to Cape Town and then coming back to London for about 3 weeks.  I arrive back in London on the 19th October and leave on the 7th Nov back to Cairns via Hong Kong for a week.

Well that is a brief overview of what I have been doing for a crust in Cairns and what my plans are next, but there is so much more to tell about cairns, but that will have to wait for my next blog entry.  You can see some photos of some of the things I have been up to on my facebook page, so go and have a look - Im under as Emily Maher, London surprisingly!!!