The LONG Bus Ride

Monday 18 October 2010

Alison and I went to the bus terminal and waited. The bus arrived and we had a 12 hour bus ride ahead of us. Yuck! We were the only people who went all the way from Mackay to Cairns, but we had some interesting people. One guy put on WAY too much cologne. Another guy reeked of smoke. One guy kept swooshing and playing around with his drink bottle noisily. One guy had his i-pod on so loud, we could hear the music from several rows back. The bathroom door on the bus swung open and things rattled. At one point, the bus smelled really bad. So someone had to have made a mess in there...It made us sick.

My seat belt was strangling me for pretty much the entire trip. It locked on me throughout the trip. It was not comfortable. We brought our own lunch, but we needed to get dinner. The problem was, the driver picked the most remote places. The only thing we got was tortilla chips. We didn't know it until we ate them, but they were well past their postmarked date. They were VERY stale.

We made it to Cairns around 7:00 pm. When we arrived, it was incredibly dark. I smelled something like Banana Boat and looked around. I saw the guy on the other side was putting on the sunscreen and a straw hat. I thought that was a bit too much wishful thinking on his part. We got off very quickly. We went to the store to get some salsa. Then we went to our hostel.

When we arrived, there was a sign on the door saying to call him on his phone (the host). We called and he was on the side of the hostel down an alleyway. He made us just stand there until he was done with fixing the door or something. Then we went in a creepy looking storage area and we paid. He then showed us the way to our room. We had to maneuver a lot and duck under or around things. It looks as if the place used to be a store, which turned into a storage place, which turned into a hostel. It looks as if they shoved the stuff to various sides to clear out some space. He showed us the door and we went in. We could see through the window as the curtains don't close properly. As soon as I opened the door, I stopped in my tracks, stunned. It looked like a tornado went through our room. There are four bunks beds and glass doors and windows that are painted so people can't see in from outside. That's bad enough, but the girls who occupy the rooms are messier than anything. Everything imaginable is on the floor, desk, chair, beds...even Alison's bed had a togs top on it. Make-up, cute tips, clothes, shoes...EVERYWHERE!!! It was hard to know what to do with anything. We looked at each other and just thought "What are we going to do?" After the initial shock, we belly-ached a while. We put everything on our beds and tried to decide if we would risk the shower or not. We decided it would help us feel better. The showers were covered in mould and you can see through the windows. Or, people could see us through the window. It was very disturbing! Just two nights and we will be out of here!