7/6/12 - 11/6/12

The next few days were pretty uneventful.
I had allowed myself a week in Cairns for the car service in case they needed to order in parts or if there was some other sort of complication, but as is the way, when you expect the unexpected, it never happens.
I had been sweating on The Ghan to confirm my travel dates, which they did today so that is a relief and I can now say I will definitely be travelling on The Ghan from Darwin to Adelaide and then from Adelaide to Melbourne and back to Darwin. I will be performing on one of the carriages to all the grey nomads and overseas tourists.
It will be a good way to see the guts of Australia and the most unusual place that I've ever done a gig.
I leave on July 21 so I have from now until then to get to Darwin.
I have also booked a 3 day tour of Kings Canyon and Uluru so I will get off the train at Alice Springs then jump back on after my tour.
I'm hopefully leaving Freda with a friend of a friend in Darwin, and I think she's quite relieved she doesn't have to travel all the way down to Uluru, which was the initial plan.
The plan is to spend a couple of weeks at Amanda's and Mum and Dad will come down in August for Dad's 60th - can't believe Robbie's turning 60!
I can't wait to leave Cairns, just to feel like I'm moving somewhere...there's only so long you can just hang around in one place not doing anything, as lovely as Cairns has been at times...
I've spent a fair bit of time people watching amongst other things and for the most part, haven't liked what I've seen. Be it yobbo Aussie tourists, being stared down by the locals, constantly hassled for money or feeling out of place in general. Combine that with the vandalism of Freda, and there is a certain bad taste in my mouth.
I had to check my own attitude one day though and tell myself to pull my head in when I realised how all that other crap had affected my attitude.
One morning when I was having breakfast on the Esplanade and feeling a little out of sorts, a bloke sidled up in his car, wound down his window and said "Nice day for camping".
I immediately jumped on the defensive thinking "I'm over taking shit from people, especially today". I thought he was having a go at me for free camping in public space. So I looked him straight in the eyes and said, "Yeah it is". With the subtext being, "Do you have a problem with that?"
Anyway, he continued on and it turns out he wasn't having a go at all, he was actually talking to people to try and get them to a festival that was happening at Yorky's Knob (which was called "The Festival of The Knob" by the way).
So yeah, that was a bit of a wake up call for me to chill out a bit and not take things too seriously. I guess everyone is entitled to be in a bad mood once in a while, right? Perhaps being on the road for six months is finally getting to me? Bring on the open road tomorrow I say!

Bye bye Cairns...