Fly to Thursday Island on Monday.

Thursday Island:

Sunrise On Thursday Island

Mission Beach to Cairns, Cairns to Thursday Island. Woo-Hoo another job, she's gana be a hot one that close to equator.

Packed up our camp at Mission Beach, and drove to Cairns, did a bit of shopping for some more tools to add to my 40kg tool bag, hopefully this new bag can hack it. Up to Simon's to drop James & his stuff off, then back down to the office to park the truck. Boss dropped Pierce & myself at airport, and take-off to Thursday Island all expenses paid again- a working holiday.

Up at sunrise to catch the plane to Thursday Island, caught this sunrise reflection in my Ute 

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 The Qantas  flight was direct to Horn Island, which  is the Island next to Thursday Island, and big enough to fit a airport.  We are staying at a demountable style house/flat in the workers camp called Gateway, with other work mates.  Catch a 10min ferry to work every day to Thursday Island and watch awesome sunrises and sunsets.

First view of Thursday Island

Just got here and already at the police station, trying to work out whats going on. Our work mates are already here working on the cop shops air cons.

Bloody hot. Feels like I'm in a roof in cairns and I'm outside doing nothing.

Saw giant Grouper  fish being fed crayfish head at  the jetty. The size of Zuis Simon giant mastiff dog, Around 80kg, that's what I weigh.

Giant Grouper fish. 

Have to walk to dinner at the main hotel 500m away at 6:30pm. Nice walking home into the sunset if u can out walk the mossies.

Sunset on the way home from dinner.

Sneaked a wicked portable fan onto the bosses account along with a hand full of other essential tools I needed. Runs off my drill batteries. It helps but still very hot.

A local T.I fella at the pub said it will rain for four days on the high tide, king tide, from last quarter of the moon to the first quarter, and that's exactly what it did. Still managed to work between the rain, But when it rains man it pours.  Lots of rain., yeah I mean lots of rain

I think that's rain coming.

Kindly asked the cook at dinner for some jars to make mayo and smoothies in, she reluctantly gave me two new ones, I just wanted empty sauce jars that were destined for the bin but These will work great thanks. Also asked how much are the new umbrellas as I need one to get to and from the ferry, and dinner because we stay about 500m down the road from both, and she lent me one, I was ready to buy one and still give it back when I left but free, even better.

Big basil bush and chili bush at job today.  Going to freeze the Basil, Be enough for a few months. Should of dried it but already pulled it off the branch, and planted the branch.

Finally got a day off after 12days straight, went for a fish down the wharf at high tide, got nothing but sunburn.  Work shirts make great fishing shirts, if u remember to roll the sleeves down.

Fishing with my mate the seagull. 

Saw the local kids swimming at the beach so must be safe, had a good swim, the water was cooler than I thought, probably because it's deep, hard to relax in the water when your thinking about crocodiles, sharks, and jellyfish.

Should be alright to swim, I hope.

Had an early day got a chance to check out the shops on Thursday Island. Some nice pearl shell necklace here, Carved into turtle, frangipani flower, butterflies, I think I'll get one for my niece's birthday next month.  In a different shop I found a coconut peeler like a big spear thing and coconut grater from the islands I suppose. 

Went up to Green Hill lookout, a WW2 fort can see the whole island from here, perfect spot for a fort. Dug into the top of the hill with concrete & dirt walls, there's buildings and tunnels underneath and a couple big cannons. 

View from Green Hill fort.

Green Hill fort 

Sunrise from Green Hill, waiting for clients to wake up. 

The days getting a bit repetitive, morning commute: walk to wharf, wait for ferry, catch ferry under an amazing sunrise to Thursday Island, jump in van go to job. Work: put in 2-5 Air con installs, then to the pub to wait for the ferry, ferry back to Horn Island, walk back to room under a magnificent sunset, shower, walk to dinner, back to room. And do it again the next day. But what a beautiful place to do it.

Sunrise, waiting for ferry at Horn Island. 

Man it's hot up here, sweat so much at work it looks like I went for a swim in work clothes. Doesn't drip off it runs off in streams everywhere. Hotter than the roof was in Bamanga. Cools off OK at night which is something I guess. Wish we could go swimming more.

Dinner, I didn't catch it. But I ate it. 

The boss keeps sending more Air cons, started out with a container of 40, then he sent 6 more, now another 12 showed up. How many more! 

I used to clean the Air con at my place in Brisbane. No one cleans them here. There disgusting, the Air con can't breathe, and until today I thought 'dust bunnies' where a urban legend, but they do exist, soft, grey, fluffy, and hide under beds and cupboards, especially in corners, all huddled together. And I get in trouble for not clean my dust and wire trimmings properly when I'm done. 

Got a local T.I Fella to help us, Lamico, he's very strong and works hard, picking up the job quickly which is good, always nice to have an extra hand, plus he knows other locals so we might get to go fishing on a boat, or hunting, the next island, prince of whales island has a large population of wild deer. 

Given some tropical painted crayfish for dinner, need a boat so we can go get our own.

Sunrise

Went to the Wongai pub near the flat, normally it's very quiet but tonight its packed as, I think it was someones birthday, and Pearce's birthday on Monday too. The had live DJ and music so loud we could hear it in the flat, which is only across the road. LOL Might as well go to the pub, not gana gt much sleep. I'm surprised how busy it is especially given that a XXXX gold can sets you back $6.50, & prices go up from there. Anyway it was a good night, funny watching the locals & workers getting drunk and dancing.

Sunset 

Managed to get a sleep in Sunday morning now doing an Air con at the helicopter base, behind the Wongai pub, had to bring everything including big Air con, tools etc, over on the ferry on the way home from work Saturday, hoping he will take us fishing on his boat, but no such luck. 

After being up here for a month the new Air cons in the container were starting to run out, and the jobs starting to dry up, so the boss flew us home, well back to Cairns where my truck is, that's my home.
 With only 24hrs notice we had to tidy up everything, pack up tools, put van in storage, but somehow still found time to get a box of crays to take home, for free of course, yummmo. 

Back to Cairns with a box of painted tropical rock lobsters. Hopefully the boss has more work up here cause I left all my tools behind to fit the crays in, haha 

Heading back to Horn Island, looking at Thursday Island. 

New split system inverter Air con. 

Here we have a buoy Mango tree, not very common, but when you look closely you can see it's balls, dangling, also known as a male mango tree. 

Another Air con. 

The boat we catch twice a day. 

A gecko shorted out this Air con, and himself. 

Nice spot for lunch in front of the pie shop

Everybody love US up here, it's Bloody hot and we give them a cold breeze in every room of the house. 

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Sunrise, this seems to happen every day, beautiful. 

Sunrise at T.I jetty. 

And another. What an amazing place. 

Sunset on the way home from work. 

Pirate map of Torreis Straight., LOL

Clouds of bait fish at the wharf. 

Sunset on the walk home. 

Sunset, that's our camp. 

Workers camp, under another spectacular sunset. 

Beat the sun this morning, here's a Moon set. 

Horn Island jetty. 

Sunset 

Ahh, not another sunset. 

And sunrise. 

Sunrise. 

Sunrise on my morning commute, beats looking at tail lights. 

The Black Spot. 

Back in Cairns: crayfish dinner. 

Mmmmmmmmmm