Good hair day

Yesterday Nate and Eli and I took advantage of the courtesy shuttle and hung out at the big Stockland shopping centre for a few hours, just as long as we had to until the shuttle was due back. Maya wasn't feeling well (and had her second fever of our travels, maybe because of the close quarters?), so she stayed at the tourist park with Nick while he moved us into OUR VILLA. She is the dearest little sick person - curls up in bed and chats through her stuffy little nose, drifts off to sleep when she needs it, looks at books, listens to her body.

The shoe curse is still with us and has now taken my recently aquired black thongs. The toe strap snapped on the Great Barrier Reef boat. I haven't even had them for two months! Haviana is going to hear from me. In the meantime, however, I needed a new pair of shoes to wear. I borrowed Nick's new mock-crocs for the trip to the shops, and am now the proud owner of some $6 pink thongs. Pink? It was the only plain pair (like, without bedazzling or sequins or bows). Nick said it's like being married to a 12 year old. I've never been a pink person, but now I have a pink bag and matching pink shoes. Who am I???

We did a big shop, anticipating our full villa kitchen! Plenty of room in a full sized fridge for lots of fruit and veg - it all needs refrigeration up here in Cairns. All the fixings for an Indian dinner and a pizza dinner for the two nights we're here. An oven! Yay! We'll be baking cookies today.

It was so nice coming back to our villa. Yesterday was really hot and insanely humid, so we kept the air con set at 24 degrees and the overhead fans on low, and it was so nice in here. The villa has two bedrooms, one with a queen bed, one with two bunks, and the couch folds out into a bed as well. It isn't big, but it is a lot bigger than our motorhome, so we're feeling a bit luxurious and spread out. We brought in all of the toys and books and the kids really got into being less cramped.

We have also had the telly on a lot. The kids haven't watched any TV for weeks, but they have watched movies from our hard drive in the motorhome, and it's been the same things over and over. It's been nice for sick Maya to just chill out watching stuff she hasn't seen before while the boys hung out at the water park with Nick.

I loved taking a shower yesterday afternoon without having to pack and tote everything I would need off to a public shower, and without dripping with sweat on the way back to the motorhome. I washed my hair and noticed that last night it was all dry and silky smooth and relatively straight. Due to the humidity, I have been sporting a frizzy fro framed by some Maya-like ringlets since like Brisbane. But yesterday I was inside all afternoon.

Last night I heard the weatherman announce, "The humidity today was pretty atrocious, and it will be more of the same tomorrow." I'm really appreciating the opportunity to hang out inside.

We have clocked 5000 kilometres, which means it is time for a minor service to maintain the warranty. I'm hoping that won't be too expensive, although we have completely abandoned keeping track of the budget as of last week. We spent an insane amount of money with the reef tour, our trip to Kuranda (which I'll write about soon), and now the villa. Since we have been in Queensland we haven't been free camping - it rains at night and our windows let the rain right in so we have to close everything up, and then it becomes stifling inside with no power to run a fan or air con. All of the accommodation charges have really added up.

We will be heading back south, recharged and ready for the motorhome once again, and we won't be spending any more money on tours or theme parks or fancy accomodation or anything big like that. So we're giving up on the budget thing. We're no good at it anyway.