Day 11 to 15

Day 11 - 11/08/11- Cairns  38 km

Today was always planned to be an easy day, so we got the chance to sleep in. Les has plans to go down to the beach to watch the sunrise one day, but today wasn’t the day. We also missed the appearance of the wallabies that apparently come into the back yard here at the B&B – maybe tomorrow we will see them.

We woke to yet another beautiful day in paradise – not a cloud in the sky. Just saw the weather on the news, and it got to 27 today. It got quite chilly last night though, as we actually had to find a blanket instead of just sleeping beneath a sheet! Again today, we were told that it is quite cold here at the moment – I suppose it’s all relative.

First task for today was doing the laundry (it’s sad how important it becomes when you are travelling), and then on to find O’Brien’s Glass, to get a chip in the windscreen fixed. A nasty truck kicked up a stone on us a couple of days ago, and we thought we should get it fixed before it got any bigger. Luckily it was small enough and far enough from the edge of the windscreen for it to be fixed rather than requiring a new windscreen.

We left O’Brien’s at around 11:30, headed for the CBD of Cairns. We found free parking out on the edge of the city, and walked along the Esplanade. The Esplanade goes for quite some distance along the waterfront, all the way into the city. There was a mosaic along the way.

The walkway is necessary to keep the people off the beach. There were signs along the way warning people about the danger of crocodiles in the area. Mind you, the beach wouldn’t really appeal to me, as it is really just mud-flats – we were there at low tide, and it wasn’t that attractive.

After walking for about 2.5km, we made it to the lagoon – a man-made lagoon so people can swim.

By then it was well past the time Joy requires a coffee, so we found a coffee shop. Joy had her usual skim cap, and Les resisted the temptation of the lovely-looking gelato, and had a milkshake.

We then kept walking around the marina, through a park that had monuments to the various types of people who served in the wars – women in service, sailors, airmen, diggers – one for each, and they were quite understated, but effective.

By then we were looking for lunch. The plan was to get some local fish and chips and eat it on the grass at the water’s edge. But it appears you can’t get fish and chips to take away in central Cairns. We had to settle for eating at a restaurant called The Raw Prawn. We both had a lunch special called Three in One – a piece of fish (battered), a prawn (battered), and some salt&pepper calamari, with salad – yum!

After the 2.5km walk back to the car, we decided that we hadn’t had enough walking, so went to the Botanical Gardens to do the Red Arrow walk, that takes you up to the top of a steep hill for views north and over the airport, and through trees back over Cairns.

Looking north from lookout



Cairns from lookout



This walk is apparently very popular with the fitness freaks in Cairns, and we’d read that it was like Pitt Street at lunch time. We got there around 2:30pm, and it was still very busy – we had to keep getting out of the way of the runners as they slogged their way to the top, then coasted back down to the bottom. We saw a few of them a few times, and it was funny to see them quickly get much slower!

We finished the walk in about 40mins, and we were pretty sweaty at the end of it.

Back to the B&B by 3:30pm – via the shop for an ice-cream. We made it in time for the daily feeding of the finches

And to see a wallaby in the back yard

We spent the rest of the afternoon catching up on the blog, and doing brain-training exercises (ie the crosswords and other puzzles in the Woman’s Day).

Day 12 Cairns to Kuranda and return.                 13 km

Arrived at the Skyrail depot 8:50 and picked up our tickets.  We boarded the Skyrail at 9:10. Skyrail is a gondola ride that goes from Caravonica (suburb of Cairns) to Kuranda. The gondola ride is approx. 7.5 km long.

The first stop is ‘Red Peak’ were we did a quick walk through the rainforest

before boarding another gondola at 9:35 and arrived at the 2^nd stop ‘Barron Falls’ for a quick walk to view the ‘Barron Falls’ (strange about that!!).

Back on to the gondola at 10:00 and arrived at Kuranda at 10:10. Les made it in one piece … not as bad as he thought but he still said it was not fun.

The first stop in Kuranda was for a morning cuppa with Joy have cappuccino (average quality) and Les had a Banana Smoothie (yummy). We were surprised that the drinks were so reasonably priced. Thought they would be much more. We then wandered around the town looking at shops, markets, etc. We did find a shop that was selling sculptures that were done by Foot Young. Joy has a sculpture of a small dolphin which she got 25 years ago when she was on a sailing ship that Foot was on. Most of the shops are the typical “tourist trap shops”.

We decided to visit the Australian Butterfly Sanctuary. Worth a visit BUT only if you take the free guided tour as you learn so much about butterflies.

Then we had lunch in the park and then did the Jum Rum walk which leads through the forest down to the river and back to the train station.

Jumped on the train for the 3:30 journey back towards Cairns.

The train winds down the mountain following ‘Barron Gorge’. Stopped to look at Barron Falls from the opposite side compared to the morning stop on the Skyrail.

 

Arrived at Freshwater station at 5:05 (15 minutes late) and shuttle bus back to the Skyrail terminal to collect the car and back at the B&B at 5:30.

Day 13 Cairns.        57 km

Another day in paradise (well as far as the weather goes anyway). Does it sound like I as repeating myself…well I am!! Slept in a bit longer today and got out of bed at about 8:00.

Did some more washing as it is such a nice day and they will be sure to dry. Les made  Joy a cappuccino (plunger coffee made in fancy tea pot with milk frothed by shaking in the bottle. Who needs a fancy coffee machine??).

Left for Cairns Markets at 10:15 and arrived at 10:45 after a fuel stop. Parked in the free parking spot so we had a 2.5 km walk to Cairns to see the markets. Joy said they were better than Kuranda but not as good as Maitland. At least they are more of the local made / handmade stuff and not just ‘tourist trap stuff’. Then a 2.5 km walk back to the car. We are making up for all those days in the car on the driving days.

We then headed out to Crystal Cascades via a suburb called Redlynch and arrived at 12:35. Walked the 2.4 km return walk to the Cascades. A long gradual uphill which had Les huffing and puffing by the time we made the top (probably Joy too but she huffs and puffs quieter then Les). When we arrived there was an older man with a walking cane had made it !!! Walked back a lot slower as Les was taking photos of cascades and waterfalls.

Lunch in the picnic area at the car park and then another short walk (500 metres return) to some cascades which not many people visit. Much quieter.

Back home and arrived 3:30. Weather is still fine however some clouds are coming in (in Sydney it would be considered ‘fine’). As I am writing this it is 23 degrees in Cairns and 16 degrees in Sydney. Actually 16 degrees was Cairns’ minimum last night and 23 is cool as most days have been mid to high 20’s.

Has an afternoon cuppa and taking in the washing and Joy has done the ironing. Something have to happen even on holidays.

Day 14 Cairns to Port Douglas and return.   130 km

Yet another day in paradise (weatherwise). Is this getting boring? It sure beats winter in Sydney!! A leisurely morning again, as it is only approx. 60km to Port Douglas, and we didn’t need to be there until around 10:30.

We left the B&B at 10:40am, and drove up the very pretty road to Port Douglas. We had a couple of stops along the way to take photos – one was on a beach, and for the first time this holidays, Joy actually walked barefoot on the sand! This was the first time she hadn’t had running shoes on, so could easily take the sandals off. Mind you, this was only the second opportunity to actually get onto a beach!

The other stop was at a lookout that was being used as a launching place for para-gliders and hang-gliders. It looked like they wouldn’t be launching for some time yet, so we only stayed a short time, thinking we would stop there on the way back in the afternoon.

Sunday in Port Douglas is market day. We don’t know if that was the reason, or if it is always so crowded. We drove down the main street – bad move. There were cars everywhere, and heaps of people wandering around, sitting in coffee shops, and shopping for beach-style clothes (ie clothes you wouldn’t wear anywhere else, but feel driven to buy when you are at the beach).

Because of the crowds, we couldn’t find a car park close to the markets, so we headed up the hill (very steep – glad we drove up it instead of walking up it) to the lookout, took the obligatory photo, then headed back down and found a parking spot along the side of the road not too far from the markets.

Since we got to the markets at around 11am, Joy only had about 30mins to check them out before we had to leave to get to our lunch at the Wildlife Habitat (more on that later). The markets featured a number of the same stalls that were at the Cairns markets yesterday, and quite a few extras. Joy’s opinion is that they are almost on a par with Maitland markets, if you take into account the fact that they are in the tropics and at a beachy place.

We got to the Wildlife Habitat around 11:45, so there wasn’t any point in wandering around before our lunch. We had the “Lunch with the Lorikeets”, which meant we could eat all we liked from the buffet, which wasn’t too bad, but nothing special. The special thing was we got to eat whilst being watched by…no, not lorikeets, but black cockatoos (red-tailed and yellow-tailed), tawny frogmouths, and eclectus parrots. They were very well trained, as they didn’t even try to leave their perches to go for our food. One of the cockatoos was taken around to all the tables, and he would sit on your arm.  He was very gentle – neither Joy nor Les has any claw marks.

After lunch, we wandered through the rest of the grounds. We both really enjoyed it, as the birds and animals are really easy to see, and quite accustomed to humans, so don’t run away, meaning you can get quite good photos. Les had the camera on the action setting, which was good for the birds, but I don’t think that was necessary for the crocodiles – the only way you could tell they were real was by watching their nostrils move when they breathed.

We left the Wildlife Habitat at around 2:30pm, but we didn’t get back to the B&B until 4:30pm. We had a number of stops along the way. One was at the lookout where the hang-gliders and para-gliders were launching. This morning when we stopped there, we were one of only about 4 cars there. This afternoon, there would have been more than 30, and we had to park on the side of the road instead of at the actual lookout. There were 2 para-gliders and 5 hang-gliders already in the air, and one hang-glider just about to launch, so we hung around to watch that.

We had another couple of photo stops, then we decided we’d drive down the Trinity Beach just to see what it looks like. It is quite nice, but nothing much else there except holiday accommodation and a couple of bars. We also had a drive out to Yorkey’s Knob – again quite nice, but mostly holiday accommodation. What we did notice, though, was how many warning signs there are for crocodiles around the area. How would you like to live in a place that gets as hot as here does, but not be able to swim because of the crocodiles, and the stingers during the summer?

As I said, back to the B&B at 4:30pm, to catch up on the diary, load the photos, and see if anyone is on Skype that we can chat to (no).

Toasted sandwiches for tea after our big(ish) lunch, then pack for our early start tomorrow.

Day 15 Croc Farm Cruise and Green Island Cruise.           0 km

Up early today as we needed to be ready to be collected from the B&B at 7:50 am so the alarm was set for 6:30 am.

The owners of the B&B came over and asked if we would be able to walk to the main road (Reed Rd) as the cruise company was using a bigger bus to collect the passengers so we set off for the main road at 7:40 to be collected at 8:00 am. The coach did not actually arrive until 8:15 but we were the last to be collected so then it was a straight trip into Cairns.

Arrived at about 8:50 and proceeded to the check in desk. We had booked for the ‘Combo 5’ which is Croc Tour and Green Island tour. When we booked we were charged a set amount and then we had to pay for the lycra suit and floatation vest (for Les).

The croc cruise started at 9:30 and we had a quiet cruise up the Trinity Inlet which is surrounded by Mangroves (the mangroves grow so thickly that in cyclones they form a VERY good defence from the wind so they bring the boats up and moor them in the mangrove creeks, etc.)

Just as we were about to arrive at the wharf to disembark for the Crocodile Farm Tour we saw a saltwater (Estuarine) crocodile (a first for Joy and probably Les) in the wild.

We them boarded a bus with a mad Irishman with an Indian name and did a tour of the Crocodile Farm. It is an actual farm and most of the crocodile go to Louis Vuitton for fashion ie handbags, etc. There are approx. 20,000 crocodiles in the farm from babies to BIG crocs. Trivia points – The sex of the baby croc is decided by the temperature of the nest when the egg is being incubated. The correct temp (32?) and it is a male otherwise it is female. At the farm they harvest the eggs and incubate them to create males as males are larger and therefor have more skin and therefor more leather.

We then travelled by small coach back to Cairns where we arrived at 12:45 for a quick lunch before boarding the ‘Reef Rocket’ at 1:00 to head to Green Island.

 The trip took 55 minutes (10 minutes longer than normal as the captain saw a whale breach and we stopped to try to see it again but no luck) and the sea was quite choppy so it made for a rough trip. From the boat we then headed to the ‘glass bottom boat’ and had a ½ hour trip around looking at the reef and the fishes.

Back to Green Island at 2:45 and changed to go snorkelling which was a first for Les but not a very successful one. While Joy could handle the snorkelling Les had problems (cannot handle breathing through his mouth, cannot swim much, cut his hand on some rock) so Les gave up and headed back to the beach. Joy finished at about 3:40

 and we went and got changed. I forgot to mention that we were both dressed in Lycra Suit and Les had a floatation vest as well. Back on the ‘Reef Rocket’ at 4:00 for a 4:15 departure. Les sought first aid for his cut hand (to make sure no infection). As the boat was full on the way back we had to sit out the back which meant we had to put up with the noise of the motors and the engine fumes along with a slightly rougher trip back, so by the time we got back to Cairns Les had a headache. A quick photo of the rain on the hills (a rarity since we arrived) and then on the bus with the mad Irishman again for a ride back to the B&B but we got stuck in peak hour traffic…So it took 10 minutes more than a normal trip but at one stage probably took 10 minutes to go 2 kilometres (Sounding a bit like Sydney).

Arrived back at the B&B at 6:10 and settled down for a while before doing some washing and having home-made hamburgers for tea.