Cairns and Cape Tribulation, Australia

Hey all!!!

Well Australia is just about over now :( We've just had the last two parts of the trip - Cairns and Cape Tribulation. We arrived in Cairns Wednesday afternoon, checked in, and me and Emma went straight to get a box from the post office. Haha we're both sending more stuff home again! It just builds up and it's so uncomfortable dragging around a heavy backpack all the time! So anyway we walked around a little on Wednesday, but didn't do too much exploring. That night we went to PJs (yeh i know, they've a PJ O'Briens here too!!! ) and we met up with Fraser Island people. I also bumped into Orla and Roger again (both from Cork) , we've pretty much seen them every place now since Fraser Island. But it's like that when you're doing the
east coast as everyone is doing pretty much the same things.

So then next day was our Reef Day Tripper - Day trip to the great barrier reef for some snorkelling. When we got out there, because of the time of season (ie its actually winter here even though its still hot) there were so many waves. You could still see clearly, all the fish and coral which were amazing, but the waves kept pushing us back. It was fun anyway. Usually
on that trip you snorkel in two spots, but cuz of the waves, we just stayed in the 1 spot longer. That night then we headed out again, as it was Heathers last night in Oz. She's one of the English girls we met on WhitSundays trip. So we were out in a bar called the Rhino Bar for the night. It was cool as there was the 3 of us, the 2 english girls, those 3 scandanavian guys, and 2 people from our Fraser trip. And it was the last time we'll see all of them now in Oz, so it was a sad goodbye.The next day, we were to do the 2-day trip to Cape Tribulation. Our tour guide woman was from Cape Trib which ended up being really cool since she gave us so much info on the place, and it was great hearing of different stories from when she was growing up there. It's a rainforest (you know that) but based on a tree they found not so long ago, they estimate it's
135million years old, making it 7 times older than the Amazon one Crazy huh!! The Amazon is about 20mill years old. They have 3 seasons up there, rainy, more rainy, and dry. And they've no electricity so they've to basically make their own, ie some people use diesel to power it or something, but thats quite expensive. One story the guide told was very funny. One day her
sister out of nowhere found a cat. So they brought it home, and thought it'd be safe for the cat to have her lie between them in the bed. Anyway they woke up the next morning with a snake beside them and the cat inside the snake!!!! Apparently, snakes will kill anything up around there, and theres so many of them, so yeh they strangle them to death and then eat them. Haha
imagine waking up to one of them beside you in the bed!!!!

So this is how the trip went. We headed off around 8am on Friday and went to a look-out first. Ah just some islands in the distance. It was nice, but not out of this world like. Then we headed to a wildlife sanctuary. It wasn't very nice now. They have loads of croc's there and they let them live to the age of 3 or 4 and then kill them for their skin, ie croc leather etc!!! Like hello dont tell us that! Ah was very bad now. And after them saying that sure you couldn't really enjoy the place. It was nothing like Aus Zoo or any of the other places we've been to. Anyway, we also did a kind of walk thing at the Mossman Gorge. It was nice now, really clear water, kind of small waterfall type thing. Mossman is before Cape Trib, and has a huge Aboriginal community there. Then we got the ferry over to Cape Trib. You have to get a ferry over, no bridge or anything over there, ah but sure the ferry is only like a few mins, one of them small ones. Then we got over and it's just trees everywhere! We stopped at one stage to do a boardwalk type thing, and sure trees everywhere. She also showed us a walking tree!! haha she said it moves about 1metre a year!! Then we arrived at our hostel at about 2pm and she didn't collect us again for 24hrs! We didn't know this so were very unprepared, sure theres nothing to do there like! Well not in a day
anyway. But there are two lovely beaches so we walked both of them - Myall Beach and Cape Trib Beach.

When we got collected the next afternoon, we went to an ice-cream place, where the ice-cream flavours are dependant on what season you're in. So we got like coconut, mango etc etc. All made from stuff on the island like. Then we stopped for a river cruise down the Daintree River. THis is the river that the ferry had to cross earlier. We saw some real wild crocs. And a wild snake in the tree. Ah it was good seeing a croc like not in a zoo like. Oh also, I never told you why cape trib is so called. Well as you know Aus was discovered by Cpt James Cook in 1770 (he reached the town of 1770 first so called it that - thats before airlie beach, but we didnt stop there at all) anyway so he sailed northwards, and came into loads of troubles when he hit cape trib cuz the main sea area kind of ended. So hence its called cape trib. Some history for ya there! Then we drove through Port Douglas on our way back to Cairns. We didn't get to stop there but it does look like a gorgeous town.

Today we just checked our Cairns a but more, and checked out the lagoon here. And tonight we'll head to the famous 'Woolshed' Bar, but then it's when the excitement starts - The Waterford v Limerick hurling match!! So we're hoping the Casino will show it since it's pretty much the only place that will still be open which the game starts!

So tomorrow it's off to New Zealand.... We've planned 4 nights in Chrischurch to start, and then we're doing the Magic Bus. I'm only doing the South Island as most of you know now, and then I'm off to New York to meet Ger =D While the others will do 5 weeks doing both islands. So then plan is 4 nights in Christchurch, and then jump on the Tranzalpine train across to Greymouth. Then we'll do the Franz Josef glacier from there. And ah well you can wait for the blog updates for the rest :)

So until next time........

Cathy x x