time flies

Sooooooo that’s it!  The 3 week vacation is over and I’ve officially driven up the eastern coast of Australia and stopped at all the little towns and sights in between.  I now feel like I have a pretty good taste of this country, and although I didn’t make it into the technical “outback” outback, I think this was a pretty good start. 

I arrived back in Melbourne today from our flight from Cairns.  When arriving in Cairns we turned over our beloved campervan that became so near and dear to our hearts (never though I would like sleeping in a van so much!) and spent a good 5 nights in this touristy city on the coast.  Cairns is most known for its easy access to the Great Barrier Reef, so it was undeniably the most touristy place that we visited the whole way up on the trip.  This meant that there were a) tons of annoying international backpackers and b) lots of overpriced food and cheesy Australiana souvenirs that were actually “made in Korea”. 

I should start off by saying that the one thing that is interesting about the tropical northern part of Queensland is that the Great Barrier Reef travels down most of it, making the beaches not so beachy and not really good for swimming in and/or surfing in.  This area is too dangerous to swim in because of “stingers” or basically jellyfish that can be fatal and are invisible to the naked eye.  When we went out snorkeling or diving, we had to rent “stinger suits”, or basically special wet suits, so that we wouldn’t have to bother with deadly stingy monsters.  Yikes!  A few beaches are swimmable but only because they have roped in one little area with stinger enclosures to keep the stingers out.  Everywhere else is pretty much swim at your own risk.  No thanks!

So yeah, we booked three different amazing tours when we arrived and they all turned out to be fantastic.  The first day we went out on a boat called the Ospry V to the Great Barrier Reef, and it was a perfect day to see all the beautiful coral and marine life that lives within.  The tour boasted offered an introductory scuba dive for just an extra thirty dollars, so I signed up for that even though I was scared out of my mind to actually do it.  I figured what the hell, and as we were traveling out to the reef, our guide gave us some brief instructions about how to dive.  When we arrived, we were giving all our gear, lowered into the water about one meter, and then asked to prove underwater that we were able to clear our masks and also able to clear our mouthpieces.  This meant taking a deap breath, removing the mouthpiece, blowing out the air, then shoving the mouthpiece back in while simultaneously yelling the word “TWo” to blow out any water that may be in the mouthpiece.  After proving we had that down, we all linked arms and began our descent down.  We only went 10 meters, which is about 30 feet, which doesn’t allow us to be certified, but it was a good way to get a feel for diving.  It was totally weird being underwater and totally unnatural, especially trying to swim around coral with big flippers and a huge tank strapped to your back!  But it was fun!  While down there I got to sit at the bottom of the reef and hold a sea cucumber – I also saw lots of clownfish (nemos!) and lots of other fish.  The worst thing that happened was my ears kept popping and at one point my left ear wouldn’t pop out and it hurt so bad that when I arrived back up to the surface it was ringing and it still hasn’t returned quite to normal yet!  Such is life.

But yeah how cool is that!  After the dive I had the option to dive again but I didn’t really want to spend the money so I snorkelled instead.  There were huge flourescent colored fish that you could actually hear eating the bits of coral.  I’ve never seen such beautiful colors of marine life ever!  Definitely a highlight of the trip.

Second day we took a sky cableway gondola type ride to Kuranda, a small village about 35 km from Cairns.  We then took the scenic railway back that meanders through the rainforests, waterfalls, etc.  While there we went to an Aboriginal Park called Tjapukai which tells the history of this aboriginal group that lives in the area and their beliefs and such.  There was a man playing the didgeridoo and I got to throw a spear and a boomerang.  Little did I know that I was doing it wrong my entire childhood by throwing it like a frisbee, when really you are supposed to throw it over handed with a flick of the wrist (and it actually does come back!)  The nice aboriginal man gave Matt a boomerang for being able to get it to return all the way, and then he let me have a few more tries when everyone else left.

Third day we took a bus tour up to the Daintree rainforest which is another World Heritage area along with the Reef.  We walked around a bit and learned about the rainforest and how it differs from other rainforests, and we evern went on a crocodile river cruise (and actually spotted 4 crocs! crikey!)  hehe.

After that we were exhausted so we did nothing yesterday, and now we’re home and I’ve got to figure out everything I need to coordinate in order to come HOMe home!!  aghhhhhhh.

I’m going home now, because I’m still not home home.  It’s cold in Melbourne and I miss tropicalness.  ciao ciao!

 

Explore posts in the same categories: Uncategorized