Cairns: gateway to reef, forest and heaps of fun!

Dear family and friends,

First of all, welcome Aussie friends to my website. This is the site where I keep everyone back home posted about my life down under. Unfortunately, it's all in Dutch... so you won't be able to read all the gossip I've been writing, but you probably will find photos with your face on it :) So from now one I'll write my stories in English, so I can keep everyone posted while I'm homeless and travelling..

I've already been in Cairns for a week and it is absolutely AMAZING here. The hostel (Calypso) is great, I've met heaps of nice people here, the weather has been beautiful since the day I arrived and I've already seen and done a lot.

But let's start at the beginning.. I flew up to Cairns last wednesday, had a good flight but because I was so stressed the last few days about the whole moving out thing that I was not really in a holiday mood yet.
The first night I met Kursty (26, UK, travelling) and Kim(18, Brisbane, holiday after cycletrip), two really nice girls who I went into town with for a few drinks. Cairns itself is just a little town and there is not much to do during the day. But it has excellent bars and restaurants along the Esplanade and a good night life:)

THURSDAY: FITZROY ISLAND

I woke up Thursday morning bright and early with a blue sky when I looked out of the window and that after a week of rain, how lucky! A nice brekkie in the morning sun was a perfect way to start my holiday and to de-stress!
I had no tours planned for today yet, so Kim, Katrien (25, Belgium, travelling) and I decided to catch the ferry to Fitzroy Island. Just 45 minutes from Cairns, a nice little island, perfect place to relax. We walked up to the lighthouse and summit, that was quite a walk, but worth the view and we spend the afternoon relaxing on Nudey Beach. I'm easily bored on the beach, so I walked around searching for shelves and other stuff and had quite a collecting at the end of the day, which I of course returned to the ocean...
That was day one, perfect to de-stress!

FRIDAY: REEF

On Friday I went on a boat trip to the outer reef for snorkeling. I had a really nice day, although I was a bit disappointed. With the colourful reef of Finding Nemo in mind, the reef I was snorkeling was way less colourful and there were not may fish at all. The first thing I thought was: o they just bring tourist to the same reef al the time, which has been damaged by the billion tourist who snorkeled here before, but the guide explained the reef looses it's colour when it is cloudy, so it made a bit more sense after that. And I did see Nemo and his dad floathing in the amemoni (?)!!

SATURDAY: KURUNDA

This was also a tour I already booked at the Coast, before I came here. Kurunda is a little town in the middle of the rainforest and there is a scenic train ride up there through the rainforest with nice views over Cairns and the ocean. It is a train only for tourists, and a very popular attraction, so I shared the view of the Barron Falls with 500 other people. Once I arrived in Kurunda I was about to visit the Butterfly sanctuary, but all the 500 other tourists were walking in that direction and I'm not a big fan of crowds. Kurunda itself is a small town and described as really nice in the Lonely Planet, but it's only souvernir shops and markets with the usual crap. I decided to wait for a bit to go to the sanctuary and found a nice and small cafe with organic coffee and food, which was kind of hidden behind a tree (= no other tourists:) The butterfly sanctuary was really nice, with a free guided tour. The way back from Kurunda was with the Sky rail, the longest one in the world (7 K's), above the rainforest. So besides good views, you can actually look into the forest from above. One the way another look out point of the Byron Falls and a guided tour through some rainforest, which was quite nice.
I went into town with Kim afterwards, for a good seafood dinner and a stroll around the night markets (again souvernirs, souvernirs, souvernirs....).

SUNDAY PORT DOUGLAS

The weekly Sunday markets in POrt DOuglas supposed to be quite nice, so Kursty, Rahsmee (25, UK, travelling) an I thought that would be a good way to spend our Sunday. We caught a bus up there, and the drive along the coast was already really nice (one of the most scenic coastal drives in Australia). Port DOuglas itseld reminded me of Noosa, it is a town with one main street with luxurous resorts, restaurants and shops and it has a nice beach (4 mile beach).
We strolled around the markets all day, and this is the best markets I've seen in Australia till now. While most markets sell only souvernirs, this markets had stuff of local people: jewellery, art, fresh fruit and veggies and delicious mango icecream.
Again a really fun day!

MONDAY/TUESDAY CAPE TRIBULATION

This was the trip I was most excited about. Up to the place where rainforest meets the ocean. Again a tour, with an annoying tour guide who kept talking and talking and thought he was really funny, which he wasn't. Anyway, after a visit at the wildlife sanctuary, we drove up to Cape trib where we had an excellent lunch. The guide dropped me and Anja (30, GErmany, around the world trip) at the BEach House at Cape Trib where we had the afternoon for ourself. We walked to Emmagen Creek with a little swimminghole and they ensured me there were no crocs there so we could swim. It was a beautiful spot in the middle of the rainforest and the water was crystal clear (and freezing cold!)
As there was a recent croc sighting on the beach, with a croc is cruising around in the water, they strongly adviced not to swim in the ocean. The guide told us he was chasing a sea kayaker and tried to attack it, not sure whether to believe that or not, but definitely no swim!
In the evening I went on a night walk through the rainforest, with an experienced guide telling heaps of interesting stories. Unfornately it was a quite night, so beside some crickets, spiders, rats and birds there was not much wildlife. But I enjoyed it walking in the forest in the dark, listening to the sounds of the birds and other animals. And without a torch it is dark, really really dark!! The only thing we could see was the glow in the dark fungi on the ground and the stars tinkling in the dark (there are more stars here for sure, or at least it looks like more..)

Unfornately one of the girls who slept in my room had bed bugs (=itchy bites of nasty bugs who hide in your bed). Backpackers carry them around in their sleeping bags and other stuff and they are a real plague in hostels. So our room got sprayed, but that doesn't mean they are all gone. Although I was exhausted after a long day, I was defintely not looking forward to go to bed. Anja, the other girls and I postponed it as long as possible, so we would spend the least possible time in our bed. I had a terrible night of sleep, paranoid about the bugs, everytime I woke up during the night I thought I could feel them, but lucky lucky they were not in my bed. At about 6 in the morning I woke up, put all my stuff in the dryer to kill any bug that could be hidden there and I checked out asap. Another beautiful day, so I went for an early walk on Cape Trib beach and I was alone :) It was great!! I walked basicly all morining, checking out the different boardwalks and parts of the rainforests and that was again really really enjoyable. I managed to get a lift back to the hostel. The man was originally Dutch, but was living in Australia for 50 years. We spoke a combination of Dutch and English, quite funny. He drove to another resort first, to pick up other people and said, so have two minutes to find the man of your dreams here. If you're not back in within three minutes you found him and i leave without you. Well.. i said i wont find the man of my dream in there, but then he siad Johnny Depp was staying there. Ha, and he is the man of my dreams. So I walked up, came to a beautiful resort, but except for a bold painter, no man. (so don't worry mum:) The tour guide would pick us up from the hostel for the second part of the tour. Another walk in the rainforest (seriously, I could spend a week up here not getting bored by the forest. Just for the records, there are for example 1000 different tree species, compared with the 72 in Europe, and some trees grow just an inch a year, so they are thousands and thousands of years old, quite amazing!) After that we drove further to Daintree river, for a croc cruise. Again, a good tour and we spotted one big female croc and several bay-croc on the way.

Tomorrow I do my last tour in Cairns, to the Tableland and on Thursday I head down to Townsville to hang out with Christy and Zane for a few days.

I had to type this really fast, cause it is quite expensive, so my apologies for any spelling and grammar errors.

I keep u posted!!

xxx KArin

P.S. Andy, thanks for putting new music on my mp3 player!! The music is fantastic!

Kim, number of spotted Nemo's till now: 27

Martijn, jij had t goed voor elkaar zeg: werken in de Raw Prawns :) Ik heb helaas niet de kans gehad op het uit te testen, maar t wat ik gezien heb zag er goed uit!