We arrived in Cairns in the dark and were dropped off at our accomodation straight from the airport. Everything was silet and dark and there were no visible signs of life in the surrounding area. It was not a particularly good start especially when the room was not what we had expected and was not suitable. It will all be better in the morning or so we hoped and thankfully it was. We got a different room with a proper bathroom and no bunkbeds and we could see where we were which is always a good thing. The weather was not perfect but it was good enough to have a walk down to the beach and have a swim. Being stinger season meant that swimming in the sea was not advisable and there were nets up which took some of the fun out of swimming but at least the evil jellyfish can't get in. The one plus about the slightly grey and windy weather along with the jellyfish meant that there were not many people about. The main noise in the area, which is primarily residential was the cockatoos squarking.
It was decided to rent a car and we took a drive up to Cape tribulation (well nearly to the cape). It is a beautiful drive particlularly the bit along the coast to port douglas. On the way we stopped at Port Douglas, the daintree and mossman gorge. We got as far as crossing over the river on the vehicle ferry and then to a lovely strech of beach called thornton beach. We spent some time just walking along it up until the sand ran out replaced by the rainforest, this area was especially beautiful being covered in a light mist drifting out into the sea. As it was getting late and we had all had enough driving we headed back from here.
Another day we drove up the winding road to the town of Kuranda. It all seemed a bit run down, due to the weather and the season i suppose. We had a look around the market and we were lucky enough to have phil and judith buy us an aboriginal painting to go up in the flat when we get back. I would have loved to get the sky rail but sadly it was closed for maintenance.
While in Cairns there was another visit to be paid. This time it was a cousin of Judiths who had moved to Australia 40 years ago, she still has her local uk accent after all those years. Cath happened to live very close to where we were staying Clifton beach so we went around for a short chat and a drink and ended up there quite a bit longer. Understandable i suppose as there was a lot of catching up to do not to mention the fact that Cath is a bit of a talker anyway. She seemed to think i was the double of her daughter even going as far as saying we have the same hands, which she promptly took a photo of. It was nice to see some of the photos her daughter had taken of christmas island among other places, many of wildlife especially sea birds. She was especially animated when talking about her passions of diving and her daughter.
From cairns it was another plane back down to brisbane. To start our road trip to Sydney.
