15th-16th May

I have just looked at this blog and realised I did not completely finish it. (It is now December!)

As far as I remember, the last complete day with Jack and Norma was spent quietly, with me sadly sorting out my packing in preparation for returning home.

I left Cairns airport on Sunday morning 15th May for Singapore where I was to change planes for Heathrow. I knew we had to drop down into Darwin on the way, but didn't know beforehand that we had around 3 hours there. So I was stuck in a small transit lounge with lots of other people. There was only a small cafe/bar and one small souvenir shop. A complete waste of time as I was just anxious to get on with my long journey. Anyway, the flight to Singapore was fine. An hour or so there before continuing on to London.

It had been a fantastic trip. The comprehensive tour around South Island, New Zealand, with Terry was just amazing and I had my first ever visit to Australia. My stay with Jack and Norma in Cairns was really good. As a house swap had been previously arranged with them for 3 weeks in July/August it was a great opportunity to find out about the house and local surroundings beforehand.

So - another long trip ends. Bring on the next one ....

12th - 13th May. Two good days

Friday 13th May Jack and Norma drove me about an hour north to Port Douglas. The coast road was stunning with rainforest meeting the sea at beautiful beaches and headlands

We stopped at various bays along the way, and a particular favourite was Oaks Bay, so deserted and unspoiled


On arrival at Port Douglas we went to the Yacht Club for lunch but were disappointed to discover they now only open at lunchtime over weekends. So, at my suggestion as I wanted to buy Jack and Norma a nice meal to thank them for their kindness, we went to the upmarket Sheraton Mirage.


Wow! What a lovely hotel, more a resort really. 5 acres of lagoon swimming pools with other amazing facilities. http://www.sheratonmirage.com.au/mirage_port_douglas.html


And the hotel resort is alongside the beautiful 'Four Mile Beach'


After a long and leisurely lunch we had a stroll around the hotel grounds and along the beach, then made our way into the pretty town. There is a beautiful old church there, now multi-demoninational and is used for weddings. What a lovely place to get married


On the way home we stopped for a drink at Yorkeys Knob Boating Club, allegedly the best Marina in the southern hemisphere. http://www.ykbc.com.au/
We were there at sunset which was lovely.



Thursday 12th May was another 'wow' day. I spent the day on the Great Barrier Reef. What an amazing experience. I, and around 100 others, boarded the Ocean Spirit, a huge twin hulled sailing ship for the Michaelmas Cay Cruise.


Michaelmas Cay is a small reef sand island which hosts thousands of seabirds and is surrounded by the amazing coral reef. http://www.oceanspirit.com.au/Dive_Snorkel_Australia_Michaelmas.htm


The birds on the island at this time were mainly Black Noddies and Sooty Terns with their chicks.


I snorkelled for probably over an hour and loved it. I joined the 'snorkelling tour' which allowed newbies like myself to snorkel with a marine naturalist who pointed out the many different sorts of coral and colourful tropical fish. We were transported from the Ocean Spirit to the beach by the 'beach buggy'


and it ran a 15 minute service throughout the day to and from the beach. I returned to the cruiser for their amazing all-inclusive buffet lunch then in the afternoon took a ride in the 'semi-submersible' - a vessel where passengers are seated underwater to view the coral and fish.


Very good but I did find it a bit claustrophobic



It was quite windy all day, especially the return voyage when it was difficult to walk around the ship.
All in all a fabulous day and something else to cross off my 'bucket list'. I was exhausted at the end of the day and fell into bed at 8.30pm!

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11th May - Rainforest

First and most importantly - Happy Birthday Aimee. 10 today. Where have the last ten years gone?

I have had a fabulous day today. I took the 10.00am Kuranda Scenic Railway from Freshwater station (just around the corner from where I am staying) up to the rainforest village of Kuranda. http://www.kuranda.org/?
The journey took one and a half hours to slowly climb 327 metres to the mountain top village, including a photo stop,

Due to the number of people (and screaming kids!) waiting on the platform, I upgraded my ticket to 'Gold'. So I peacefully travelled in style and comfort in an armchair with unlimited drinks - hot, cold or alcoholic - and an endless supply of lovely food. My style of travel! The railway is very historic and is over 100 years old and the website is definitely worth a browse http://www.ksr.com.au/Pages/Default.aspx
Kuranda village is full of markets and cafes, and is somewhat 'touristy', but is interesting to wander around. I visited the small zoo where I just had to cuddle a koala!





And I also saw kangaroos with little joeys in their pockets as well as wallabies, and many exotic birds in 'Birdworld'. Kuranda was a great place to visit.
But the icing on the cake was the journey down. I took the 'Skyrail' - a 7.5km cable car high over the top of the rainforest canopy. http://www.skyrail.com.au/
It was truly a wonderful ride and lasted an hour. I had a cable car to myself which was lovely, but a bit freaky whenever the system stopped briefly, as it occasionally did!





We passed over the Barron Falls





and the cable car stopped at a couple of stations for us to get out and have a walk through the rainforest on a boardwalk and to take some photos





It was a wonderful experience and the views were just spectacular





As usual, there are loads more photos on Picasaweb https://picasaweb.google.com/judystevens17/AustraliaAprilMay2011#

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9th - 10th May. Cairns continued

Tuesday 10th May. Today is Jack's **th birthday. Happy Birthday Jack.
As is the custom in the Perrett family, as many of the clan as possible gather for a birthday breakfast at the Shangri La Hotel at the Cairns Marina. Being a weekday son-in-law Martin nor the two grandsons could be there.
Breakfast is buffet style - eat as much as you can for 24 bucks. I sure did get my money's worth! The food was very good, the coffee great and sitting outside on the boardwalk looking out at the million dollar boats in the warm sunshine was a lovely experience. Thank you Perrett's for allowing me to join you.

We made a detour on the way home via the Lake Placid Recreation Area on the Barron River. In Feb 1999 the river height was up to the White marker
on the tree


And then to the Barron Gorge where there is a big power station. It was lovely there


The day ended with a short drive to one of the several lovely beaches in the area - Palm Cove where a sea eagle was being a bit friendly





Another enjoyable day in this lovely part of the world.

Monday 9th May. This morning Jack and Norma took me into Cairns so I could familiarise myself with the area for when I return with Jacky and Aimee in July.
We spent time around the Marina and I booked a day trip to the Great Barrier Reef for Thursday and for the Crocodile Explorer http://www.crocodileexplorer.com.au/ for this afternoon
We had lunch (great value) in a Club that Jack and Norma belong to and then they took me back to the wharf for me to go see the crocs!
It was a great cruise along the beautiful tidal Trinity Inlet, for an hour and


a half with a most informative and interesting commentary. We did see 2 large crocs on the way to the crocodile farm. This one was about 4m long.


On arrival at the crocodile farm we were met by a coach and driven slowly around, with plenty of stops to look and take photographs. There are 200+ breeding crocs


and over 20,000 farm crocs being raised for their skin and


meat. All the skins are sent to Italy for the upmarket leather trade. This photo shows just one of many tanks.
During the evening I attended, as an onlooker, a house group that Jack and Norma host every Monday. They are committed Christians who belong to the New Frontier Worldwide mission http://www.newfrontierstogether.org/

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6th - 8th May. In and around Cairns

When I arrived at Cairns airport on 5th May, the lovely Jack Perrett came to meet me. He and Norma only live 15 minutes from the airport. It is lovely catch up with them after so long. They are ex-Woking folk and I met them through Send A.D.S. many years ago.

So, to keep this in it's usual date order (latest date first): yesterday 8th May was Mother's Day here in Australia and the day started with a breakfast BBQ at Catana Wetlands, organised by Martin, Jack and Norma's son-in-law. Their daughter, Nicola and their two grandsons Samuel and Joshua

were there too. Martin laid on a lovely breakfast and I supplied the Bucks Fizz. Loverly!!
I was lucky enough to see a couple of large birds there which I had never seen before. A Jabiru (black-necked stork)



and several spur-winged plovers (masked lapwing)


Apart from a brief visit to the local shopping mall on the way home, the rest of the day was spent in usual Sunday fashion .... not doing very much. We did go for a late afternoon dip in their pool where I had a snorkelling lesson in preparation for my planned Great Barrier Reef trip later this week.




Saturday 7th May saw us heading up to the Atherton Tablelands to Herberton Historic Village where there are buildings, vehicles and machinery dating from 1870. It was most interesting. Many local people were dressed in fashions of the day which added to the atmosphere. http://www.herbertonhistoricvillage.com.au/


It was a lovely drive through tropical rain forest and we passed lots of huge termite mounds


On the way back we had a stop to meet some friends at Halloran's Hill lookout - wonderful views.

Sunday 6th May. My first full day in Cairns. Well, not exactly Cairns but Caravonica about 20 minutes north. Jack and Norma are making me very welcome in their lovely home.
Today we visited Cairns Botanical Gardens - very tropical and all the lovely plants and trees seemed huge. This very strange tree creeper looked almost as though someone had pasted it on as wallpaper





We later drove up through the rainforest to Lake Morris and Copperlode Dam. The road up (and down) was very steep with many hairpin bends and the views from the top were tremendous. Norma packed a picnic lunch.


A lovely first full day in North Queensland.

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4th - 5th May. Uluru/ Kata Tjuta

On 4th May we departed Alice Springs for Yulara (aka Ayers Rock Resort). It was a 6 hour coach journey including a couple of stops. The scenery was just like we saw from The Ghan - desert, eucalypts and the occasional mountain range.
In the early 1970's the pressure of unstructured tourism near the base of Uluru was having detrimental effects on the environment surrounding Uluru and Kata Tjuta. So a new tourist town (Yulara/Ayers Rock Resort) was built 14 kilometres away and completed in 1984. It can hardly be called a town as it is a group of 4, maybe 5, really large hotels. There is a small shopping mall but I didn't get to see it - not enough time.
I was really excited about this part of the Australian adventure as Uluru has been on my 'bucket list' for as long as I can remember.
On arrival at the Outback Pioneer Hotel & Lodge we had just enough time for a bag of fries for lunch before our first trip of the area. We headed for Kata Tjuta (aka The Olgas) with it's 36 domes.

I went for a long walk into the Walpa Gorge between Mt Olga and Mt Walpa. (Tom stayed in the coach as he couldn't tolerate the flies).





It was about half an hour of uneven walking but I made it to the end:


It was a fabulous walk.
We left Kata Tjuta around 5pm in order to be at Uluru for sunset .... we needn't have bothered - there wasn't one due to too much cloud cover. Sunset at Uluru is an organised circus:


All coach operators lay on wine or soft drinks and nibbles for all. It was a great atmosphere even though the sunset let us down.
Thursday 5th May was a REALLY early start. We were collected at 0550 in order to be at Uluru for sunrise due at 0615. Again the sun let us down as the famous rock didn't glow red at all


But we did see the most amazing sunrise


We were then taken on a one-hour cultural walk around the base of the rock when our guide pointed out many natural features of the rock, sacred sites which we were not allowed to photograph, aboriginal paintings and he told us traditional stories relating to this sacred site. I took many, many photographs and here are a couple. If you want to see more go to my Picasaweb site where I have uploaded them all. https://picasaweb.google.com/judystevens17








It was just amazing. An unforgettable and somewhat spiritual experience. I loved it.
I flew out of Ayers Rock Airport for Cairns at 2.30pm and was delighted that I was able to see both Uluru and the resort from the air.


Fabulous!
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1st - 3rd May. The Red Centre

Wednesday 3rd May was a full day of sightseeing.  The morning was taken up with a trip out to the West MacDonnell Ranges to visit Simpsons Gap and Standley Chasm.  Gaps and Chasms (and bigger 'Gorges') are passes through the mountains - a chasm is bigger than a gap.  Simpsons Gap was a beautiful place, much revered by the Aboriginees.

From there we travelled a few kilometers further to Standley Chasm, a deep red cleft crowded in on either side by craggy slopes that rise 80 meters or so.

The 20 minute or so walk to the chasm from the coach park follows a creek where spring fed pools attract a great variety of wildlife and we saw many amazing trees and plants. The walk was quite a difficult one, as we had to negotiate many rocks and large 'puddles'

The afternoon trip was a 'city tour'. Whereas I loved the surrounding areas, I was not too fond of Alice Springs itself. I was expecting something older and more historic (although there are lots of historic buildings there).
Our first stop was at the Reptile House where I actually plucked up the courage to handle a large python - another 'first' for me

From there we visited the historic Telegraph Station. Connecting Australia with England by means of a single wire in 1872, the overland telegraph line was a huge achievement, making contact with 'the mother England' much simpler and quicker (before the telegraph, messages could take up to 3 months by ship).

We then visited the Royal Flying Doctor Service Museum and information centre. I hadn't realised before what an important part of outback life (and other medical emergencies) the RDFS played. The Royal Flying Doctor Service was established in 1928 by Reverend John Flynn. His vision was to provide a 'mantle of safety' for the isolated communities of inland Australia. Using air links and radio, the service provided medical aid to people living, working and travelling in the outback. Today it operates 21 bases and covers more than 7,150,000 square kilometres. The Alice Springs base was opened in 1939 to provide emergency and preventative medicine to outlying communities and stations throughout Central Australia.
Our final stop for the day was to the top of Anzac Hill where we had a 360 degree view of Alice and surrounds.



Alice Springs was an interesting place to visit but I would not hurry back there, although I loved the surrounding countryside and mountains

On Sunday 1st May we left Adelaide for Alice Springs.  This time we boarded 'The Ghan' - the iconic train which runs from Adelaide, up through the centre of Australia, to Darwin in the north.  www.trulyaustralia.com/rail/ghan
We travelled as far as Alice Springs, about half way, but even that took over 24 hours. The train departed at 12.20 and we were called to lunch soon after departure. Kangaroo steak was on the menu so I had to have that. It was nice, not too different to a beef steak. Life on this train was very similar to the Indian Pacific and our compartment was just the same. It was just the scenery outside that was different. We travelled through the desert and I thought I would be seeing miles and miles of nothing but red sand, but after all the rain that has been experienced in Australia over the recent months there was far more green than I expected:

There was even some water in the Finke River:

We arrived in Alice Springs on time on 2nd May and were taken to the Crowne Plaza hotel.  We were some way out of town and later in the afternoon we wandered in to get something to eat.  There was not much choice as it was a public holiday, so we found a pizzeria which was open.  I was not too comfortable sitting outside eating as there were a lot of aboriginal women wandering around that I didn't like the look of too much.  I am sure they were all harmless, but I clung on to my bag evenso!