Week 24: Merry Christmas from the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rainforest!

As you may, or not have realised my blog title has slightly changed. Well, very quickly after arriving here I was duly informed that Aussi's use the term prawns rather than shrimp, so 24 weeks later I have finally got round to changing the title. Throw another steak on the barbie seems a bit more accurate as I have had so many barbie cooked steaks in the past 6 months. Anywho, on to this week...

The week started out with a journey from Sydney to Cairns. We had a quick walk by the beach at Double Bay before making our way to the airport. It was the first internal flight I have ever taken and by golly isn't an internal flight so much easier than international. No passport faffing, security checks were quick on the down side there was no duty free. We had an uneventful journey thankfully, Geek Alert: I managed to complete a monster soduku filling in numbers 0-9 and letters A-F, I know right! After picking up the hire car which coincidentally was a VW Golf again and the same colour, we made our way on the coastal road on our short journey to Port Douglas. We arrived at our surprisingly spacious self catering apartment and went for a walk to the Marina to see what was going on. Not much it turned out.

Just a quick note about the weather up here, hot and humid.... lovely!

Christmas Eve was spent pretty relaxed, we went into Port Douglas and I finished my christmas shopping before spending the arvo by the pool reading the first bourne book in the sun. For all of you who know how brown I usually am, well imagine the last time you saw me; Aussi's double it and all the Poms (Brits) multiply be about ten! Early evening we headed down to the Marina for our sunset cruise. We jumped aboard a pretty swish catamaran and set sail (proper sailing) out along the coastline. We were treated with drinks and canapes, it was great getting out into the ocean, peacefully sailing along.

Along came Christmas Day, I am fairly certain this will be my weirdest Christmas Day ever. I opened a few presents from friends and family before settling in for a feast that Mum had cooked up for breakfast, scrambled eggs, bacon, tomato and toast mmmm. After filling our bellies a walk was definitely in order so we headed to the coast for a very hot and sweaty walk to what turned out to be a disappointing viewpoint. On the flip side we bought ice creams on the way back. To make christmas even weirder we decided to go for a swim in the sea... the 29 degree sea, inside the shark and jellyfish nets of course. It was the most peculiar feeling walking into sea water that was warm, I have never been in a sea that warm and not many pools that warm either. For Christmas dinner we had a BBQ by the pool, steaks, prawns, sausages were all sizzled up by yours truly. Can I take a moment to boast about my steak cooking, it was amazing! Throughout the day it was necessary to take a jump in the pool and the evening was no different!

A cable car tour took us over the "mountains" on Boxing Day. I use quotation marks because they are not quite proper mountains but then again they are bigger than hills. We stopped off at stations along the way and got a feel of what the tropical rainforest is like. Flying over the canopy was great, you can see how dense the forest is. After arriving in Kuranda we had a mooche around the shops and grabbed a great but expensive bagel for lunch by the River. Our return journey was on a pretty traditional train that wound its way down the mountain side, it was one of the slowest train rides I have been on I think, but the scenery was great, even if we were all pretty sleepy from the heat. To finish the day off I made my infamous fajitas for dinner.

The Great Barrier Reef was our destination for Friday, we set off pretty early to catch our luxurious catamaran/boat our to the Lowe Isles. We were given fruit and a selection of drinks for our journey out there. Before long it was time to don our lycra suits (to give a bit of protection against the sting rays), flippers and snorkels. We moored a few hundred meters from the Low Isles and took a snorkeling tour from the boat to the island. It was amazing to see a coral reef in real life rather than on TV! We swam over all manner of hard and soft corals, with fish swimming all around us, from the size of a gold fish to the massive bat fish. Once we arrived on the island we took a tour of the island and was taught a little bit about the reef and the island. We then took a snorkeling trip back to the boat for a splendid lunch (I don't know how else to describe it and im bored of using amazing!). Just as we were finishing lunch a couple of Black Tipped Reef Sharks appear around the boat to we scrambled to get our kit back on and slipped back into the water. It was very surreal having two or three sharks swimming around you as well as many other large fish. Check out the photos and videos (that will be uploaded when I can). Without a doubt seeing the Great Barrier Reef is definitely up there with seeing the Grand Canyon as the most amazing experiences of my life. We headed back as the afternoon heat cooled off, the sails went up and we relaxed on the boat. We didn't feel like cooking after the day we had so we headed off into the quaint town of Port Douglas and found a pub/bar to get some grub.

Check out a selection of clips from Snorkelling the Great Barrier Reef!

(Watch in HD!)

It was a lot more impressive in real life believe me!

Hello Mr Sharky

Rockin' it right?!

The previous days had been relatively strenuous so we deserved a lie in on Sunday. We didn't get going until after lunch and decided to head over to Mossman Gorge. This Gorge is located in the Daintree National Park, which I remember learning about in GCSE Geography and never in my life had I imagined that I would be there only a few years later. We took a leisurely stroll around a circular walk in the rainforest, luckily we were out of the heat of the sun but it was still pretty humid. On completion of our walk I went for a swim in the Mossman River which was very very refreshing.

To finish the week off we were picked up nice and early by a Land Cruiser for our day in and around the Daintree Rainforest, we were joined by one couple so there was only 6 of us for the whole day! Our guide took us up and across the Daintree River, giving a comprehensive commentary on various topics along the way. We took the chain ferry over the croc infested river, spotting a turtle on the way across. A short walk was next on the cards at Jindalba Rainforest, where we got a education in the fauna of the rainforest. We spotted a great looking lizard and I managed to see my first Aussi wild snake! Finally! It was a red bellied black snake and is not quite lethally venomous, but nearly. Morning tea was held on the Kulki Cape Tribulation Beach and I managed to drink a cup o tea in order to sooth my sore throat... maybe I am a true pom. We had a walk along the beach before heading over to a freshwater creek for a swim.

Red-bellied Black Snake, can you spot it? 

It was lovely and refreshing. Our next stop was a great little ice cream place, where they made ice creams out of locally grown fruits, so we had raspberry, macadamia, mango and whortleberry (I think). By this time it was gone lunchtime so we headed to the Daintree Tea Rooms for a steak lunch... yes steak... again... it was delish... my steak was accompanied by a range of exotic fruits such as passionfruit, dragon fruit, lychee, mango and quite a few more that I had never heard of. They were surprisingly good, but I dont think I am quite brave enough to buy them in the supermarket yet. The afternoon consisted of a boat ride on the Daintree river, we came across five crocodiles on our adventure, which included the skipper crashing the boat into a tree, typical Aussi's.

Baby Croc

Muma Croc

On departure from the boat we were given a try of the miracle fruit. So we swirled the fruit in our mouth and then sucked a lime and the taste left by the fruit makes the lime taste like an orange, it was extremely peculiar! Apparently it makes bitter things sweet and sweet things ever sweeter. We finished the week with a BBQ by the pool and a well deserved early night.