It's pronounced "cans"...........

Cairns was my starting point for diving the Great Barrier Reef and home base for seeing some of the state of Queensland Australia. Having been corrected several times, it’s pronounced ‘cans’, said with

Beautiful Beaches

Get close to nature

sort of a Bostonian accent. Cairns sits on the north east coast of Australia and from what I had heard was the place southern Aussie’s go to escape the cold (ha! Sorry couldn’t help that), so I was expecting a city with warm sunshine and beautiful beaches like the French Riviera. At least that is my expectation of the French Riviera since I’ve never been there either, so maybe it too is hot, humid and carved out of a giant mangrove swamp with no beach, just a giant mudflat at low tide. They do have a large lagoon i.e. giant swimming pool right on the waterfront that substitutes for the beach. As I later learned when they say they are going to Cairns, the mean through Cairns to get to the beautiful beaches farther up the northern coast. The easily accessible city center is mostly hotels, backpacker hostels, restaurants, bars, souvenir shops and travel agencies with tours to the Great Barrier Reef and anywhere else but

Rabies anyone?

 Cairns. At least that is the way it seemed to me, although I did find a few gems among the potch. The Esplanade, a long path along the waterfront, is great for a walk. There is a nice park running parallel to it for most of the way, with benches, picnic tables and even free gas powered BBQ’s for public use.  The Esplanade then continues on past the lagoon and  marina. The best time to stroll is when the tide is in so that you are looking at an ocean of blue water instead of a sea of black mud.  Since the Esplanade ends at a mangrove swamp there are signs warning you of crocodile in the area, so beware! This town also has bats living in the trees. At dusk, hundreds would leave their roosts for night time feeding. Mud, Crocodiles, and Bats; what a lovely town

This photo is for my dentist- BTW a root canal in Fiji is only

$17.50 and that's in Fiji dollars!

The Cairns Museum is wonderfully charming.  Although in the central business district, it is little hard to find and overlooked by most visitors. The museum has a lot of artifacts and dozens and dozens of photos chronicling the history of Cairns, with some good photos of a devastating typhoon that hit the city. It occupies part of the second floor of an old hotel. The exhibits are kind of crammed together and the volunteers are doing the best they can to present the items in a meaningful way, but I think the city is doing itself an injustice by not providing adequate room to display the materials in a space it deserves. I was commenting to the lady at the front desk about how much I enjoyed the museum and she said they have many more objects and ephemera but don’t have an area large enough to showcase it all. It’s really a shame.



Hiking trail

Rainforest turkey - I wonder how they taste with cranberries?

The botanic garden is another beautiful spot. Located adjacent to a large park with several lakes, it has a few nice paths through the lowland rainforest and one fairly rugged hike up into mountainous rainforest. Although it was mid-winter the day I climbed it was very hot and humid, as were all my days in Cairns. It was like Chicago in August, I’d hate to feel what Cairns is like in summer.  At times the trail up the mountain was steep and narrow, with tree roots reaching out to trip you at every step. Although you were high, there really were no good views as the trees blocked every angle. Occasionally I would see scrub turkeys scratching their way along the forest floor like big black chickens. At least they're not dangerous.

Daintree River

Mossman Gorge

Small Saltwater Crocodile

The Daintree Rainforest lies a few hours north of Cairns so I decided to take a day tour out to see it. The tour included a trip to Mossman’s Gorge and a short cruise on the Daintree River. I picked up the bus in Cairns, but we stopped at several other beach towns picking up passengers as we headed north. After seeing those towns I can understand why no one actually stays in Cairns.  The gorge was nothing grand, just some boulders in a river and the trail with suspension bridge was closed; maybe the trail would have been more impressive, but even if it was open we wouldn’t have had enough time to hike it. The river cruise wasn’t much better, just a short jaunt up the

Large Walking Stick

river with some good commentary from the guide. You get to see a few small salt water crocodiles









and a few birds, but that’s it. I think you can do longer trips or can go fishing on the river, so those might be the better way to go.

 The road up to the rainforest is just one lane in each direction as it hugs the coast. You get some really nice ocean views from the bus. There are backpacker hostels and beach campsites all along the way and many people take advantage of these and caravan. It is a very popular and practical way to travel in Australia. That is the way to do it if you really want to spend some time in this area.  Had I known better, I would have skipped the tour and just stayed a couple days less in Cairns and spent the time up in the Rainforest. The rainforest is a wild tropical jungle as you would imagine a jungle to be. Hot, humid with things growing up from the forest floor and down from the treetops. Vines creep over everything and strangle the life from trees. Every plant seems to want to climb to the top of the forest for precious, life-giving sunshine.  Thankfully it was the dry, relatively speaking; it must be unbearable in the rainy season. We stopped at the end of the paved road, Cape Tribulation, so named by James Cook who ran into troubles there while exploring Australia. There is a long, wide expanse of beach and several hiking trails, but again we

Cape Tribulation

only had enough time for a cursory view. Like

Cassowary

many of the northern beaches, they have bottles of vinegar readily available on the beach. This is used to alleviate the pain from jellyfish stings. There is another option you often hear about if you don’t have vinegar available, peeing on the sting, although I don’t know how much truth there is to that, it may be an urban legend, and you need a really good friend for that method so I would stick with the vinegar or better yet not swim with them. I mean the jellyfish not your useless friends. Jellies are very common in the summer season and most beaches have nets to protect the swimmers, not only are they painful, certain types can be  deadly. It’s best to visit in the off season. The rainforest is home to the cassowary, a large (4-5 foot tall), flightless bird; mostly black with a bright blue head and red wattle. The bus driver said it is uncommon to see a cassowary yet we saw two as we made our way through the forest. Of course we stopped to take the obligatory photos. Reputedly you don’t want to get too 

Amusingly altered road sign

close to a cassowary because they can be aggressive and they have a large claw on their feet with which they can jump up and slash you open. They’re like the velociraptors of the bird world. Again, this may be an urban legend, but any giant bird coming at you would still be intimidating. On the return we stopped at the Daintree Ice Cream shop. The flavors they were serving that day were wattle seed, raspberry, mango, and jackfruit. The wattle seed was not as good as that I had in Tasmania, the raspberry and mango were okay and I did not care for the jackfruit. If you want good ice cream, stop in at the Glenview Dairy Barn. They have some of the best ice cream in Illinois. If you’re ever in the Chicago area make your way to the northern suburb of Glenview and give it a try.  Ask for Teri and tell her Norb sent you.

Texas Chainsaw Bathroom

That ends my time in Australia; six weeks went by in the blink of an eye. I wish I had another six weeks to explore the areas I missed, Broome, Kakadu, Darwin, Perth, all of Western Australia……so much to see, so little time.  I guess I’ll just have to come back J If you ever have the opportunity to visit Australia, I highly recommend it, you will not be disappointed.

Cheers mate.

norb   

Next stop….Fiji

Pretty Flowers