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Lucy's Big Adventure
Arrived in Cairns at about 6pm Saturday evening after a short flight. Was staying at a backpackers called Calypso which was great. Lovely atmosphere and great bar with all u can eat buffets for $8 everynight (about three pounds fifty!) Spent Sunday checking out the town center and lagoon (they don't swim in the sea for a variety of reasons but mainly because from October to April theres deadly box jellyfish in the water that kill u pretty quickly!
Cairns itself is very pretty - because of the rain they get here later on in the summer its very lush and green and there wasn't many high rise buildings at all. I went to a few travel agents to organise package deals on trips down the coast and ended up booking myself for diving on the Monday. I got to do three certified dives (See that PADI course was worth it Dad!) and plenty of snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef (Saxon and Hastings Reefs in particular) plus lunch and wine and snacks later on for the bargain price of $169 which is about 68 quid! Probably the cheapest diving I'll do out here. I think its because one of the crew had been to Bideford and knew some people that i did!
On Tuesday I went on a three day trip up to Cape Tribulation. Its about 3 hours North of Cairns and into the Rainforest proper. I stayed at a place called the beach house which was as the name suggest right on a beautiful sandy beach. On the way up we went on a river cruise on the Daintree river and saw three crocs and countless snakes and frogs! On arriving at the beach I also saw a Cassowary (an endangered bird a bit like an Ostrich) which I'm told is pretty rare and i got a picture which will follow. Wednesday saw me walking up the beach in the morning and going exotic fruit tasting in the afternoon - had amazing fruits that tasted like lemon meringue pie and one was like chocolate! One was also like a mixture of garlic and onion so i wasn't so keen on that one!!
Thursday was my final day up there so I went horseriding in the morning - we got to go through the rainforest and onto the beach and its probably the most scenic ride I could have chosen so I really enjoyed it. We went out for just over two hours and I got a couple of canters in (can't believe i remembered how!) but my god was i stiff afterwards!!! I went back to stay at Calypso on Thurs night where there was a 70's themed party in full sswing for one of the staff's leaving nights.
Waved goodbye to sunny Cairns on Friday as I caught the Greyhound down to Mission Beach...
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