One Year to Give: Cairns

We arrived in Cairns last Tuesday, and spent 6 nights in a great spot!

Some reasons why we have enjoyed it: (in no particular order)

The Crystal Cascades Big 4 has the best bathrooms we have encountered so far, and believe me, Lily and I are becoming highly trained bathroom "connoisseurs"!
We have caught up with 3 families we have met previously in our travels. This is always good fun, as you feel like 'long lost friends', that you can catch up on what's been happening, compare trip notes, pass on good tips for future experiences and share on a similar level, as you are generally, encountering the same life happenings.
Coffee and Chocolate!! Yu.u.mmm! Tasting these at Coffee World, in Mareeba, was a real treat.
Snorkelling and seeing beautiful coral, fish, turtles etc, when we went on a Frankland Islands Tour, to Normanby Island
The weather - still! We have been very lucky. This week was forecast to have been showery every day and raining yesterday. However, we have seen no rain until there were a few spots yesterday, and it was a bit cooler (low 20's instead of mid 20's!), and today has been warmer again. We even braved the swimming pool at the C Park today. It was ...refreshing! No one believes in solar heating pool water up here - I guess for a lot of the year it just isn't worth it, but this time of the year, I reckon, it would be a good thing!

Everything seems to be "big" up here in the far north of Queensland:

Big Insects! It looked a bit like a "mozzie",
but I don't think it was!?

Big Shells - (note the camera case size)

Big Capt Cook!!

Big...Lagoon, for safe swimming,
on the Cairns Esplanade

Day Trip with Frankland Island Tours

We got up bright and early on Thursday, to drive down to Deeral
(south of Cairns) and catch the tour boat, for it's trip down the
Mulgrave River and out to Normanby Island. This particular tour had been recommended by several of our family contacts we have made, and we were lucky enough to get a really good deal with the price.

We were glad we had left in plenty of time as the rush-hour traffic was "thick as". Halfway there, we were dismayed to encounter a sign that said "prepare to stop - accident ahead". There were people and families that weren't having a good day, and according to the 'truckies' on the UHF it had been a 'head-on' with several cars involved.
The Bruce Highway, at this point is surrounded by mountains, thick vegetation and waterways and has limited options for detours. Definitely hard work for emergency services! However, they were at the road 'cleanup' stage when we went past the accident site. Although I have looked on the news etc for this accident, I have been unable to find out what happened. So, hopefully the p-plate driver of the hotted up, red ute that looked particularly 'mangled', survived!
We were pleased to be only held up a half hour or so, and according to the Tour company, we weren't the only ones 'stuck in traffic' - in fact the "Skipper", and another bus load of tourists,were also caught up in the mayhem! Luckily the tour operators were going to wait for all concerned, before embarking!

Thirty eight people on board (instead of the possible 100), made for a great day's fun. 'Skipper' - Ron took us down the river for about half an hour, dodging sandbanks, and across the shallow area where the river enters the sea. Consequently, they are somewhat bound by tide times and with the morning's holdup, the engine was doing a bit of growling and churning of sand. But we made it!

Once we were out on the open water, it was only a short 'hop', about another half hour, to Normanby Island. These islands are a group of undeveloped islands, declared a National Park, with this tour operator being the only ones to go there on a regular basis.

Co-skippers, steering us across the open water, to Normanby Island. Jed was amazed that the boat direction could be controlled by the tiny little finger lever.

The island was not very big, with lovely light coloured sand and a sheltered bay, with palm trees, etc lining the beach. The crew were young, friendly, and fairly casual. "Yuki" was our main host, and responsible for guiding us with a "snorkelling tour". I was very proud of myself, as I had never snorkelled before, and managed to get on really well. Now I am hooked, and would love to be able to do some more. It was great to be able to sea fish, giant clams and colourful coral under the water. We snorkelled, and then rode in the semi-submersible boat, where we were lucky enough to see 6 sea turtles, an eagle ray, sea cucumbers, more brightly coloured fish and coral. Beautiful!

Ready for snorkelling

A fantastic buffet lunch was served under the temporary shades they have erected on the island - that, and tables, being the only 'aspirations' to civilisation, on the island. The main 'dilemma' of a day long tour was solved by taking a "Toilet Tour", on the tinnie, back to the main boat. Yuki, then took a guided walk around the island, where we checked out some creatures living in the rockpools. Following this was a bit of free time for swimming and snorkelling and then it was time to grab our gear and leave 'paradise,' before the tide was too low for us to enter the river.

Beautiful water colour

Two sea turtles were sheltering and
feeding in this lagoon style water hole.
If you look carefully, a foot is out of
watercentral in the pool

A clam shell, found in a rock pool

The day's weather was magic, about 25, or so and a bit overcast (which was probably just as well, because the sun, when it shone, was "burny-hot")!! The water temp was about 23 degrees evidently and was quite easy to plunge into.

Back across sea and up river we went, with coffee and cake supplied, and chatting to the people we had been with throughout the day. It had been a fun day and we drove back to Cairns for an easy tea and everyone early to bed.

Day out with 'Coffee and Chocolate' - what more could you want?!

Coffee World at Mareeba is the dream of everyone who loves coffee and chocolate! They buy in the coffee beans from local coffee farmers and then roast and label their own brand of coffee. They also have flavoured and other coffees for tasting. They have 21 types of coffee for tasting.

Sampling chocolates, while sipping coffee, yummmeee!!

Some of the 21 pots of Coffee lined up for tasting

Of course the perfect accompaniment for coffee, chocolate is available too. From their chocky kitchen they have a selection of 12 different types/flavours available for tasting and they produce a variety of shapes and fancy moulded creations for purchase.

The gift shop and cafe, add a nice touch too, but one of the most unique museums/collections I have seen exist here - all around the theme of coffee!! There were thousands of articles on show, and while I didn't need to see every style of coffee percolator etc that had ever been made, the whole concept of one person's interest was fascinating.

One of the displays, with lights, soundtrack and recordings was based on an American beauty pageant with Tom Jones' song "Sex Pot", as the theme song. Lined up on shelves were sashed coffee pots, one collected from each state of USA. This was just one of several themed displays.

The "Sex Pots" - one coffee pot collected from every state in
the US, in the Miss American sexiest pot beauty pageant!!?

This visit, actually brought back memories of my Year 10 trip to Tasmania, when we visited the Cadbury Chocolate Factory in Hobart and I was put off chocolate for a few minutes! Likewise, I certainly didn't need any further cups of coffee for the rest of the day after visiting Coffee World!