Last Travelling Post!

Sorry for the long entries, I typed them each day instead of all at once so I could remember more!

2/16: Today was our departure day from Sydney. We got up around 10, said goodbye to our “lovely” hostel room, and made our way down to reception. We checked out and then waited outside for our shuttle. Shuttle was boarded a little late, but we got to the airport with 2 hours of downtime. We had lunch at the food court, at a place called Red Rooster, which was like chicken and fries. We then bought some amazing KRISPY KREME DONUTS! Same thing as the States, can you believe it? I was so excited, and ate mine before we got off our plane. The plane boarded a little late so we were half an hour late to our destination. We called our new shuttle bus and got our bags and made our way to Gilligan’s Backpackers in Cairns. Cairns is up near the Great Barrier Reef, and has weather similar to a rainforest. In other words, it has been very hot and humid. We checked in and made our way to our room. It is a lot nicer than our other places. For the same price, we are in a 4-person dorm room (which only has us 3 in it so far), and it has an en-suite bathroom, with separate rooms for sink, toilet, and shower. The shower stays the same temperature the whole time, and the sink is big enough to wash your face in (these two things were not so in Sydney). Also, the bed is not as hard as a backboard like it was in Sydney, and I do know what those feel like from my EMT training. We unpacked a little and went to eat our free dinner that they serve each night, which really isn’t all that great. We went over to the mall, and passed by this tree that houses at least a hundred little parrots that squawk incessantly. Luckily, they are about two blocks away, but they were quite loud. The mall was closed as usual, because everything down here closes so early, but the grocery stores were open. Emily and I bought guacamole ingredients, which included Doritos “original” flavor, which are like tortilla chips, and coriander, which is what cilantro is called down here. Our hostel has a nightclub/bar and pool which aren’t all that interesting to me at least.
2/17: On Thursday, we didn’t have anything planned. We woke up late morning, and went to Cairns Central (shopping mall) and ate lunch at the food court there. Emily and I ate at the Bucking Bull for lunch. Emily had a yummy baked potato and I had a breakfast sandwich. We then walked around the mall a little bit, and headed back to our room. We then went to find where our scuba-diving trip would be taken off from, and saw this really cool pool area by the marina. We got back and watched some HOUSE and watched the movie Daddy Day Care. The heat here is quite sweltering to say the least, we are still trying to get used to it. Luckily, our dorm room is air-conditioned, and some stores are, but the rest of the backpackers isn’t and many stores aren’t. We then went down for our free dinner, which again was spaghetti, and then went back to the grocery store for some more food to last us the rest of the week. Not a very eventful day but it was a nice acclimation day.
2/18: SCUBA DIVING DAY! We headed out at 7:40 in the morning, a little early. Got to our boat, checked in and received our wetsuits, mask, and fins. I was so nervous to tell whoever is reading this the truth. This is my major in a nutshell, seeing an actual ecosystem thriving! However, the breathing underwater was a bit scary. Our first dive was around 10:30 a.m. We got our scuba gear on (tank, weight belt, etc.) and made our way to the back of the boat. The scuba gear is quite heavy, it would be easy to just fall over while walking for sure. We sat down on the edge, put our fins on, got our oxygen tank ready, and fell headfirst into the water. The water near the Reef is actually really warm; I was worried that it was going to be a lot cooler than the air temp. We had to practice a few skills such as finding your oxygen breathing tube thingy if you dropped it, and a couple others about 5 feet underwater. Breathing underwater at first is really intense. You just have to put your thoughts aside and realize that it is actually working. When you go down, you have to equalize the air spaces (lungs, ears, etc.) in your body with the water pressure. This involves plugging your nose and blowing against your plugged nose to fill those air pockets on the way down. We get down to the reef, and it is in full action! Tons of fish were swimming everywhere, I think I was in awe for the first few minutes. We all hooked arms at this point, and swam over to a spot where we could kneel on the ocean floor. Here is where I got my close-up with Nemo! Well, some of his relatives anyway. It was really awesome to see them and be in the water with them! There also was a really friendly fish that the crew nicknamed Wally, and I got to pet him on my second dive. He is a huge wrasse of some sort. There were many other tropical fish of all colors, and many huge schools of fish that we swam by. Apparently we saw a turtle, but my mask was too fogged up that I missed it. Of course right after the turtle swam by I fixed my fogginess problem. We ended up doing 3 dives total, each for about 20 minutes or so I believe. It was so invigorating to be in the same environment as these living creatures! On our third dive, we got to hold a sea cucumber, and saw a bunch of different types of fish. When you resurfaced, you swam over to the boat and got your fins off and scuba gear off. It was nice to finally take the wetsuit off. They are so nice in the water, but outside they are a little too close for comfort. We had some lunch served, which was nothing special, and then after our third dive we headed back home. We got some cool pictures and talked with some of the crew. There was one guy named Sam that was really interested in talking with us, and he made the journey back very fun. We were introduced to MILO, this chocolately-powder type stuff, and to the Tim-Tam straw method. He also gave us sour plums, which apparently some people like to eat (a kind of lolly that the British enjoy, like a candy). He was really nice to us and made us feel welcome and involved which I really appreciated. We got back to our hostel, and Emily and I ate at a place called Cactus Jack’s, that had Mexican food. We then watched the movie “Never Been Kissed” (personal fave!), and got ready for bed.
2/19: Today we went up to Kuranda, a little village in the Queensland rainforest. The coolest thing for me was seeing all of the biology at work. For example, there is this type of tree that can grow from top to bottom. The bird can deposit it somewhere in the canopy, and it can work its way down to the bottom, attacking other trees and such and not needing roots. Also, there are these things called basket ferns that can develop up in the canopy, and can use other trees for structure (without harming them), and gain its own nutrients by developing its own soil. Emily and I also went to the Koala Gardens, where we had the opportunity to cuddle koalas! Our koala was named Chimby and she was pretty cute. She weighed about the same as a human baby of the same size I would say. We also hand-fed kangaroos which was cool. Next we went to Bird World. Basically it is this huge aviary that has TONS of big birds (parrots, cockatoos, etc) and a ton of other smaller parakeets and cool stuff. One of the birds landed on me, and I got a picture! There were also two cassowaries there, one of the most dangerous birds, and I was within 3 feet of them, which was really cool! They estimate there are only about 1500 left in the wild, and they may lose a bunch more with the latest cyclone passing by. The cyclones make all the fruit fall off trees, so the cassowaries are very well fed but then have a hard time finding food, and may venture into the towns looking for food and can get hit by cars. They actually will send helicopters to do food drops to make sure the cassowaries are OK. We also checked out the Venom Zoo, where this guy who developed it has a bunch of venomous spiders and snakes. I was intrigued to see the box jellyfish that our driver said was there but I didn’t see one. As we left the place, it started DOWNPOURING. Real rainforest rain! It was coming down pretty hard and we got soaked. The transportation up to Kuranda was provided by something called the Kuranda Skyrail. It is this big gondola type thing and our driver said that it was built by using helicopters only. Afraid of harming the wildlife, huge helicopters were brought in and the concrete for the poles, the carrying of the poles, and everything to construct this place was done via helicopter. The rainforest up there has been around since before the dinosaurs they have found out, and many of the plants there go way back. There was also a river and waterfall called the Barron Falls which was really cool to see, probably the biggest waterfall I have seen yet. After all of this stuff, we headed back to the hostel, and ate some dinner. Emily and I watched the movie “Freedom Writers” which is really good, made some guacamole, and went to bed.
2/20: Our last day not at school! Today, we went to Hartley’s Crocodile Park. Basically, this place was like a big zoo for crocodiles. They also had cassowaries and koalas and some lizards. This place was pretty cool: we were supposed to go kayaking but there was a crocodile in the jetty where the kayaks were supposed to go out, so it was cancelled. We got there around 10:50, and watched an awesome crocodile feed at 11:00. We also got to see the crocodile farm area. This place breeds crocodiles for their meat and for their skin: you can’t take wild crocodiles for these things, only ones bred in captivity. We also went out on a boat in a crocodile lagoon area where the crocodiles had more area to spread out. There was a snake show and a crocodile attack show, where the croc demonstrated death rolling some food and did some cool jumps for food. The koalas, that Emily and I named Bert and Ernie, were actually both females we found out. We got to pet the one that was named Paulita! Also, Emily and I got to feed the cassowaries which was cool. After the crocodile park, we came back to our hostel, made some quesadillas for dinner, and got all packed up and ready for bed, because our flight the next day was leaving at 5:20 a.m. for school!
Thanks for reading everybody! My blogs will turn into weekly updates from here, but feel free to email me!