Dreamtime Travellers Rest Cairns

Arrived in Cairns this morning - to a tropical storm - more rain... and my hot air balloon trip tomorrow is looking doubtful......

Yes.... my hot air balloon trip got cancelled late yesterday evening.... I was sort of half expecting it after all the rain yesterday and seemingly its been like this for the last week here in Cairns. Ah well - I'm disapointed as I was really looking forward to it and its unlikely to get reschueduled as its giving rain until Tuesday and then im out of here on wednesday. So I booked a trip up to Kuranda which is a village set in the heart of the rainforest. The itinerary for the day was to sta...

Happy St Patrick's Day to you all from Down Under. Well St Patrick must have been looking down on me today as this was the first day since I arrived in Cairns that the rain has stopped and the sun has come out to play. It was a gorgeous day after two days and nights of constant rain. However, as I am constantly reminded, this is the wet season in Northern Australia and I am in the tropical rain forest region - so it is to be expected. So today I travelled up to Cape Tribulation, about 150km n...

I would have to say that today was probably one of the most amzing days of my life.... never mind this trip. Woke up to another clinker of a day - which the locals say is hard to get two really good days of sunshine at this time of the year especially after all the rain - and left 7am this morning to go on a proper sailing boat, with masts and sails and a captain and a first mate, to sail 2 hours out of Cairns to Green Island on the Great Barrier Reef. The boat was so cool, watching the sailo...

So, is been a while since I blogged anything here. Been to the Red Centre, seen the rock, and the other rocks, and the canyon. It was great fun, although very hot (up to 45C) ad lots of flies which are more than a little annoying (I dont really understand why they all live out there). Flew into Cairns, the change in landscape is incredible, from red desert to green rainforest in only a coule of hours! Cairns is nice, fairly small (130,000 people) but very much geared towards tourism. I went d...

On the 8th June we caught the Greyhound up to Cairns. For the first few nights we stayed at 'Calypso', which was quite loud & didn't have any proper cooking facilities, as they expected you to buy food from their bar. First couple pf days in Cairns we spent looking around rown, the Esplanade & shops. Cairns doesn't have a beach as such. but has a nice man-made lagoon. We decided to rent a car for several days to see all the sights around cairns. On our first day with the car we drove ...

When imagining Australia, I suspect most people think of heat and beaches, with maybe a kangaroo bouncing around in the background or a koala getting stoned somewhere. But timing is everything and when Chelone (my brother) & I met up in Cairns, we were in for a shock - rain, lots of it! It had already been raining for 30 days and 30 nights, and after we landed it rained some more. By the time we left 2/3rds of the state were an official disaster zone and all roads to Brisbane were flooded...

Ok, the posts are going to be noticeably shorter from here on in so you can all breathe a sigh of relief! We emerged from the internet cafe in Townsville in time to see some of the City's Sunday market - plenty of stalls covered in crafty, sparkly tat and edibles. We'd had a bit of a cock up with our Greyhound passes - we'd run out of kilometres because we'd strayed off the 'Bruce' highway - but it was all sorted and after a bit of a delay we left for Cairns. On the bus we enjoyed 'the Chambe...

Arrived in Cairns on Monday after two days in the sky...the journey not so bad at all thanks to Tynemol PM..the Yanks know how to knock themselves out properly.. Got picked up at the airport and brought to the first hostel - Dreamtime...so nice, very quiet hostel and we'd a private room..It was scorchio when I arrived and so started my daily sweats..attractive..Had all these intentions of going exploring before the girls arrived but my bed was too tempting and I passed out for most of the aft...

I have had a week in Cairns - decided I needed time to relax after a hectic 3 weeks! I have spent quite a bit of time chilling out down at the esplanade, and swimming in the massive lagoon. I have also done a couple of trips: Did a day trip to the Great Barrier Reef and Green Island, which was great. It was a perfect day - not a cloud in the sky and very little wind. Apparently the water temperature was 25 degrees, but I still needed a wetsuit, being the wimp that I am! Also took a trip to th...