Cairns

The bus to Cairns was an overnight one so I had a whole day in Airlie Beach to realise there wasn't much to do there. Jamie had left for Magnetic Island that morning. By the time 9pm had rolled around I was more than ready to leave. I slept fitfully most of the night and woke to drizzly rain in Cairns where I had been told there was sunshine. It was extremely early in the day but I called my prebooked hostel and waited for their bus to come pick me up. I would be staying in Cairns Asylum mainly because I'd had a good time in their sister hostel in Sydney when I was there. This one wasn't as good as the other though. I'd booked in and paid for 3 nights so I was there for that period at least. I was pretty tired from not getting much good sleep on the bus so I went back to bed for an hour. An hour later I was feeling a bit more refreshed and ready to look around Cairns. As it turns out there isn't a whole lot to see in Cairns itself. It poses as two things, one is a place to visit Cape Tribulation and the Great Barrier Reef from and the other is to drink a lot in the multitude of bars. The esplanade on the waterfront is nice but would have looked heaps better if I got to see it in sunshine. Most people don't spend a whole lot of time in Cairns as they hop from one tour to the next. My first day was pretty low key as I simply walked around the place and a fair bit of dossing. As part of staying in the Asylum I got a free meal in one of the bars, the only reason I would have gone as they are too damn expensive to drink in.

The next day wasn't a whole lot different from the first. I went looking for cheap things to do in or around Cairns but most things were going to send my budget out the window. Story of Australia so far really. I also looked at what I was going to do post-Cairns. At the time the plan was to do a relocation from Cairns to Melbourne. This would involve moving a camper van in super quick time so it could be rented out again. Most people arrive in Sydney or Melbourne and rent these things there then travel to places like Cairns and leave them there. So the companies need a cheap and quick way to get them back to the big cities. That's where people like me come in. I had been in touch with a company about doing just this and they told me to call back each day until something came up. That night in the hostel was pretty unremarkable. I made good use of the tv room and got an early night. I needed my energy for the next day as I had something planned!

On the Monday I went for a long walk down the esplanade in the direction of the Botanical Gardens. This was a good 4km so it was more exercise than id had in quite a while. It wasn't a particularly nice day for doing this but the weather didn't look like it was going to accommodate my wishes so I just ignored the drizzle. Plus the gardens were basically rainforest so when better to explore them than in the rain? Alongside the gardens were two ornamental lakes, one saltwater and one freshwater. Between all this I managed to spend a pretty pleasant day out there. I had lunch beside the saltwater lake and watched the little tortoises swimming around in the water. So I was in a good mood as the evening approached and this doubled as I would see a familiar face later – Jamie. I even got dinner cooked for me! We had a nice evening where we went for a walk and had a couple beers and generally just chilled.

The next morning Jamie was off to Cape Trib so I was on my own again. I was moving to a less crappy hostel which was cheaper, nicer and had free wifi. Then I got the news that a camper van was available and ready to go in the next two days. I spent most of the rest of the day online and on the phone as I discovered a slight hitch with this proposal. Well a few hitches, one of which was I had to drive nearly 3000km in 6 days but the bigger one was that I had to lay a big bond on my credit card. My card was maxed out and all the conversations in the world with my bank weren't going to change that anytime soon so I had to ditch the driving to Melbourne idea. That meant I needed to look at flights and I discovered a cheap deal leaving on Thursday. But to book it I needed a different card so I had to make a pleading call home for a loan. Luckily this turned out to not be a problem and I got my flight sorted. So my whole day had been spent stressing out and basically wasted. I had different ideas for the day but they got thrown out the window once this emergency occurred. I consoled myself by taking advantage of “Cheap Tuesday”. In Australia it seems that a lot of people get paid on a Wednesday so on Tuesdays they are a bit broke, hence “Cheap Tuesday” was born. I got a Dominoes pizza for dinner to console myself after a busy day.

Wednesday was going to be a much better day than the previous few. This is because I was off to the Great Barrier Reef to do some snorkeling. I did have to get up pretty freaking early so I could get to the marina by 7.15am and get on Ocean Freedom (the boat). This was going to be a little different to my Whitsunday trip as firstly the boat wasn't a sailing boat but like a cruise yacht thing. Secondly it was only for a day. Anyway we got on and got breakfast straight away and were off soon enough. Weather wasn't the best (sensing a pattern here?) but it did clear up slightly as we got out to sea. On the way to the first stop point we picked up the glass bottom boat which is basically moored near the reef. We reached our first snorkeling spot and changed into our wetsuits and snorkeling gear. Oh and I was wearing a life jacket as well, just in case. We had a big crew on the boat and some of them jumped in with us and acted as guides and offered info on a lot of the coral and fish that we could see in the water. That was a pretty cool thing to have because you do get a bit overwhelmed by the sheer diversity of the GB Reef. It was amazing to see all the fish swimming about oblivious to us on the surface and there were plenty of big as well as small fish. After a bit of snorkeling the glass bottomed boat was sent out and we got to see all the stuff we might have missed. All in all we covered that spot of the reef, known as Upolo Cay, pretty well. Then lunch got served and we fed bits of it to the batfish swimming near the boat. There big, crazy looking things but they do like prawns.

Pretty soon we were on our way again to our second snorkeling spot but in the mean time we had to wait for low tide as it only really becomes visible then. So as the tides changed we saw some sand islands appear out of the middle of the ocean as it seemed. We got as close as we could with the big boat and then we all jumped aboard the glass bottom boat to get shipped onto these new islands. It was really freaky standing on a pile of sand in the middle of the ocean with no other sign of land. Then the crew guided us around this little area which was really clear and shallow and home to even more fish and coral than the first spot if that's possible. The highlights were when a green sea turtle was spotted and of course when I found Nemo! It is so cool to see these things in the wild. After a lot of swimming around, mostly following cool fish, we got back on the big boat. Then we got treated to an adrenaline rush as we got taken out on the tender for a spin in small groups. This tender (dinghy) had a bigger engine than the one we had on the Whitsunday trip and so we were able to build up a fair bit of speed and do some sharp turning. It was great craic! Once we got back on the big boat we got tea and biscuits and headed back to shore.

Jamie was back from her trip that evening but like myself was quite tired from her exertions. We got some food and both had early nights but it wouldn't be the last time we saw each other. My flight to Melbourne just so happened to be on the same day as her flight to Melbourne. So once we got there we would have a few days to spend together before she went home to Scotland. Cairns as a whole didn't leave the greatest impression on me but I thoroughly enjoyed visiting the Great Barrier Reef and it was definitely worth going there simply to see that. Hell I'd go back again for another trip on the reef!