Easter Break in Cairns

First Day: Sunday

Mom and I woke up at the crack of dawn (aka 4:45am) and caught our train and bus up to Sydney and made our way to the airport. Our flight was set to depart at 9:05am and we were at the airport about an hour early. We had breakfast at a café and then looked around in the shops before getting to our gate. We were supposed to begin boarding at 8:45am but that time came and went. 9:00am came and went. Finally, my mom decided to inquire at the front desk about the delay (which was unannounced). It turns out that day light savings time was the night before. In Canada when we “Spring Ahead” an hour, Australia turns back the clocks an hour. So, we were an hour earlier than we needed to be – and we lost an extra hour of sleep. But we caught our flight just fine. We flew with Qantas (the Australian airline which has a kangaroo on the plane tails). Our in flight movie was “It’s Complicated” starring Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin. Mom and I both loved the movie. Closer to the end of the flight, Qantas played a promotional video for some of the popular tourist attractions in Cairns – it included some of the activities that Mom and I were set to take part in! Upon landing, we realized that the weather was less than agreeable. It was pouring rain, a trend that would continue for three more days, but it was extremely warm and humid. We grabbed a shuttle from the airport to our hotel, the Tropical Queenslander, and checked in. Our room is actually quite nice: it has a large washroom with a bathtub shower combination and a lot of counter space. I have become used to our small and unfortunate bathroom back at Campus East, so this was a pleasant surprise. We have our own kitchenette with all the utensils and appliances to make a good feed every day. We also have a large countertop and a small table for two. There is one queen sized bed and two single sized beds covered in tropical sea themed duvets. (Tacky, yet endearing.) We decided to get some groceries from the local grocery store (IGA) which also allowed us to see a bit of the area. We walked along Sheridan Street – a street with a lot of different buildings and establishments. There are a handful of other hotels, some shops, an internet café, an antiques store (specializing in goods from the 1960’s to 1980’s!) a school, car dealerships and a few different grocers. We bought some pasta, rice, asparagus, snacks and milk from IGA and headed back to our room for a decent feed (finally!). Mom made me penne and pasta sauce with parmesan cheese – something I have been craving since I arrived. After dinner we watched a bit of TV and by 7:30pm, both of us had fallen asleep. It was a long, rainy and boring day.

Second Day: Monday

On our second day in Cairns we both hoped for better weather. We woke up at around 8:00am that morning feeling well rested after a twelve-hour sleep. After a delicious brekky of fried eggs (over-easy) and toast, we decided to go for a walk on the Esplanade. The esplanade is a long walk-way which stretches along the beach and leads to the Marlin and a lot of the shops. The skies were overcast but it would not start raining until later, so we were able to enjoy the beach strip and the views it had to offer. The mountains along the coast looked beautiful because they were covered in mist and clouds. You could watch the catamarans and the other boats leaving the “fingers” in the Marlin heading out for the Great Barrier Reef. We continued on the esplanade until we hit the marlin and then decided to check out some of the shops. We shopped around for a good few hours, and sat down for a feed at a pub. I had crumbed prawns (shrimp) with salad and French fries and mom had a burger with fries. Afterwards, we ducked into the Cairns Historical Society Museum that contained the history of Cairns. It held everything from the Gold Rush, to old teaching materials, aboriginal weaponry and art, telephones, airplanes, refrigerators, washing machines, Chinese urns and a python skin. One of the curators struck up a conversation about Canada and his experiences overseas with us. We got to talking about all the things Canadian and Australian. He told us about a snake on his lawn that at a poisonous frog and died. Apparently, these frogs are a curse on the Australian landscape and the native animals and reptilians. When they are threatened, the frogs spit poison out of their skin – and that is what happened in the instance with the snake. When the snake swallowed the frog, it spit the poison from its skin while the snake was attempting to digest. It is sad in a way. The curator’s wife is terrified of snakes and nearly fainted when he brought her out to the front lawn to see what happened. And yet, she gardens every day. Not long after we left the museum, it started to rain – again. We quickly walked back to the hotel hiding under a tiny umbrella and getting absolutely drenched on the way. When we got back to the hotel and dried off, we had some dinner and watched television until we went to sleep.

Third Day: Tuesday

Today, the real vacation was set to begin. I booked a day of snorkeling on the Reef. The weather did not look too promising, but often the weather on the ocean is much nicer than the weather on the shore. We made it to the marlin at 8:30 and checked in on our catamaran where we were given our safety instructions and the itinerary for the day. The drive out to the reef took an hour and a half. Unfortunately, the wind was fierce causing the water to be extremely choppy. The boat ride was nauseating to say the least causing many of the passengers to be ill. Though they sold ginger tablets to quell the nausea it did not work. I took the ginger tablets but I ended up getting sick in the garbage can right next to me. Thankfully, it was right next to me – because the “Just in Case” bags were too far away and I could not wait. Though I was the first person to get sick on the upper deck, I was certainly not the last. Some of the passengers were part of a cruise or a multi-day reef excursion. One of the young girls who got sick was questioning whether she wanted to continue on her multi-day reef excursion. The seasickness did not end when the boat anchored on the reef. Many of the passengers opted out of snorkeling or scuba diving because they simply could not stand up. Mom and I gave it a try because we were told that getting in the water would make the nausea subside. We suited up in our wetsuits flippers, snorkel and goggles and jumped in. At first I felt like a million dollars – swimming around with coral, anemones and an abundance of fish – certainly distracted me from my upset stomach. I was able to take many photos of the underwater world that exists on the reef and even a video of some of the scuba divers. The waves became too much for my mom and I so we made our way back to the catamaran. The tightness of the wetsuit irritated my stomach and so we stripped down to our swimmers and got some lunch. My nausea returned full force not long after we returned to the catamaran and so I resorted to sleep. I slept for most of the afternoon and many of the passengers made their way back to the boat as well for an afternoon siesta. At about 1:00 we moved from our starting point on the reef to a place called Turtle Bay. Mom and I decided to stay on the catamaran and not go back into the water. We saw a pontoon that I assume is Reef World – a sort of accommodation on the reef – and heaps of other catamarans and boats. Over the side of the boat, we spotted a small blue bottle jellyfish and roughly ten minutes later we heard screaming coming from the side of the boat where the jellyfish was floating. An older woman was stung across the neck by the jellyfish. A younger girl was also stung around her neck at some point during the trip as well. She had just suited up and jumped in the water when it stung her. Ultimately, I am glad that I had seasickness and not a sting from a jellyfish.
We met some interesting people on the catamaran who were also feeling ill: a young girl who was also on exchange from New Jersey and attending a Music Conservatory in Sydney, a family from Melbourne, and two couples from Mexico. When we started toward the coast, it started to pour rain. And, because we were out on the sundeck at the top – we got soaked. I was in the corner underneath a part of the roof but unfortunately, this did not help a bit. We would have made our way downstairs but we were not allowed because some of the passengers were being transferred between our boat and another cruise ship. Until they were all off our boat, we could not go downstairs and into shelter. Once we were downstairs and out of the rain – we were both thoroughly soaked. I passed out on a bag of dirty laundry on the way back to the shore – but I had a nice conversation about tattoos with an Irishman (his wife is from Montreal!). After we left the boat, I felt nauseous for the rest of the evening. I do not have sea legs.

Fourth Day: Wednesday

By the time Wednesday hit, we could only hope for an overcast day. When we opened our curtains the sun was shining and there were very few clouds in the skies. Our shuttle picked us up at 10:25am and after a few more pick-ups, he dropped us off at the foot of the rainforest. On the way he explained to us the history of the Skyrail and some of the history of the area. We drove past fields of sugar cane – it will be harvested in a few months time and exported. (I cannot remember the exact figure, but somewhere in the neighborhood of 22 million tons of sugar cane will be exported later this year).
Skyrail itself is an ecological way to explore the rainforest with zero impact to the environment. Your group boards a gondola that is attached to a wire that brings you up and over the rainforest. The Skyrail is 7.5km long and was completed in 1995 after one year of construction. The first station that we stopped at is the Red Peak Station and it sits at 545m above sea level (the highest point on the Skyrail). When you get to the first station, you disembark your gondola to take a walk around the boardwalk through the rainforest to see some of the native plant life. According to the pamphlet, some of the plants that can be seen from the boardwalk include Cycad, Elkorn, Staghorn, Bird’s Nest Fern, Kauri Pine, Banyan, and Alexandra Palm. The second station is the Barron Falls Station that overlooks a waterfall and the large Barron River. Our final destination is Kuranda: the village in the rainforest. This is a village that was created by hippies filled with markets, café’s, art galleries, a butterfly sanctuary, Bird World, a scenic railway station, Koala Gardens, and a Conservation Park. Basically – it is my vision of a perfect village. There are sculptures and murals down every street. The sidewalks are tiled, and lined with hippies, dogs, and friendly Australians. Those who run the markets are local artists and hippies. They make their products locally and with organic material. Unfortunately, we only had about an hour and a half to explore the village before we had to get back on the Skyrail and head back to Cairns. On our way up, mom and I had a gondola to ourselves, but on the way back we shared it with a friendly couple from the UK.
When we got back to the hotel, we decided to make the most of the sunny day and use our hotel pool to cool off. We had the pool to ourselves for the first few minutes until two young girls and their mom came to use the pool as well. We quickly found out that they were from Sweden and were traveling up the East coast of Australia. They did not stay long though, and once again, we were alone. Mom and I took pictures of ourselves underwater with my camera and then turned in.




Day Five: Thursday

This morning mom and I caught the bus in the rain to Cairns Tropical Zoo. When we arrived we bought rain pouches to stay dry and then went to feed the pelicans. There were three pelicans in the pond: Peter and his two girlfriends Penny and Petra. Also in the pond were a number of turtles. The zoo keeper came over and gave us some dead fish to throw to the pelicans. It was disgusting but a lot of fun. Pelicans have to eat fish headfirst because the fish in their diet have spikes along their backs and if they went down the wrong way they would cut up the pelicans’ throats. After we fed the pelicans, we went to the tropical bird exhibit and saw birds like the Brolga. Next, we moved to the Cassowary pen. I read up on the Cassowary before I came to Australia and as a result, I knew how dangerous they were. What I did not realize was that the Cassowary is an enormous bird – nearly the same size as an Emu, but it looks more like an evil turkey with a very large red wattle and covered in black feathers. These birds are very territorial and will eviscerate anything that threatens their territory. They have two long legs with enormous feet and their middle toe has a large (and terrifying) claw. As an attack the Cassowary will lunge at its prey, and, using its claws, will slash open the belly causing the innards to become out-ards. All of this knowledge came flooding back to me when I was less than a meter away from the cassowary. We did not linger too long, but we stayed long enough to get a video of the cassowary communicating with its mate. (Think gagging and vibrating while puffing up its feathers.) From here, we went to the Free Flight Bird show where we learned about owls, cockatoos, magpie’s and eagles. The show was unfortunately cut short due to the heavy rain. We then saw Madagascan ring-tailed lemurs and even a dingo! I pictured dingoes to be more “wild” and angry looking, however, they look like a cross between a wolf and a dog. The dingo pen was right next to the cassowaries – and these two birds kept the dingo mesmerized. He kept has back to us the entire time. We then walked through another bird exhibit that led to the kangaroos! We were led into an open pen with kangaroos all about. We bought some kangaroo food for $1.00 and were able to approach the kangaroos to feed and pet them. We saw one kangaroo with a Joey in its pouch. Kangaroos are actually very soft and the ones at this particular zoo were quite docile and relaxed. From the kangaroo pen the path led to the crocodile exhibit. (I will come back to this in a little while). The photography booth opened up just after we exited the crocodile exhibit. I paid to cuddle a black headed python and a baby Estuarine crocodile who were estimated to be six years old and three years old, respectively! The snake came first – and I was terrified! When the snake was placed around my neck, he kept wriggling away and nearly falling off – the zookeeper had to reset the snake three times before we were able to get a photograph. I was just happy that he did not lunge at my face and bite me. The snake had a very weird feeling – he was not slimy at all. The zookeeper said that this is actually a common misconception about reptiles: generally, none of them are slimy. The snake’s skin was quite smooth and I could feel all of his slow and creepy movements. After that photograph was finished, I held the baby crocodile. They had taped his mouth shut so there was nothing to worry about! I placed one hand around his neck and the other around the bottom of his torso, just before his tail. His skin felt very similar to the snake’s skin but his movements were stronger and quicker. After my photograph with the crocodile my mom came in the frame to get her photo taken. As she walked over the croc moved his whole body to watch Mom’s every move. It was actually a neat sensation – I probably should have been frightened, but I was thankful that it was not the snake – crocodiles are a piece of cake. We then ate lunch – I had Belgian waffles topped with strawberry ice cream, whipped cream and fruit salad. Mom had a ham baguette with chips. Delicious! We ate in the cafeteria, which was surrounded by different animals. There were pythons in tanks, a koala exhibit, and a cage with cotton-top Tamarin monkeys. These monkey’s were extremely tiny, lively, and adorable! They made tiny little squeaking noises when we got close to them. I immediately fell in love. But, we could not stay there forever. And after lunch as we were approaching the red panda exhibit, we encountered a stray peacock walking about. We knew it was a male because he had a beautiful plume full of vibrant blues and greens. The female peacock’s are brown and do not have the same coloring as the males. He let us get close to him to take photographs and overall he seemed to be quite used to the attention. We made it to the red panda (or firefox) exhibit where they had one red panda on display. I have always said that to have red hair is to be beautiful and lucky, and I now know this to be true. The red panda is one of the most beautiful, vibrant, and graceful animals I have ever seen. It is sad to think that they are extremely rare and endangered due to habitat destruction. We stayed for quite a while at the red panda exhibit enamored by this majestic animal. Right next to the panda were two Sulphur-crested cockatoos. The one cockatoo was quiet and content on his perch, but boy! – the other cockatoo was loud and boisterous because he wanted attention. As soon as we approached him he quieted down and gave us quite a show. He displayed the feathers on his head and spread his wings while turning in circles and walking up and down his perch. He was very happy to have the attention – and we were happy to give it. Next, we finally found the Emu pen. I have always wanted to see an Emu (and a cassowary, dingo, kangaroo…etc.) so this was a very exciting moment for me. We were able to get very close to the pen, and one particular emu was at the fence watching our every move. I found the resemblance between emus and cassowaries to be nearly uncanny (Not in their faces, but their movements and their body structures). From here we went to another show called More on Marsupials. There were two koalas and a wombat in this particular exhibit. The zoo has a breeding program and they were attempting to mate the two koalas named Romeo and Kyla. Romeo has had four girlfriends in the past and he successfully impregnated them all. During the show, the zookeeper explained how generally koalas hate being handled and Romeo could be extremely fussy when it comes to this, however, if the zookeeper lets Romeo be independent then he is content. For example, the zoo keeper did not take Romeo into her arms, he crawled down the branch and onto her instead. She carried him around the exhibit so that the audience could pet him and ask questions if we wanted. We learned that the strongest joint on a koala is his wrist joints and if they are picked up by any other place on their body their bones will break. We also learned that koalas sleep for twenty hours a day and use the other four hours to eat and potentially mate. Also, their lifestyle is their defense mechanism. It is because they sleep so often and rarely move that they avoid danger from predators. Such neat animals! Romeo went back into the tree afterwards, climbed above where Kyla was resting, and slowly made his way down to sit on top of her. This was his way of telling her to get out of his spot. (If that isn’t love…) The zookeeper tried to coax Bam-bam the wombat out of his log, but because these animals are nocturnal, she was unsuccessful. When the show concluded, we started back to the crocodile exhibit for the crocodile feeding. This zoo held upwards of fifteen crocodiles in separate ponds – most of them were pretty old and most of them were huge. Some of the crocs were two to a pond. The zookeepers who were feeding these two particular crocodiles in a pen explained to us all the different types of crocodiles and which ones are able to kill humans (and of course which ones are not). He talked a lot about conservation and how to avoid being attacked by a crocodile (which includes such advice as avoiding salt-water ways and watching for danger signs). The zookeepers feed the crocodile’s whole, skinned chickens and entice them out of the water in order to entertain the audience. Because it had been raining for sixteen straight days in Cairns, it had cooled down (relative to the usual climate since it was still 30+ degrees) and the crocodiles were reluctant to come out of the water. The larger male crocodile did come out of the water once and while he distracted the zookeeper, the smaller female crocodile snuck out of the water and tried to attack him. Fortunately, the zookeepers work in teams of two and he was prepared to deal with the situation. And although it was an intense scenario he dealt with it quickly and was making jokes all the while. During the feeding in the pond behind where my mom and I were standing there were two crocodiles mating. The raucous and loud nature of crocodile mating was extremely distracting for the audience. At the end of the day, we left the zoo and went to a place called Palm Cove. It is a tourist place with tons of upscale villas and resorts. It was on the waterfront near a heart shaped island and very remote from central Cairns. But, it was very quaint and peaceful. We had dinner here at an ocean side café where I had my first Veggie burger since my arrival in Australia. (It was delicious.) Mom had breakfast instead of dinner and afterwards we walked around and looked in some of the shops before heading back down to Cairns. We stopped in at a mall on the way back and looked in a few of the stores but because it was getting late, we left shortly after we arrived.

Day Six: Parasailing




Our parasailing adventure was booked for 8:50am on Friday morning. We left our hotel at 7:45am and walked along the Esplanade to the Marlin. We got to the B Finger Jetty a bit early so we grabbed a coffee and waited until our boat was ready. We met the crew – an entire two people, Steve the captain, and his assistant Sam. Sam was of Asian Descent and Steve was from Ireland but came to Australia nearly twenty years ago. Steve was playing around with rubber insects and spiders. He was planning to rig the parachute so that when it opened the insects will fall on those parasailing. He ended up giving the rubber toys names. Peter the Spider, Parker the Cockroach and Jake the Snake. He also told us that he was in the process of setting up a speaker system in the boat. He intends to play Flight of the Valkyrie when his passengers are floating away. Mid-way through our “flight” he stopped the boat and let us slowly drift down close to the water. (Thankfully, my mom brought up her non-water proof camera and so he would not let us submerge like he does to the rest of his passengers). Later he told us that he plans to play the Jaws theme song when he drops his passengers into the water. As we were parasailing, Sam took photos of us and they put them on a CD for us at the end of our excursion. Overall, the views were spectacular and I fell in love with parasailing. My mom on the other hand was terrified the entire time and did not enjoy it much. I would do it again in a heartbeat. By the time we finished parasailing it was getting very hot in Cairns and we decided to go swimming in the pool along the Esplanade. We took many underwater photos and felt very refreshed after a short dip. I got cold though and decided to lay out in the sun to warm up and mom took this opportunity to sunbathe since this was the first truly sunny day since we had been in Cairns. I began to feel ill from the sun almost straight away and so I moved into the shade and waited for mom to get sick of sunbathing. But I should have known better – she would have laid in the sun all day. I eventually coaxed her into going for lunch down by the Marlin. We ran into some of the girls from Campus East. Many people I know ended up vacationing in Cairns for the Easter Break. After lunch we decided to go back to our hotel and get cleaned up but the walk back to the hotel was long and hot so we went swimming in the hotel pool. After a quick dip I napped on the pool side reclining chair while mom continued to swim. Our hotel had two outdoor pools and she tried both of them that day. Afterwards, we showered and walked down to the Cairns Shopping Centre. While window-shopping we ran into one of the men who worked on the boat that took us to the Great Barrier Reef. He recognized and approached us and struck up a conversation about snorkeling. While I was getting sick on the boat he was looking after me and he noted that I am “a completely different person when I am on land.” He told me not to give up on snorkeling and scuba diving because there are places to do these activities that are closer to land and do not require an hour and a half boat ride. He seemed confident that one day I would get my sea legs though. The mall closed shortly after our conversation with our new friend and so we went over to the internet café before going out to dinner. Usually the internet café was not overly exciting with the exception of today. (The internet café doubles as a video store.) So, today while I was on the computer a bird flew into the window and then flew inside the video store smashing itself into walls and racks of movies. I was horrified. A man was unsuccessful in trying to catch the bird with his hat. The bird flew over to the computer area and I felt it fly past me. It ended up at my feet under my cubicle and it really upset me. It was still alive at this point, so the man with the hat brought it outside and it died. The woman who worked at the video store said that this had been happening all week and she did not know what caused the birds to become so disoriented. When we finished at the internet café we ate dinner at an Italian restaurant. We both had pasta and garlic bread – it was divine. We went back to the hotel, watched the movie Hope Springs, and went to sleep.

Day Seven: Mom’s Birthday

I intentionally did not plan anything for my mom’s birthday because I knew that she would want to sleep in and go shopping, and that is exactly what we did. We had been getting up early all week and so we designated Saturday as our sleep in day. We woke up at about 11:30am, had breakfast and then left to go shopping at the Cairns Shopping Centre with adequate time to shop today. We spent all afternoon going to different shops and I ended up purchasing a t-shirt, a dress and lots of jewelry. Mom got some more souvenirs and a bracelet for herself. We walked back to the hotel afterwards and got ready to go out for dinner. We decided to eat along the Esplanade and at the waterfront. We wanted to go to a place called The Waterside Restaurant but we ended up at a place called Dundee’s. Unfortunately, our dinner’s were not very enjoyable. Mom had her heart set on a steak and ordered one that came with a skewer of shrimp and mashed potatoes. I ordered seafood pasta containing shrimp, calamari, scallops and octopus. When our food was delivered, my mom got somebody else’s plate with sweet potatoes instead of mashed and shrimp on the side. She did not realize until later that the steak was rare. We brought the mistake to the attention of our server and the situation was rectified. I did not like my seafood pasta because it was not at all what I expected. It came with three huge octopi in the centre of the plate and the sauce had too much garlic in it. After we finished eating, one of the servers came to our table, sang my mom Happy Birthday in Brazilian, and translated the lyrics so we could understand what he was saying. It ended on a positive note to say the least. The next morning our flight was set to leave Cairns at 5:00am and so we packed up and went to sleep.