Friday, March 13
This morning, we are off on a scenic tour of the rainforest and Kuranda village. I'll have more to tell and show you later, but in the meantime, the bush fires in Victoria state, north of Melbourne, are now out as that area has had a couple of days of steady rain. You may have heard about Cyclone Hamish, which started late last week off the north eastern coast of Australia and was heading south towards Cairns. Hmmm. Just as we were getting ready to fly up to Cairns. Needless to say, we kept a close eye on the news. At its peak, Hamish became a category 5 cyclone (hurricane), but fortunately it decided to run parallel to the coast a couple of hundred kilometres out to sea, so apart from some high winds and a powerful surf, it didn't do much direct damage. By the time we flew up here on Monday, it was well south of us towards Brisbane.
Unfortunately, though, there was a ship carrying crude oil and ammonium nitrate that ran aground during the storm off thecoast north of Brisbane. Now there's a huge oil slick washing up on the beaches along the Gold Coast. They certainly seem to be having their fair share of disasters down here! Fortunately we've not been in the middle of any of them. Well,it's time to catch the tour bus, so I'll report back in later.
...Later:
What a great tour! We started out from a little village called Freshwater, just north of Cairns, so
named because it was the place where fresh water was first discovered in the area. We caught a train up into the mountains to a village called Kuranda. The sights along the way were breathtaking.The train stopped about 2/3 of the way up at Barron Falls, where the Barron River falls over 250 metre cliffs into a gorge. Quite specatacular.
Then onwards up to the village of Kuranda, whose sole industry is tourism from the looks of things. Anyway, it's a rather picturesque spot with lots of little shops, a butterfly sanctuary, the Koala Gardens and the
Heritage Market. And, most importantly to us parched and weary travlers, a pub!After a pint and a bite to eat, we jumped on the cable car that took us back down the mountains through (actually, over) the rainforest. What a brilliant way to see it!
They took great care in building the cable car system in the late 1980's 
and early 90's. There were no roads built and the workers had to walk in. Materials were brought in by helicopter and any vegetation that needed to be moved to accomodate the pylons were transplanted as close nearby as possible. Their aim was to leave as small a footprint as possible. I admire that greatly.
The cable car is the longest one in the world at 17km and takes about 40 minutes non-stop to complete the journey. However, there are two stations along the way and we stopped at both of them. The first is at Barron Falls again, this time across
the gorge from the railway station offering another spectacular view of the falls.
The second stop is called Red Peak and it offers a short boardwalk tour through some of the rainforest. The size of theferns is amazing! They're like trees.
And then it was down to the bus and back to our comfy resort where I am sitting in blessed air conditioning writing this.Tomorrow, we say goodbye to Cairns and fly down to Adelaide (via Melbourne for some strange reason) where we will be
touring the Barossa Valley wine country. I'll check in with you then (barring any more Internet access schmozzles, that is!).
Ta!
and early 90's. There were no roads built and the workers had to walk in. Materials were brought in by helicopter and any vegetation that needed to be moved to accomodate the pylons were transplanted as close nearby as possible. Their aim was to leave as small a footprint as possible. I admire that greatly.The cable car is the longest one in the world at 17km and takes about 40 minutes non-stop to complete the journey. However, there are two stations along the way and we stopped at both of them. The first is at Barron Falls again, this time across
the gorge from the railway station offering another spectacular view of the falls.The second stop is called Red Peak and it offers a short boardwalk tour through some of the rainforest. The size of theferns is amazing! They're like trees.
And then it was down to the bus and back to our comfy resort where I am sitting in blessed air conditioning writing this.Tomorrow, we say goodbye to Cairns and fly down to Adelaide (via Melbourne for some strange reason) where we will be
touring the Barossa Valley wine country. I'll check in with you then (barring any more Internet access schmozzles, that is!).Ta!
