Our time in Cairns

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Working at the Green Ant Cantina

After a week of being in Cairns, me and Daniel both got jobs at the Green Ant Cantina which is the best Mexican in Cairns. I’ve been working as a waitress and Dan as a kitchenhand. Our time at the Green Ant has been great. 18 weeks has gone so quickly and we’ve made some great friends whilst we’ve been here.
Our manager Lisa is originally from Huddersfield and moved to Australia 4 years ago. She said she only employed us because we’re Northern and since we’ve been here her accent has become stronger and the Aussies have been struggling to understand our conversations. We spend a lot of time out of work together and she’s been a bit of a tourist guide for us both. She drove us on our trip to Port Douglas, Mossman Gorge and the other beaches.
Dan has become good mates with the chef, Kye. They’ve spent a lot of time arguing about BBQ’s, we thinks coal bbqs are far better than the Aussie bbqs which are basically outdoor ovens. The arguments got so serious that Kye invited us and a few of his friends to his house to show us how good their bbqs really are. We had tonnes of food including kangaroo, obviously. The food was amazing, the least you expect from a chef BUT we stood our ground, you just can’t beat the charred flavour you get from coals.
We all go out on regular nights out to the biggest club in Cairns, Gilligans which usually end up back at our flat. A few times, the owner Alex, has ended up passed out in one of the spare bedrooms.
Working at the Green Ant has meant that we’ve got a lot of trips for free or for discounted prices. For such a small place there have been tonnes to do which has helped us to really enjoy our 18 weeks here.

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Green Island - 19th June

We were up early to set of to Green Island, the trip Kim won by selling the most cocktails at work. The flat was freezing so still shivering we made it down to the reef fleet terminal to sign in for the trip.
Once we'd arrived we went straight in to snorkell, having hired an underwater camera we wanted to take full advantage of this and get as many pictures as possible. So off we went wetsuited up with masks and fins on dropped under the water and it was full of jellyfish, I. SHIT. MYSELF. having been stung before im not up for it again so we got out of the sea toot sweet. After calming down we ended up talking to an old lady who said they dont sting but still abit worried we walked around the island to a sheltered part of the beach and did some snorkelling safe away from jellyfish. It was pretty cool but the reef just wasn't as impressive as it was near the jetty. So we had lunch while we psyched ourselves up for the jellyfish. The reef was amazing when we got out and ignored the jellyfish, there was plenty to see including an absolutely massive moray eel which seemed to go on forever, I pointed this out to Kim who proceeded to scream through the tube of her snorkel and then take of faster than i've ever seen anyone swim. We carried on snorkelling for abit longer seeing huge clams and starfish as well as loads of other fish. The full albumn is on facebook;

We'd been snorkelling for hours by now so we retreated to the beach to dry off in time for the boat home.

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On the Wallaby - 3rd June

We were up early as today we are going 'On the wallaby', thanks to the green ant we get this trip for free! So to summarise it's a full day of looking at stunning waterfalls, placid lakes and rainforests.
The first stop was at the cathedral fig tree, looking like it's come straight out of Avatar. It's not an actual tree but more a plant that takes over the host tree and blocks out all of it's light. Once the tree inside dies the fig has enough roots and strength to stand on it's own, you can walk into the middle of this one and look straight up, it's name comes from the branches looking like an organ in a cathedral.
Our next stop was Millaa Millaa falls, this is one of the most visited spots in the tablelands due to it appearing in many commercials and promotional videos (as well as peter andre's mysterious girl video), we did a rainforest walk and saw the infamous stining tree, it can still irritate your skin up to 18 months after it originally stung you. ow! we kept well away. Whilst listening in I relised that a leech had clung to my ankle, it was only little but was growing by the second!
For lunch we stopped at the really peaceful lake Eacham that had little turtles in it, they are the only species of turtly that alternate their legs when they swim, so 1 front fin and 1 back fin at the same time instead of both front then both back.
Another waterfall we visited was Dinner falls this is a collection of waterfalls that carries on down stream a long way, around the corner there is a huge crater that no one quite knows how far it goes or where the bottom resurfaces.
We visited several lookout's on the trip and all of them had spectacular views that went on for miles. We slept the whole way home, absolutley nacked.

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Port Douglas road trip - 14th July

We'd been planning this trip for weeks but everytime we all get a day off together some one gets asked to work or something and we have to cancel, but finally on the 14 of July we were off!
A bit of a problem to start the day though, Me and Kim were up and at thrifty for 8a.m. but our card wasn't right for hiring the car so we had to wait for our travel buddies Lisa and Amy. Lisa is always late and today she made it a record of an hour, so after pissing about we were finally off and on our way to Port Douglas.
The drive there is rated as one of the best in the world and you can see why, windy roads trapped between the rainforest and long sandy beaches, unfortunately for us the weather was overcast and the forest had all been burnt to stop bush fires, so not exactly as good a drive as we'd of hoped.
Port Douglas is a little town with a 4 mile long beach, and after a look around and a bit of shooping was done we had lunch and went up to the lookout to get a good view of the whole of the cleverly named 4 mile beach. There was a statue type thing that had distances to cities around the globe, 15,050km to london which according to Amy wasnt very far until she discovered the world is only 19,000 km.
After Port Douglas we went to Mossman gorge, a huge river bed filled with enormous boulders and between rapids there are huge deep pools that you can swim in, although you'd have to be brave, it's baltic that water.
On the drive home we chilled out at a beach for an hour or so, taking in the view and getting a few photos.

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