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Published: October 21st 2009
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After returning from Bali I had a few more days in Darwin. I spent one day at Litchfield Nat'l Park and on a Crocodile Cruise. Our tour left Darwin and drove south to the Adelaide River. Here we boarded a tiny little boat to spend some time up close and personal with some Crocs. We fed a few crocs, a White Bellied Sea Eagle, and some Kites. Amazing!! Some of the Crocs we fed were longer than the boat. Our guide attached a chunk of chicken to a stick and held it over the water until the crocs would jump for it. Crazy!! The crocs were coming 8ft out of the water!! Then we went into Litchfield Nat'l Park and stopped at and swam in a few watering holes and waterfalls. Beautiful and tons of fun! We saw and swam in Wangi Falls and Buley Rockhole and just took photos at Florence Falls. Wangi Falls is a lake fed by two waterfalls, but you can't swim at night because the fresh water crocs come up the river to feed. Haha, sounds a little crazy! Buley Rockhole was a really cool set of a bunch of pools fed by small waterfalls. Some
of the holes were deep enough to jump into. It was a great place to relax and have some fun!
One last night out on the town in Darwin and I was off to Cairns!
I arrived in Cairns at 8am (after leaving Darwin at 5am) and found a hostle, some lunch, and booked the next month of travel. It was great to have everything taken care of! The first night consisted of racing a fish to represent USA (I lost to Canada in the 1st round) then Jello Wrestling (to win $150!) Day two in Cairns I was picked up by Uncle Brian's tour and my tour guide Cousin Pete. We set off to Wooroonooran Nat'l Park, where our first stop was a jungle walk then a view of Boulder Gorge. I took a bunch of pictures but no swimming here, too dangerous. Our next stop was a another watering hole with a waterfall that ran down a smooth rock surface that we could slide down! The water was freezing though!! Then to Millaa Millaa Falls, the place where some famous Australian commercials are shot. We did our own version of the sexy hair/shampoo pictures! The last
swim of the day was at Eacham Lake, which is actually an extinct volcanic crater. We watched sunset while swimming in the warmer (but still cold) water. On our way home we stopped at Henrietta Creek to look for a platypus. I saw one; although it wasn't the best view of a platypus, now I can say I've seen one! (I saw a black outline of the platypus on the bank.)
Today is Bungy Jumping Day!!!!! I was picked up and drove into the forest to the largest building in Cairns. I did two jumps one just jumping forward and another one falling backwards... SCARY!!! I love the thrill!
Now on to the best part of my time in Cairns, and maybe the best part so far in Australia... Scuba Diving! After two days of classroom time and pool time we set off to Milln Reef, about 2.5 hours outside of Cairns. We got out to the reef about 10am and got to jump in the water at 10:45!! I was so excited!! We did our first two dives and had amazing visibility, 10-15m!! Two more dives the next day before noon and I am a certified Open
Water Diver!!!! Yay!!! Our first four dives were learning dives where we had to perform skills to prove we were competent under water, but most of the time was cruising along seeing amazing coral, angelfish, parrotfish, turtles, anenome, trumpetfish, lagoon rays, and so much more! Our next time that afternoon was the first dive that my dive buddy (Philip) and I got to do without a guide! A little scary but we were fine once we were underwater. Again, another amazing dive! Our last dive of the day was our night dive! We each had a torch (flashlight) strapped to our hands and a glow stick attached to our tanks. We in the water about 7pm and there were tons of Red Snapper Cod and a few sharks swimming around!! So freaking sweet!! There were three 1.5m Whitetip Reef Sharks swimming below us right when we jumped in! We swam around and found a massive sleeping green turtle under a rock ledge. It was probably about 8 ft long! Before we ascended we all kneeled on the floor and put our torches into our wet suits to hide all the light, then we waved our hands in the water and
tons of little luminescents lit up in front of us. When you aggrevate them they light up, awesome! Philip and I decide to get our Adventure certification so that we could go to 30m. We were up and in the water at 6:20am and off to the bottom... 29.3m! We swam along the bottom and watched as tons of little worms dissapear into the sand. Our guide showed us how much a water bottle shrank at 30m, very cool! We ascended back to around 18m and swam around so more and came up on a 2.0m sleeping Whitetip Reef Shark! We got within about 3m before it woke up and swam off! So awesome!! Philip and I had to take the next dive off, and did a snorkel instead. It was just as amazing, seeing so many animals! The skipper let us jump off the second level of the boat. I, of course, choose not to jump, but to flip! It was fun, but on my last one, I tried for a double, and landed a bit short bruising my tailbone for the next two weeks... Our last dive on the reef, Philip and I took a camera with us
to get some pretty good shots! Another sleeping shark! It was an amazing 3 days out on the reef and it was sad to have to leave. Three hours and we were back in Cairns and getting used to walking on a stable surface again. Everything felt like it was still rocking! Overall, our live-aboard boat trip was amazing! We had spectacular food, not to mention we got fed about 5 times a day and at least cake once a day, all the guides and crew were great, the beds were comfortable, beautiful sunsets and I met some great people. A spectacular time on the reef!
More photos at: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2330690&id=16912798&l=1e647808f4
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