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Published: January 19th 2009
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After the rain, came the sun - no sooner had it finished lashing down the place was baking hot and with a humidity that makes it hard to breathe.
Booked a trip up to Daintree rainforest and Cape Tribulation. Drove up Captain Cook highway and stopped off for a quick sail down Daintree river to see some Crocs in their natural habitat - seen a Croc called Scarface, basically he ruled the land in a three mile radius and he looked mean. No feeding them here as it’s a bit too dangerous, he had a nice female croc just round the corner a little baby hanging off a branch. Was funny to see a 4 metre croc and then a little 2 foot one - you can just make out the little fella on one of the photos. Scarface will probably eat the baby croc if it’s a male though . . .
After the river went on up to Daintree rainforest where we had a good tour and some interesting facts from the guide - Daintree is the oldest rainforest in the world and spreads right down to the coastline, one of the trees we were shown is
600 years old and had a male and female plant - the male actually produces sperm and the female receives - mad! The guide picked up a green ant and explained that it detects the earths magnetic force and if it is going to rain it goes in a trance and faces either the north or south pole perfectly and then we seen a Bettong, half rat, half Kangaroo! This thing eats truffles and disperses them around the forest - the truffles then grow and wrap themselves round the roots of the trees - helping the trees to retain water. . .
Was a really good day and you can tell all the guides out here love their job and enjoy telling people all this interesting stuff. Got to PKs backpackers up in the forest and the rooms were basic - a hut with faulty air con. In the room with four German girls (each scarier than Scarface) and a Swiss guy called De'mion. Spent the evening playing pool with D and had a few beers. Night in the hut wasn't too good though - most of the animals in the forest are Nocturnal so you can imagine the
noise and with four sweaty Germans, me in my sleeping bag covered with a Mosquito net - beads of sweat were coming down my head.
Early morning went on a horse ride through the forest. First time I'd been a horse properly but the horses were well trained, great going through the forest and down through streams and some rough terrain. Made our way to Cape Trib beach and had a gallop down the beach, beach is pristine and the sea looks beautiful - only thing is you can't go for a swim in the sea due to all the jelly fish this time of year - they can kill you. Stopped off at a gorge and went for a swim there though, really and great after a good few hour’s riding - we only had to watch out for roaming Crocs! Did a few Canters with the horses and picked some good speed down the tracks - great fun!
Had lunch with a few people and got picked to move on to the town Port Douglas. Met a couple of good lads from Sydney - Si and Sam and had a quick bev with them Port D,
will try and meet up with them when I get back to Sydney. Stayed in a place called Port O Call and met some Americans in my room. Chris, Krista and Jeff are on a world tour and I ended up going out and having some tucker with them - was good swapping stories. As they are American they got off early so I stayed out in Port D to see what the vibe was like . . . was only sitting on my own for 5 mins before one of the locals came bouncing over like a Kangaroo - you on your own mate??? where ya from mate??? Got talking to this half aboriginal girl and discussing the history of the Aborigines and the problems they still have integrating over here. She introduced me to all her mates - big gang of bush fella's. Chatted with them for a while and they asked me to go on to a club but I was too tired and I stumbled back down a dark road with big things flying over my head into the trees and little birds with big massive beaks running in front of me . . good job
I was a bit drunk!
Spent the next day down four mile beach (which is actually six). Took me about two hours to get the courage to for a dip in the net enclosure on the beach. Read the jelly fish warnings on the beach about 10 times - water temp is 26c so was like taking a lukewarm bath . . .
Got picked up and headed back to Cairns Friday afternoon . . have a Great Barrier Reef trip booked for Saturday and flying down to Brisbane Sunday evening.
By the way it is the rainy season up in Northern Queensland this time of year - it averages 6 metres of rain a year!
PS - a few people have messaged me to say the pictures are small, if you click on the first one it opens a new screen and you can see them full size. There's also a slideshow option on there.
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Stephen Mitchell
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Alright Mate
Glad to see your having a wicked time. I've enjoyed your updates so far. :-)