Port Douglas Sunday Market and croc spotting

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Saturday 16th I worked in Calypso and I had to take out the certified divers that day. I had an Aussie couple from Melbourne and a French family who were living in the US. Nothing particular about that day and didn't do much in the evening, even though it was a Saturday night. I guess that working in these conditions, every day is pretty much the same and there's no real difference between a Tuesday and a Saturday, so going out during the weekends isn't a big deal; if I want to go out, I can do any day.



I had Sunday and Monday off, so plenty of time to relax. On Sunday morning I called home and then, at around 10am I took a bus to Macrossan St. because I wanted to see the Port Douglas Sunday Market which is held weekly at Anzac Park from 8am to around 1pm. People from the surrounding areas of Port Douglas come to sell all kinds of things like clothing, fruits and vegetables, souvenirs, jewelry, photographs, paintings, etc.; most of the things sold are home made. I walked around, took some photos and I ran into Melina there. We spent some time listening to a man play a harp (the music was very soothing) and then she went to meet with Anthony and I went to buy a couple of T-Shirts I had seen before. After I left the market, I went to the supermarket to restock my fridge and then took a bus back home.

At lunch time, Paul, our journalist neighbor who works for the local newspaper (The Gazzete) invited the three of us (Anthony, Melina and I) to drive up to Mowbray river (a 5 minute drive from the house) to take photos of the crocodiles that sunbathe during the low tide. The timing was perfect because when we got there, we saw 2 crocs sunbathing about 100 meters away (first time I've seen crocs in the wild, not caged up in a zoo!). We spent about 30 minutes there taking photos of them and got some really good shots. Then the 4 of us went to the Port Douglas yacht club to have a beer and then went home; it was a pretty good, chilled afternoon. At 6:30pm more or less, Jessie, an American girl who started working in Calypso a few days before, came to the house because she wanted to rent the spare room and Anthony and Melina wanted to meet her beforehand. We spent maybe an hour talking outside the house and then Melina took the time to show her around the house.

While we were talking outside, we heard a very distinctive sound of bells: the ice cream truck that shows up once a month with cheap homemade ice creams and of course, we couldn't pass on the opportunity.

At the end of the evening, Jessie got the room and she moved in the next day.



Monday morning I didn't do much, as well as for most of the rest of the day. In the evening, Bruce, Anthony, Jessie, Melina and I went fishing to the beach and I took that time to try a new setting I discovered about my camera that day: 30 minute long exposure photos (I got a new Nikon SLR in September, but haven't used it much and I'm still learning about it), so I took a tripod and tried it on the beach. We didn't actually catch any fish, but still the conversation was good and we had beer and wine. I got to play with the long exposure feature and think I did pretty well with some of the shots, so I was happy with that. We didn't go back home too late because we were all working the next day.



Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday I worked in Calypso. It was good to get back to work after 2 days of inactivity - don't get me wrong: 2 days off of not doing much is great, but there's no money going in. All five days were pretty standard work-wise.

I did have a few good dives during these days and I'll mention one that I did Saturday at a site called "Two Tone". I took 4 divers in this site and warned them before getting in the water that we had to do a bit of swimming before getting to the really good spot of the dive site. It takes about 10 minutes to get there and the last 3 minutes or so, there's a very strong current to be crossed, but once you get through it, the place opens up and it's really amazing. I saw a potato cod that day, as well as two big schools of barracudas, a grey shark (which is often spotted in that area) and about 3 or four white tip sharks. It was an excellent dive and the other divers were really stoked after getting back to the boat.



In the evenings, there were a few days that some of the people of the crew went to have a few beers after work at "Lure" (the usual place); it's certainly a good way to spend the crew tips of the day.



One more thing we did Friday evening: Bruce, Giselle, Jessie, Florence and I got together at 4 Mile Beach for a bonfire and stayed there at until 11:30pm more or less. We had beer and wine and I brought a brand of beer called "James Squire" and specifically, a pale ale called "150 lashes" (the story behind the 150 lashes here: http://www.jamessquire.com.au/blog/index.php/2011/09/14/news-from-the-brewery-september-2011/).



That's about it for this entry; nothing too exciting about work this week. Yesterday was the start of school holidays and apparently it's going to be super busy the next 3 or 4 weeks.

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Comments

[Andres]

saludos
Hola Dani, bueno saber de ti. Por aca tampoco nada muy exciting. Conn Pablo fuimos al estadio a ver a la U de Chile contra boca Juniors que empataron pero la U quedo elimindad de la copa libertadores. eran las semifinales. La Sofia quedo tb eliminda en debate. le toco ser contraria a que hidroaysen debia construirse y no les fue bien en esa postura. Este fin de semana está tranquilo y sin novedades. un abrazo andres