Our world tour Part 2

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Monday March 13, 2017

Going on tours is great and I love to go on them, but here in Australia there is a slight drawback to them: they start on ungodly hours. Today we had to get up before 6.00 AM, run to get breakfast and run to get on the bus. When you are just a little late, a couple of minutes, as was the case today due to the fact that I left the voucher in our room, we were frowned upon. The reason for the treatment is that everything here works clockwork and since we were picking up people at different hotels in the city, at specified hours, small delays mount to larger delays and things do not run on time.

After picking up people in several hotels, we drove to the Daintree River, home of Australian crocodiles. During the trip we are shown for the first time since arriving a local animal: the wallaby, a small cangaroo. There are hordes of them, but they are too faraway to take a picture.

Our cruise on the river, although very pleasant, nevertheless did not show us what we came for. What we saw were anumber of very minor crocodiles sitting on logs in the water. Well, anything is better than nothing!!

After the cruise we continued to the Alexandra Lookout, which gives a beautiful view of the Daintree River, Snapper Island and the Coral See, where we had lunch. True to mention, everything here is very well prepared and food is really good.

After lunch we continued to Cape Tribulation, were we walked on the beach straight out of the rainforest and fringed by coral reefs (Kulki Lookout). Exceptional to see how the 3 elements ( beach, rainforest and reef) come together in one place. The Tourguide tells you that there is no other place in the world where the rainforest is next to the beach. He obviously has never been to Venezuela, where this is the situation in a large part of the coast close to Cata, Puerto Colombia, etc.

The scenary here reminds us much of Venezuela, in particular the road from Caracas to Valencia with a mountain range on the one hand and sugar cane fields on the other. Here everything nevertheless is much better organized and maintained.

The area around Cairns (pronounced as Cans) is tropical, and I have been to many tropical places in different continents of the world, but have never seen a more organized and developed area as this one. A great example how things can been done.

On the return journey we visited the Mossman Gorge Gateway Centre and saw a presentation by the traditional owners of the gorge, the Kuku Yulanji people, he is a shaman and showed us natural paints and medicines, he's name is Mook and he was invited to Germany to give talks.

The presentation was followed by a walk in the rainforest. Nice, but for people such as us, that have walked in other rainforests, this one looked too organized and slightly artificial; not that the forest looked artificial, but the paths and bridges are all made of concrete and steel. Possibly better, you lose less people this way.

The trip back takes us over 1.30 hours and we arrive back at our hotel at around 6.00PM. Afull day of activity and we are done for for the day.

We have a great dinner at one of the best restaurants in town "Dundees".

Curious note: Australians go to dinner early and restaurants close early. We had a reservation at Dundees at 8.30PM, but were the last to leave the place. At 9.30 PM tables were being cleared and everything readied for closure. Not something we are accustomed to.

Note: photos to follow.

Note from Margarita, who is reading this, give feedback,it's nice to hear something!!!

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