Unlike the buzz of Brissie or the quaint country charm of the Glass House Mountains, Cairns is centered in a tropical paradise – through its veins throb a lifeblood provided by tourism and a thousand backpackers – all of it centralized around little trendy bistros and cafes. It’s decorated with palms and the music is provided by the lorikeets that live in the mango trees. You can smell the pawpaw (passionfruit), pineapple and bananas, and everywhere you look, you see hectares of sugarcane. Did I mention the sunrise over the salt flats, where the sea birds and plovers catch their early morning breakfast? Of course, this is all bordered by the aquamarine of the Coral Sea. There is nothing like it in the world. Nothing.
By the way, this was the view from my room.
Day one in Cairns really was just an evening. We arrived pretty late. We walked around town and looked for a laundry. We had accumulated quite a bit and had intended to do it ourselves in the hotel. Having never stayed in a 5-star hotel, I guess we didn’t realize that they don’t have DIY laundry room…and I certainly wasn’t going to pay a maid 6 bucks/per to wash my undies and whatnot. We walked through the twists and turns of the bent grid of Cairns, finding a tiny laundry filled with backpackers and no coin machine. Drat! You know what that means? Hoof it back to the hotel. Except that we didn’t want to flip-flop it back, so we took a cabbie and went out to dinner instead.
We landed in the Waterbar Grill – a chic little steakhouse and bar. On the menu? Salt and pepper squid and garlic bread. A burger and chips for the main. But the salt and pepper squid … AMAZING!! I’m hungry just thinking about it! Think calamari…but better.
We didn’t spend much time out however. We had an early day exploring this little tropical paradise.
The beauty of Cairns is that no matter where you look, you see something beautiful. On our way to the Scenic Railway up to Kuranda, we had some morning tea and biscuits. A little fun fact for you: biscuits are really cookies.
Step one of our journey was to arrive by coach at the Scenic Railway station. From there we would begin our ascent up to Kuranda. After exploring Kuranda, we were to take the Skyrail back down the mountain range, high atop the tree canopy.
The train up to Kuranda took us through the heart of the rainforest. Every 15 meters we went forward, we also went up 1 meter in height – over amazing bridges and through various tunnels. Through the twists and turns of the track and all throughout our slow but steady ascent, there were spectacular views of the area – the Coral Sea all the way to the endless green of rainforest.
According to the locals, Kuranda was settled by hippies. Here people escaped common society to live together far up in the rainforest, living off the land, sharing their talents and helping each other survive, while entertaining tourists who ventured to visit this small rainforest town. Today, the town is still small, and can only be reached by the one road that goes to and from it. Of course there are several tourist shops, cafes and other attractions. The one we visited was the butterfly sanctuary. Once again, anyone that knows me knows that I adore butterflies. The amazing thing about this sanctuary was that there were so many exotic and beautiful butterflies. So many butterflies landed on us, drank us a bit and fluttered away. The Ulysses butterflies were everywhere. These are my favorite of all butterflies – the underside of their wings is brown and very moth like, but all the artwork occurs on the topside of the wings. There you see a stunning aqua, blue and purple iridescence that glimmers and shimmers as they flutter by. Most exciting was the Cairns bird wing butterfly unique for its bird wing-shaped wings (in case you couldn’t figure that out for yourself!) We spent quite a lot of time in the sanctuary, soaking in the quiet and the beauty in a meditative state. I love when butterflies land on me. They kept trying to drink Brian’s Steelers jersey and my blue tank top. I never get tired of butterflies and their magic. And yes, I pretty much expected to feel right at home in a town founded by hippies.
Anyway, on the descent down the mountain, we floated down on a sky-rail high above the tree line. At a few points we were permitted to get off the rail at a station and walk around a bit – we were able to see waterfalls, spiders, cockatoos, ancient trees and breathtaking landscapes.
It’s hard to explain what it feels like for me to be exposed to so much beauty all at once. There is this calm that washes over, coating me like a thick, golden honey that doesn’t wash off – it has soaked in and through and imprinted itself on me and my memory. I’ll take it with me where ever I go.
Xo
m
PS - we also went to Hartley's Crocodile Adventures - home of the "original" crocodile death roll show. Here's two shots of a croc leaping out of the water to eat some fish...by the way...these are NOT pet crocs or part of any zoo...these are wild crocs that the Hartley people bait off the shore to show us their intense power. When their jaws slam shut it is the most intense sound I've ever heard... 3000 pounds per square inch. Brian likened the sound to taking a cast iron lid and slamming it down perfectly on a cast iron pot. WHOMP! and there's no way to impress you with it. But just know that if you were a wallaby who bent down to take a cool drink from the river - up from a the water would leap a croc and it would clamp down on your head with such ferocity that you would be dead instantly ...which of course would be a good thing, because it would rip you to pieces, twist by twist. Crocs should be respected. End of story.
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