"Let's see some fucking nature!"

18th December 2010 - Kuranda

Early on Saturday 18th we got up to go visit Kuranda, via the Scenic Railway and the Sky Rail . . . And since I know you're bad bloggies (that's my new name for you guys) I'll just assume you didn't read those wiki pages and I'll explain all those things to you.

We drove out to Redlynch, me driving one car and my uncle Paddy driving the other. Red Lynch is named after an Irish man who played a huge part in the construction of the railway in the 1880s. Thousands of Irish workers were employed in the construction of the railway which runs up into the Atherton tablelands and had to cut through forest and mountain to reach its destination, and offers so great fews of the rainforest and of Cairns from high up on the mountains.

You take the train/skyrail for the view, not convienence, you can drive there in about half the time the train takes, but the view is awesome from the train, and it's an experience. And, as my title may suggest, we're going to see some nature! So off we go then, shall we . . .

It was bloody hot on the train, even with all the windows open and while we enjoyed the view, I think we enjoyed getting off slightly more. It also didn't help that the train broke down once, or "stopped for operational reasons" as the announcer put it . . .

There was also the one scheduled stop, just over the Barron Gorge, where I got some half decent pictures.

Unfortunately it hadn't rained in awhile so the river is pretty low here (in a great irony, some time later, half the fucking country is underwater and I'm stuck in this part of Queensland until the flooding dies down).

There were plenty of other awesome photo opportunities but I won't post them all, don't worry. There's this one here of a waterfall and that's it for now.

We got off the train at the gorge and following a fifteen minute stop for photos and fresh boiling hot air, it was back into the even hotter train and onward to Kuranda, where we were tee shirt shopping, because there isn't a whole let else to do in the village. It's just a village.

I bought three tee shirts with various funny slogans but I'll keep them to myself - you can see me wearing them when I get home! Oh what a delightful treat that shall be! Aren't you just dying to see them?

We also bought some little doughballs covered in sugar from a very strange dutch man with a stall.

We finished up in the local "Irish" bar, which was the only bar as far as we could see and the non-drivers had a pint before we moved on to the Sky Rail for our way down.

The Sky Rail is a cable car that goes over the rainforest and back into Cairns, if the picture above didn't give that away. Space is limited so me, my dad and my uncle Fran took on car an the others got another. As it turns out, Fran *really* doesn't like heights. At first we thought he was messing, but actually, he was totally freaked out the entire time we were on the things.

Actually the thing was quite safe and comfortable and the view was just amazing! And I have the videos/pictures to prove it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5yFaGYodbM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CJUX_Us8G8

That's the Barron river again, coming out of the Barron Falls we mentioned earlier.

Anyway, bout half way up you stop and get off, go for a little walk round the rainforest. It's really cool in there, and there are guides who can give you a bit of a tour if you want. There's loads to see though it only takes about ten minutes to walk the short trail.

Then it's back on and after a minute or two we crest the top of the mountain range and start descending towards Cairns. Once you clear the trees, the view changes completely from endless forest to a huge open expanse, right out to the sea. You can see all of Cairns and it's surrounds and we could even pick out my uncle's beach and approximate street as we went down.

And as you come in for your landing, they insist on taking your photograph and then trying to sell it to you later on.

Actually, we were already in the station when this was taken, and the background is superimposed on the image. We bought one digital copy, which comes with a print out, so now I can make as many copies as I want! Yay!

So that was the very impressive Kuranda, next (over a week later) we headed out to Mossman Gorge but to be fair, it doesn't deserve it's own post so it's getting slapped in here. Oh the joys of being so very behind on my blog! Ah well, blame the shitty Australian internet, it takes so fucking long to upload videos and pictures!

28th December 2010 - Mossman Gorge

Two hours north of Cairns, not far past Port Douglas, there's a huge gorge, falled Mossman Gorge, because it's near the town of Mossman. One morning we elected to drive up here and have a little look at some nature, yet again. In case you were wondering, the titular quote of this post belongs too Kevin, the young American from Chaing Mai, who kept on telling us all how much he wanted to see some fucking nature!

It's in the Daintree Rainforest, which actually is probably the same rainforest as Kuranda and the one where I went rafting down in Tully.

Anyway, huge big gorge, lots of water, but unfortunately I didn't bring either contact lenses or swimming stuff, so I couldn't swim. But it was still pretty cool to see. It's pretty hard to explain the scale because it all becomes pretty meaningless. It's like this right, you could totally die here if something went wrong in the water. See the man in the picture. He's small. The river is big, not far away.

After that we went back to Port Douglas and went up to the view point but because it was raining a misty the view wasn't at all great of Four Mile beach. There was this cool dial though, which shows you in which direction everything is from that spot. How it's helpful I have no idea, but silence - I'll have no neigh-sayers amongst my bloggies!

So eventually we piled back in the car and headed off back home, along a twisting and turning road that should really consider lowering it's speed limit!

So that's nature dudes, hope you enjoyed another random ramble from Shane . . . see you next time (or in about as long as it takes you to scroll to the next blog, if that's what you're planning on doing) . . .

Shane.