nedelja, 18. marec 2018

Cairns, Tropical paradise in Queensland

5,5 hours on the bus...it would be a shame if I didn't manage to put together a lousy blog post so here ya go...

Does anyone remember that time when I negotiated my east coast tour for about 500$...yup self high five right there...well the time has come and I hit the road...actually I hit the plane seat with my bum (and waaay more "hand luggage" than it's actually allowed haha) and flew to Cairns as my first of many stops along the East Coast. Between the last 8 straight working days, 6 of them being morning shifs and everyday evening farewell events you may have figured out that packing and organizing my sh*t was probably last on my to do list (which usually is not the case as I always pack everything a week in advance haha there's a first time for everything hey :D). I'm not even going to start talking about sleep deprivation...you know when you're really really tired, your brain is playing mind games with you and the next day you kind of don't really remember how things went on before going to bed? That was me on Tuesday before leaving. Thank goodness I at least packed everything I needed (probably even more, you know how girls are ;) ). Wednesday 6am, after 4hours of sleep, I was more or less ready to get on that plane and fly back to summer! Said bye to my roomies and took off. For sure my backpack weighed more than 7kg (had to pack stuff for NZ too!!) But luckily some Asians in front of me got called on the side for bag check...have I mentioned what an absolute lucky bastard I am some times?! No? Well it's out now. I am. :D got off the plane in Cairns and the tropical heat just hit me (of course I was wearing long jeans, long sleeved shirt...I mean, I had to put all heavy things on me instead of in my bag, right?!)
After a pretty expensive shuttle drive to my hostel I'm back in the "backpackers" life - long time no see mate but I haven't missed you one bit! The weather was absolutely amazing and after I changed into a more proper attire for a tropical summer (at some point, taking my skin off seemed like a very good idea...damn heat!), I was ready to rock and roll......kidding, went sunbathing at the waterfront of the Esplanade Lagoon. To my surprise, the hostel had free bbq and pizza nights alternating every second evening...how can you say no to free food? You don't, so you eat whatever they feed you. 
It's funny how I'm "on vacation" now, yet I literally won't have a day to sleep in. Besides the fact that my body clock is still on 5:30am work mode and an hour time difference, all the tours also start at approximately 7am...now do the math. But not complaining, you don't get to go to the Great Barrier Reef every day am I right?!?! :D speaking of which, that was also my firs tour. I booked a sailing trip with snorkeling and an introductory dive. To say the Reef was beyond anything I've ever seen before, is probably an understatement. At boarding, each passenger got a pair of fins, snorkeling set and stinger suits. It took us aroun an hour and a half of sailing to get to the outer reef. Time did fly by while we were listening to diving and safety instructions. Sun was out, the sky was blue and before I knew it, I was sitting on the bench all buckled up with a set of weighs around my waist and a huge oxygen bomb on my back. I have to say, firs time diving, I was a bit nervous...especially because the last time I was actually (free) diving at UNI, that did not feel very pleasant to my ears with equalizing. As you jump in the water you go through a minor panick stage (at least I did hahaha) before you realize you're actually completely fine and also...you can breathe under water...duuuh. relax, you're fine. we had to demonstrate some safety tasks at the first line before diving down to the second where you also had to equalize the pressure for the first time. So far so good. After another set of safety tasks the instructor, using hand signals, asked us if we're ready to go down. Hell yes, now or never. I took my gopro with me of course...and the funy thing was, when we got down to the bottom, the pressure squeezed it to a point where it turned on by itself and instead of taking a video it was taking photos and I couldn't turn it off hahahaha (no idea how deep we were but the camera is fine as it can go down to 10m without a case). Half hour dive and 1578 photos later....hahaha the water was a bit gloomy because of the cyclone that just went past this area a few days ago, but nevertheless, the experience was just priceless. Although I don't think I'll seek professional career in diving haha after I got saved out of all that heavy equipment, I had some time for snorkeling before lunch. Oh gosh, what an exciting world there is under water! fish, corals, sea stars, and yes I saw a shakr, a baby harmless one, but it was a shark! :D unfortunately no luck with turtles. Next time! After lunch, we sailed off to a different reef where we spent a couple of hours snorkeling again...wau, wau, wau. Speechless. We concluded the day with a lesson on marine life, the reef and the surrounding area being the rainforest. Oh how excited I was to get back to the hostel for pizza night...again, never say no to free food!!
My third day in Cairns was reserved for a trip even more to the north of Queensland - Daintree Rainforest and Cape Tribulation. First stop on the way was Mossman where we attended a traditional Aboriginal smoking ceremony, got "marked" as the tribe from this side of Daintree river and learnt a thing or two about their culture. Then we took a bus to Mossman george before driving all the way up to the middle of Daintree Rainforest, oldest continuously living rainforest in the world, literally older than dinosaurs. Mindfuck. We went on a boat tour on Daintree river, spotted some crocodiles sunbathing on the edges,  and we were fortunate enough to see a couple of days old baby crocks! Cuties. We also learnt that crocodiles don't eat smart people...and if you do get attacked/eaten by one......that's called natural selection. Sorrynotsorry. Throughout the whole drive we hoped to see some "crazy killer chickens on steroids" as our guide would call them...in other words we were hoping to spot a Cassowary (if you're not familiar with this animal, and above description doesn't stimulate your imagination, google and learn a bit about them and why you don't want to face them eye to eye hahaha). Lunch was already waiting for us when we got to Cape Tribulation, in the middle of a rainforest at a tiny camp site (no idea why anyone would want to sleep there surrounded by all those not so nice animals....). Anyways, Carl showed us a spider that knits the strongest web and how aggressively it attacks anything and everything that tuches his web thinking it's food. Pretty impressive, almost like me attacking my plate of food. :D There's one more thing Cape Trib has to offer...a stunning sandy beach where rainforest meets the ocean. But the water is infested with crocks so...if you don't want to be "naturally selected", take a photo and run away. But seriously how amazing is this place?!?!
Last thing on our agenda was a walk in the rainforest. Before entering the path, we had to listen to a "brief" Cassowary safety talk..."if he gets you with his claw, your intestines become outestines", "stay together as a group, huddle up and put me in the middle", "don't run, hide behind a tree or a meat shield (yes, he called a person a meat shield)" hahahahahaha very useful. You walk in the rainforest, thinking to yourself "whoa, this is amazng, sooo old omg" and then you realize "oh, of course, no wonder this has been untouched for so long, even the freaking plants are trying to kill you"...Carl again: "Australia needs to calm the fuck down", I agree mate, I agree! 
At the end of our trip with everyone still alive, all limbs attached, no insides out, this day was estimated as an absolute success. We hit the road back to Cairns...I don't think I have to emphasize that I was exhausted and oh so ready for bed.

I did my reef tour with Passions of Paradise and Cape Trib with Active Tropics...and just have to say how amazing, informative and absolutely hilarious all the tours itself and the guides were...especially Carl, not many people walk around the "killer" rainforest bare foot...he did, what a legend!! Definitely couldn't recommend them enough!!

Alright, three days in my east coast adventure and I've done so much already...I spent my last day in Cairns wandering around Botanical gardens where I went back to the rainforest. The weather was absolutely bonkers, almost 30 degrees outside before 9am, gosh. Chilled day ended up with a dip in Esplanade lagoon and a FREE bbq for backpackers hosted by a local church (?!?!)...I feel like the biggest lesson of this blog today is "never say no to free food" hahaha

Well it was time to pack up again and leave to the next destination...

Maybe just a few words on my spending money...Considering the fact that I pre booked and paid majority of my tour, I gave myself a budget of 500$ spending money...will I make it? I don't know...I guess we'll see?!?! At the moment...it's not looking very promising hahaha I'm going to try really hard (who are you kidding?? you're not, if they ask to pay 40$ to hold a koala, of course you're gonna do it!) - oh the daily battles of the "rational" and the "yolo" side of my brain. Which will win??? ...stay tuned :D


Sunny kisses from Down Under

D*


P.s. sorry for no photos post, I'm currently stranded on a deserted island (I'll be happy if this goes through at all!) haha so bare with me, photos will come but feel free to catch up with things on my Instagram @dasazagar!!**

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