Cairns: Good Times Capital of Australia

The Great Barrier Reef is no doubt the most well-known attraction in Cairns, but the list of stuff to do and see goes so much longer: beautiful camping "where the rainforest meets the reef" in Cape Tribulation, exceptional wildlife zoos and sanctuaries, forests with lakes and waterfalls, hiking, bunjy jumping, skydiving, hang gliding, mountain biking, fishing, sailing, parasailing, abseiling, all kinds of atv activities, whitewater rafting, horseback riding, and people who actually dance.

The surprisingly dangerous cassowary

Shops and cafes along the esplanade, which travels along the oceanside walkway

Great Barrier Reef diving

The Daintree Rainforest

Cairns is the tourism capital of Australia, and that's pretty obvious, but the town is small and feels closer to Santa Cruz than Miami.  It's not overwhelming, but there's a good amount of hippie culture here .  In the outback my tour guides were rough around the edges - here my guide through the Daintree rainforest played Hare Krishna music on the bus and "quizzed" us on facts with directed answers ("When was Australia first discovered?  60,000 years ago!  *Ding*, correct!").  People here are laid back and spend a lot of time in beachwear despite there being no true beach (only a man-made "lagoon" - remember: crocodiles).

A favorite Cairns moment of mine was seeing some guy in the grocery store (in a mall, no less) in nothing but a bathing suit.  No shoes, no shirt, no service is pretty standard, so I took a second look - it was one of my dive instructors :P

It's one of the few places where, after having left, I wish I would have bought a tourist shirt.  Because I do "heart" Cairns.

Camper van

Cape Tribulation

Not to mention it's gorgeous.

In short, I'm left wishing it were somehow a part of the US so I could make regular trips.



Tours I took in Cairns:

-Atherton tablelands waterfall and lake tour with Uncle Brian's.  Takes you as far as 2 hours outside of Cairns into the forest and then the rolling countryside.  The wit on this tour was unforgettable.

-Cape Tribulation and wildlife park tour north of Cairns into the Cape so-named after Captain Cook totaled his ship on the reef.  Very, very beautiful rainforest and nice, quiet stay in a cabin for a night.  No swimming - again, crocodiles - but beautiful hiking and pretty located on the beach.

-"Learn to Dive" 5 day course, 3 day live aboard on the Great Barrier Reef with Pro Dive Cairns.  Absolutely perfect - gorgeous reef, nice boat, great food, great people - and now I'm PADI certified for any future adventures :)

-Bunjy Jumping at the AJ Hackett tower- one of few purpose-built bungy jumping facilities in the world.  I never intended to go bunjy jumping, so why here?  100% safety rating and 15 years in operation, that's why.  And probably the best move towards conquering a fear of heights.


A message to you, domestically untraveled Aussies: you're seriously missing out if you've never been here.  Get on it!

Scuba Zen

Videos of my time in Cairns: (via my YouTube channel, MeChamaCisne)


General Scuba on the Barrier Reef: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UDHVn4PxU0

Playing with a giant fish: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0ZfRElE7gY

Reef Shark: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wc1SthZQSXU

Giant Clam: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSY3xg8yIc4

Bunjy Jump: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7jbaQHjg8Y





More fun with Aussie sayings:

There are a few sayings in the northern parts which I never heard much, if at all, while in Sydney:


"Mufti days" - casual dress days.  Used for both work and private school. 

"Pommes"   - possibly derogatory word for the Brittish - usually ex-pats.  An Aussie told me this term was short for "pomegranates" - the color that Brits come after coming here and being out in the sun.  A Brittish person told me that no, this was derived from some old reference to the Brittish ships bringing over potatoes, which are "pommes" in French.   Hmmmmmm.

"Bugger that" - As in, "Take the bus for 12 hours? Nah, bugger that, take a plane!"

"Ripper" - pronounced "Rippaaa."  As in, "Everybody on the bus?  Rippaa!"

Living History: Kakadu, Litchfield and Darwin

Jim Jim Falls, Kakadu National Park

Darwin is a small city.  There are really only a couple busy pedestrian streets, a park, and a bay, and then suburbs take over.  The hostels are nearly all lined up on the main drag, looking out from balconies over large bar porches and a slew of smaller food shops and tourist traps.  Southern Australians come here to warm up in the winter and spring ("nomads" are their version of "snow birds"), and tourists come here to see "the real Australia" - the crocodiles and snakes, aboriginal crafts and unique wilderness.  Yet on a country-wide scale Darwin is generally overlooked, overshadowed by every other major city.

Darwin's only swimmable waves

I can understand that - the city is set on an ocean that you can never swim in, and its skies are filled with eagles, no seagulls.  More often than not the weather is either enormously hot, rainy, or both.  But it's the tourists who have it right.  Culturally and historically speaking, "The Top-End", as it's called, has more intrigue than perhaps the rest of the country combined.  The city itself has a history filled with fascinating bits, if you seek them out.  Yes, it was named after Charles Darwin, and to this day new species of plants, animals, and insects are being found.  Prior to World War II the majority of the city's population was Chinese - along with aboriginal, Indonesian, and a few other ethnicities.  Likewise, Darwin has suffered disaster like no other city in the nation - having been essentially entirely destroyed first in World War II, then again by hurricane Tracy in the '80's.  Likewise, some of the most significant and important aboriginal rights movements happened here, which ultimately created a sea change for the entire country in recognizing the rights of and horrible abuses against a whole continent of native inhabitants.

To its south lies Katherine Gorge and the stark contrasts of an enormous red desert.  To the east are the prehistoric wonders of Kakadu and Litchfield national parks.  Just beyond these is the sacred Arnhem Land, now again in Aboriginal hands.  To the north is all of Asia, and to the west the coast and the Kimberly.

It seems even residents of Darwin may not fully appreciate how intriguing all of these is when it's put together in the right way.  Historical and cultural tours exist but are fewer and farther between- with crocodile features and sea fishing recognized as the big sales.

But if you're willing to get a little sticky wading around for the tasty details, you'll certainly find the diamonds in the rough.

Maguk Gorge, Kakadu National Park

Some features of my time in the Top End:


- many amazing sunsets over the ocean from the park, the national parks, and Mindil Beach

- great food and indie shopping at the outdoor, dry-season-only Mindil Markets

- a 2 day rough-and-tumble camping tour in Kakadu with a very fun guide in a 4x4 SUV via Kakadu Dreams

- a flip-flop day tour of Litchfield park waterfalls and holes with regular unexpected stops by the tour guide to show everyone a wide range of different plants, animals, and their significance

- a sunset boat ride across the bay to another peninsula to learn how aboriginals make rope and throw spears - only to get cut just a little short by the first storm of the season (they say if you're out in the first storm of the season it washes away your bad luck from the previous year)





All this after a week in the outback and I'm pretty done with the heat.  Perfectly, I arrived in Cairns today to breezy, sunny weather and a beautiful rainforest.  Even with so much more to look forward to and enjoy right now, it's almost hard to stay in the moment with so many great memories :)

The Red Centre

Only one person I talked with in my office back in Sydney had been to the center of Australia.  For everyone else it was a bit of a national guilt trip - the place that all the tourists go see but many - possibly even most - Australians never do.  It's expensive, there's no beach, and it can be ungodly hot.

I suspect, too, that there had been some stupid publicity that there is little there other than Uluru, seen above (also called "Ayer's Rock" if you have outdated information).  Bill Bryson had me thinking this way after reading "In a Sunburned Country".  I'm not quite sure how he got so ignorant.

Other than being intensely beautiful, the terrain is surprisingly varied.  Every rock formation you'll go past is different.  King's Canyon, see above, is made up of sandstone formed after the inland sea which used to cover parts of inner and coastal Australia dried up, leaving behind sand dunes, some of which condensed into this rock formation.    Kata Tjuta seems to be some sort of conglomerate, made of smallstones hardened together, while Uluru is, infact, a gigantic rock which extends an estimated 6 km underground.  These features are only the most publicized - there are other unique areas such as the McDonnell mountain ranges and Devil's Marbles that seem to spring up as soon as the previous feature has gone significantly out of site.

Kata Tjuta

Uluru - smiling

This in addition to spectacular wildlife, and the sacred nature of these sites per the oldest maintained culture on Earth.

So seeing the red centre was epic - incredible sites, hikes, heat, camping, stars, wildlife, and kitsch.

Devil's Marbles

Daly Water's pub

What's sad is the disrespect that some of the people who have put forward so much time and energy into traveling to Uluru insist on.  Pictured below are tourists climbing Uluru.  This site has been estimated to have been used by local aboriginals for sacred purposes for some 10,000 years.  The English came here in the 1870's, gave it a new name, conflicted with local tribes trying to settle the area, and ultimately drove posts up this side of the rock and started bringing in tourists in the 1930's.  The Australian government eventually gave the site back to the aboriginals - but required that they lease it to the government for 99 years (yeah, don't know what's up with the British and the whole "99 years" bit).

This also included allowing tourists to continue to climb the site though this went very much against the sacred practices of the native peoples.  So they've put up a large sign in languages from German to Japanese at the bottom of the climbing point explaining this in detail and asking people to please not climb.  As you can see below, plenty of people ignore this entirely - actively choosing to disrespect and disregard what truly makes the site unique and powerful.

Other than wondering who really spends all that money just to come climb a big rock with an average view in the middle of the desert - it's a painful reminder of exactly how far the whole world has to come when it comes to respecting one another.  Though the posts the English drove into the rock can't be removed and the iron oxide which has been rubbed off under people's feet will remain as a reminder of the wrong that was done, the active disrespect of the people from every corner of the globe who come here and do this is an ongoing statement.

Assholes

Anyway, getting off my soap box,  I'll list some of the cool activities I got to do between Alice and Darwin:

 -Hiked King's Canyon and Kata Tjuta is 36 degree + heat, walked around Uluru in the cooler morning

-camped under amazing stars for 2 nights

-mildly explored the hot, dusty and small town of Alice Springs

-only had 5 people on my tour up to Darwin, so got to know people pretty well :)

-got to stop at Wycliffe Well!!  Most amazing alien kitsch in Australia!  And an excellent gas stop.

-Explored Devil's marbles, experienced huge amounts of blow flies, a rare desert rain, and canoed beautiful Katherine Gorge

-got some decent historical insight: the telelgraph cable construction, one of the first Australian airports, and WWII significance of some of these sights after the attack on Darwin

And now, onward, to Darwin and Kakadu.