rainforests and barrier reef-my trip

[malakpetmasala]

It all started on a lazy Thursday evening (08.07.04). I went back home from work as usual, maybe an hour before the normal time. I had to pack and had a few things to buy before I embarked on the long journey. Though I may sound like I am sailing around the world in a medieval vessel, it was just a journey with Cairns, a laidback touristy town on the northern part of Queensland as the destination. Its about 1765 Km from Brisbane (that’s if you stick to the highway and not deviate to see anything else)

Let me introduce the group to you, it was two guys and a girl, the first one Mark, American dude from North Carolina, working in my lab for one year as a part of his scholarship and about to leave for the states to start his MD/PhD. The second one is Bec (Rebecca), Brisbane girl, works in the stem cell lab as an RA and also Mark’s housemate. She owns the car we travelled in (theoretically, her dad’s car) and me being the third person. Coming to the car we travelled in, it was a new Mazda 6 (about 3 weeks old), scarlet red, manual.



Oh well, back to the journey part again. So I had to pack my bags and leave for Mark and Becs’ place on Thursday night after I had dinner. Slept there for the night and we hit the road with Bec on the wheel at about 6 in the morning on Friday (09.07). We travelled to this place called Gympie where we had breakfast at McDonalds. From there I had to drive probably for the next two hours to this place called Gin Gin from where Mark took control. For him, it was the first time driving on the “wrong side” of the road from the “wrong side” of the car. Well that was not a big problem as we were driving just on the highway, but biggest problem was driving a manual car, which he obviously has not driven before. Oh well, but I really don’t have time to describe the chronicles of Mark and the manual car. So we better leave it alone and carry forward with the trip. We stopped again in this place called Gladstone where we had lunch headed forward again.

Amazingly all the three places we stopped so far start with ‘G’, and I can assure you that it was just a coincidence.



That night we halted in a campsite/caravan park at this place called Hay point beach which is about 30 Km to Mackay, we got to that place at about 6.30 in the evening and it was pretty dark. On the whole, we did 1000 Km on the first day of our journey. Pitched our tent, which was just enough for three people, cooked our dinner- lamb sausages, had a stroll, tried our luck at card games, was a good way to pass our time, talked a bit about geography and went to bed. We resumed out journey through the never-ending cane farms at about 5.30 in the morning and stopped at Airley Beach. This is one of the most beautiful sea fronts I have ever seen, though there is no defined beach here. This beautiful place is the gateway to the Whitsunday Islands, all you see is boats and boats and more beautiful boats and nice little cafes. Had a slight breakfast there, “Coco pops and milk”.



All we get to see along the road up to cairns, and even further is cane farms, god knows what they do with all the cane and I also wonder as to why rum is not so popular in Australia given a high rate of sugarcane farms and factories. The other interesting place on the way to Cairns worth mentioning is the lookout from this hilltop in Townsville from where you get a good panoramic view of the city as well as that of the magnetic island across the channel. This is one place I will have memories of; good, bad and humorous. The good: beauty of town and the surrounding. Humorous, as to how someone can slice a thumb opening a bottle of peanut butter with a butter knife and the bad being that we opened up our minds to realise that it is not the best thing to go on a road trip with someone with Mad Cow Disease. Well, the female version of it. Don’t get me to be sexist, but it was pretty hard. Words of an experienced novice!



Travelling across cane farms, dry grasslands and beefy bulls, we halted our journey at this place called Innisfail and called it a day though it was only 6 in the evening. Sad but true, not always does democracy work. Had pasta for dinner and rolled into the tent.



It was a fresh Sunday morning and we drove further north through Cairns to get to Port Douglas. For some reason, I like this town, very touristy and beautiful in its own sense. Made our booking for a trip to the barrier reef and moved on into the rain forests. Mossman was our first stop, we put on our board shorts to walk through the rain forests and take a dip in the gorge. The rain forests were impressive. Well, obviously I haven’t spent too much time in there to be bored already. But the gorge was really beautiful, the water was crystal clear and did not realise, cold, until I got in for a dip. Cant deny, had my share of fun. But overall I was pretty much annoyed for not getting to see any wildlife. But the plethora of plants was amazing. From there drove another 50 Km along the ghat roads across the Daintree river to get to “ever so beautiful” Cape Tribulation as described by many. It was getting dark and being with someone who tends to get paranoid about pitching a tent before dark, we had to get a place and as I said before, democracy does not always work. And by now, the symptoms of mad cow disease were getting even worse, I wonder if it has anything to do with the moon.



And then it rained, just to make us realise that we were in the rain forests. The amazing thing is the cloud formation over the mountaintops. There always seem to be clouds over the mountains in the rainforests makes me wonder if they really are hiding paradise from us. Later in the night we went to this pub across from where we were camping. Was a full house, was a bit surprised to find a full house in the middle of a rain forest on a Sunday night. Had a long chat with couple from England over 7 jugs of brew between 3 of us. Oh well, maybe four of us. Not to forget my reincarnation as Slash doing the solo from Knocking on heaven’s door with my air guitar. I would say, “It was fun”.



The next morning, we woke up to feel and taste the molten clouds dropping on to us, went for a long walk on the beach, this is the place where the rainforest meets the reef. The beach was all right, nothing amazing, just a northern beach with reef. We did spend a little time on the beach before heading down south to Mossman where we camped for the next 3 nights. Mark and I spent Tuesday basking in the sun on Port Douglas beaches where we had our adventures with coconuts while Bec was busy shopping. No wonder they call coconut as multipurpose plant. You can eat it, you can drink it, and you can even play golf and baseball with it. Amazing! The beaches were pretty nice but I would not describe them as beautiful. Coming from Sydney where even the metropolitan beaches are beautiful, I was shocked not to find the wilderness beaches of Port Douglas or Cape Tribulation live up to the expectation or may be my expectations were a bit too high. Well, it was sunny, so we didn’t really bother about anything else.



The next day, we made a trip up to Kuranda, which is a aboriginal village. We took the sky rail to get there. The view from the sky rail was very scenic, going over the rainforests and Barron River. But at a point I felt like I was over dosed on rainforests with no wildlife at all. Kuranda is a small village in the rain forest with nice little cafes and shops. Mark and I hiked up to the Barron lookout from where you get to see the Barron falls. We were told that the falls were much better in the wet season with heaps of floodwater flowing the hills. Well, Bec was obviously shopping. That was a long walk through the rain forests back to our train station, about 10 km totally. Made it to the camp but we were very tired. But were happy to eat the sausages. But sadly, it was getting worse on the mad cow part.



The next day was the most exciting day of the trip so far. We had to hit the ocean on Thursday morning to make it to the Great Barrier Reef. We boarded the catamaran and headed northeast from Port Douglas to the outer reef. The journey to the reef took about 2 hours; it was a bumpy ride on the ocean waves. At last we got into our wetsuits and dived into the warm tropical waters of the Great Barrier Reef. It was low tide, so the reef was hardly a meter high from the surface of the water, made it a bit difficult for us to get into it, but got to see some really beautiful fish out there. And the water, I just cannot describe how bright blue the water looked. I was enchanted. The sea was a little wavy and every two minutes I had clear my snorkelling tube. After an hour and half in the water, got back to the boat, had lunch travelled for another 20 mins to the second site. If I thought the first site was amazing, then I had my own surprises at the second one. The variety of marine life I got to see there cannot compare it to anything else anywhere in the world. The most amazing thing is that we got to swim along with five sharks on the reef, well, I was not really freaked out, but if I were to be all by myself, I am sure I would have. Had brief encounters with a few big fish. Almost a meter in length.



Was time to set sail back home. We sat on the front deck of the boat watching the setting sun as the boat sailed back home. Tranquillity has its own effect on human minds or rather, hearts. I did not really have time or the patience to sit and think about what part of the body is affected, but my eyes were pleased to see the sun setting over the blue waters and my skin was full of life feeling the fresh ocean breeze. Enchanting, reminds me of Keats describing the eternal love of a mortal for nature (in a more personified form of the moon goddess) in his Endymion..



“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.”

Maybe there is no Diana in the present day, but we, as mortals experience every bit of the joy from the beauty and the pleasure of the fresh air, the vast blue waters and bright radiant skies on a lonely planet



Later in the night, we went out for dinner to one of those restaurants in Port Douglas, had a nice meal, got back to the campsite where we met a few English Backpackers, shared a couple of drinks with them over discussions about religion, travel and pregnancies before making our way back to our tent for we knew that we were leaving the next morning.

On our way back, we drove through the highlands to reach the Atherton Tablelands, was a nice drive but it was getting really hot from the inside, took us a lot of patience to keep ourselves cool. We went to this Spanish castle called Paronella Park in the middle of the rain forest, was on the way down to Innisfail from the tablelands. Was a piece of beauty, took a tour around the castle and head back on way to Brisbane. We drove till maybe 10 in the night to camp on this state forest campsite about 100 Km before we reached Mackay. This probably was the best night of the trip. It was a no moon day, not a single cloud in the sky, I was amazed to know that there could be so many stars in the sky and we could see how clearly were the constellations demarked. That was one amazing treasure we miss in the cities.

[asli_badmash]

It all started on a lazy Thursday evening (08.07.04)............

Nice one..



BTW; There is something called as BLOG. Try this link http://www.fyllhyd.com/blogs. You can write as much as you like there.



~badmash~

[azazel]

BTW; There is something called as BLOG. Try this link http://www.fyllhyd.com/blogs. You can write as much as you like there.

damn, u beat me to it..

[Jaan]

Typo! The link is:





Jaan

[Jaan]

Shit....sorry.



http://www.fullhyd.com/blogs



Jaan

[asli_badmash]

Typo! The link is:

Jaan

Typo...



But, Typo ka baap.. hehehe to appa se hua hai Jaan. Its [url] not [img].

like this... http://www.fullhyd.com/blogs.



All ye bow down to me.... Fear me... all ye denizens of FHDB for I weild the URL. I can navigate you to another website with my magic URL power. Ha! Ha! Ha!



*Looks around... spots a rat. Even the rat doesnt give a rats ass about my powers*



Nobody... God damn it...



*throws the URL down stomps on it and goes back to finger painting*



~badmash~

[asli_badmash]

Shit....sorry.
http://www.fullhyd.com/blogs
Jaan

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...

Should have checked before posting..

~badmash~

[Jaan]

Shit....sorry.
http://www.fullhyd.com/blogs
Jaan

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...
Should have checked before posting..
~badmash~

LOL



Jaan

[CtrlAltDel]

LOL

is that ^^^^^ suppossed to be a LOUD laff?

[asli_badmash]

Shit....sorry.
http://www.fullhyd.com/blogs
Jaan

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...
Should have checked before posting..
~badmash~

LOL Jaan

Whatevvvaaaaa.... One win! Ha! Dekh loonga... *sulks* mummmmmy...

~badmash~

PS: I am making a fool of myself.. but what the heck I am having fun.

[asli_badmash]

LOL

is that ^^^^^ suppossed to be a LOUD laff?

That was supposed to be the loudest of LOL. Dekh loonga...

~badmash~

[azazel]

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...

hehe.. bhanjiJaan got one back on ya..

mez happy now.. *gives Jaan a freshly baked cookie*

[akhilis2cool]

yeh sab kya ho raha hai

[azazel]

yeh sab kya ho raha hai

kuch nahee.. this is called spamming a thread tht was asking for it ..

[akhilis2cool]

aah ok heres my humbul contb....

[asli_badmash]

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...

hehe.. bhanjiJaan got one back on ya..
mez happy now.. *gives Jaan a freshly baked cookie*

et tu brutus!

~badmash~

[CtrlAltDel]

aah ok heres my humbul contb....

..and mine too....

[Lucifer]

Whoever read that looooooooong post please raise your hand... rather post a smiley.



I gave up after the first line.

[asli_badmash]

First line...

~badmash~

[Jaan]

LOL

is that ^^^^^ suppossed to be a LOUD laff?

YES



Jaan

[Jaan]

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...

hehe.. bhanjiJaan got one back on ya..
mez happy now.. *gives Jaan a freshly baked cookie*

*after having palak paneer and naan for dinner, is still hungry*

looks at her right.......*gasp* fresh dessert...eats it in one bite...

*goes to find something healthy to eat, comes back with grapes*



Jaan

[malakpetmasala]

Arrrghhh. you beat me to it...

hehe.. bhanjiJaan got one back on ya..
mez happy now.. *gives Jaan a freshly baked cookie*

*after having palak paneer and naan for dinner, is still hungry*
looks at her right.......*gasp* fresh dessert...eats it in one bite...
*goes to find something healthy to eat, comes back with grapes*

Jaan

alright!

i had put my words on the wrong board.!

[Jaan]

arre yaar! I read it completely...you know guys! short attention spans.



Jaan

[CtrlAltDel]

create a blog malakie....

[malakpetmasala]

create a blog malakie....

yeah CLD, just did!