Interlude Post 13 (and final) from Cairns, Australia

Happy late Thanksgiving everyone! We have established a reputation for spending turkey day on adventures, and this year was no exception.  We did get some roast chicken, but as Thanksgiving is not celebrated in Oz, we spent most of the day underwater!  We met many new creatures, but Wally the giant Maori Wrasse is our new friend.  He followed us like a puppy and LOVED to have his lips rubbed as he swam by you.  Our night dives were full of grey reef sharks, quite the eerie experience but totally awesome!  Saw some nudibranchs (brightly patterned slug like creatures, tons of fish, a giant cuttlefish (I'm pretty sure he was smarter than us) and turtles, but the coral was very cool, mostly hard corals, and very bright colors.

We spent two nights on a ship out on the reef and three days diving.  By the time we got back, we were exhausted but deliriously happy.  That was our last big adventure in Australia, in a couple of days we fly to Hawaii to see Kellee's brother for a few days and then on to Trinidad and finally back to Navigator!  Spending time on the water lately has made us really miss her and we're excited to get back.

Backing up, we put some serious kilometers on the car working our way back towards Sydney then took a break for a few days in Coolum Beach, a sleepy beach town near Noosa Heads and just enjoyed the sun and sand for a couple of days.  The water was a nice temperature, but lots of nasty looking jellyfish washing up on shore kept us on the beach for most of the visit.  It rained in the afternoon, which would become the common theme for the rest of our camping vacation.

We worked our way north along the coast, with a stop in Airlie Beach, gateway to the Whitsunday Islands, which if you didn't know any better, you'd think you were in the British Virgin Islands.  We did a day sail with some snorkeling, which also made us miss Navigator and we enjoyed the day, but it did rain...every day.

North from there we found another sleepy beach town, Mission Beach, and holed up for a couple of days relaxing by the pool, watching the kangaroos in the camp (one night on my way back from the loo, I got surprised by one crossing right in front of me...totally fearless, but about my height!) and looking for cassowary.  A cassowary is a bird like an ostrich or emu, but more aggressive.  The bathrooms had signs reading: "If you see a cassowary, do NOT run! Back away slowly and put a tree between yourself and the bird, and continue slowly backing away"  Awesome.  We started a list of all the ways you could die in Australia, here are some of our favorites:

-Sting from jellyfish (some jellyfish are so small you can't see it).
-Cassowary head butting you or eating your face.
-Gum tree falling on your tent (they drop perfectly healthy looking heavy limbs randomly, in calm wind).
-Kangaroo jumping in front of your car.
-Crocodile lurking in the river bed along your hike.
-One of the ten most poisonous snakes in the world crawling in your tent.
-Attack by Titan Triggerfish.
The list goes on, but I digress.

From Mission Beach we passed through Cairns and continued north in the Daintree National Park rainforest to the end of the paved road in Cape Tribulation, so named from Captain Cook after he ran aground near there on the Great Barrier Reef and his "troubles" started.  We spent a night on the beach, again in the rain.  Went for a nice walk in the morning and drove back south...we did finally see a cassowary here in the rainforest, but safely viewed from the car.  Our walk on the beach showed signs for killer crocs and jelly fish, and there were vinegar bottles on the beach in case of stings...only in Australia!

The final campsite was in the heart of the rainforest outside of Cairns and boy did it rain.  We escaped to the movies for awhile and enjoyed the new Hunger Games flick with popcorn for dinner.  The mornings were nice and sunny, and then (finally!) we got a sunny day and spent it at the pool.  Then it was time for our dive trip, definitely a highlight of this trip and something we are very glad we did.  The live-aboard boat was the way to go, nice and chill and not that crowded and lots and lots of time in the water!

So now we're back, we gave our camping gear to one of the dive instructors and are happy that our tent which we've called home for the last 6 months has gone to a good owner and now we have all of our stuff strewn around a hotel room for the final packing.  We have enjoyed our time in Oz and during all of "Eur-Afric-Oz" but we are excited to see Tom and get back to Navigator for the final leg of our sabbatical adventure.