Next stop was Cairns, just up the coast from Sydney, so three hours flight. Our main determinate in going to Cairns was to meet up with some more of Frenchie's pals who live there, if you are following this blog you will realise that Frencie has far more friends over here than I do but, not to worry, I'll be laughing when we start our grand tour of Sutton. We stayed with Caroline, Tim and my new best friend Sam (he's four, we have a lot of common ground) in another huge house - and again we were made as welcome as is humanly possibly, thanks again guys; hopefully you will visit us in our two-bed flat in Twickers one day, in its entirety it is about the size of your 5th bedroom. Cairns is a real holiday town, think Brighton but hotter, less gaybitts, younger buildings, oh but don't go in the sea, apparently crocodiles live there together with Box Jellyfish. We had some great meals out, some tasty dinners in sitting on the veranda (bear in mind it is winter over here, it shouldn't be warm enough to eat your tea outside in winter should it?). Our days were filled by strolling around Cairns Esplanade, swimming in the lagoon (man-made and reassuringly croc-free), taking a cable-car from Karunda to Cairns over a rain forest; snorkeling around the Great Barrier Reef which incidentally is the world's largest living organism (a reef shark came to check us out about three seconds after we had got into the water, they look completely shark like in every way, but they are only about a metre long) and fulfilling a long held ambition of coming face to face with a Koala.
Pictures:
1. Sammy taking a break from swimming in lagoon.
2. Coralie and I in a rare pose together.
3. Playing with big fish at Barrier Reef.
4. Mummy and baby Koala.
5. Frenchie, me and Princess who is doing her best to stay awake, and please animals lovers don't fret about exploitation, the Koala union only allows them to work 30 minutes a day (of which they evidently quite often sleep through anyway) and the money I spent on my official photo (which you will be able to view on one of my walls at home) will go to helping koalas to do stuff (I don't have the details but I imagine it will be fun).
6. Frenchbitt purchasing some Aboriginiart (new word invented by us, self explanatory though) from the original artist - soon to be exhibited in a bathroom (or perhaps hallway) in the Twickenham area.
7. Cable car ride view.
8. From left to right, me, Sam, Coralie, Caroline and Dr Fox (I mean Tim).
3 heures d'avion vers le nord, et nous voila presqu'au bout nord de la cote Est, a Cairns. C'est la que je devais rejoindre mes amis Tim et Caroline, rencontres en Angleterre il y a 8 ou 9 ans deja. Ils ont migre en Australie il y a deux ans et ont maintenant une belle maison sur les hauteurs et une vie tropicale...il en faut. Merci a eux pour leur accueil et leur disponibilite. Cairns fut notre point de depart pour explorer un peu la barriere de corail (qui fait plus de 2000km) et faire du snorkeling sur un catamaran (photo 2 et 3). Cairns a aussi un "lagon" central artificiel ou tous les habitants viennent se baigner gratos, donc obliges d'y faire un saut (avec Sam, le fils de la maison, photo 1). C'etait aussi notre derniere grosse etape tropicale avant de descendre vers des climats plus doux, et on en a profite pour visiter les villages d'arborigenes des alentours. On s'y rend si on veut en teleferique, au dessus de la foret tropicale (photo 7) et de la on peut faire plein d'activites "typiques" australiennes comme PAR EXEMPLE jouer avec les koalas (endormis). Je pense que ce fut l'activite preferee de Neil de tout le voyage, vu la tete qu'il a fait pendant 20 minutes. Cette koala ("Princess") etait tres douce par rapport a celle que j'avais portee il y a 4 ans, et sentait bon...un plus! La photo 6 montre une jeune arborigene qui m'a vendu une de ses peintures; passage oblige, on ne quitte pas souvent un pays sans art. La derniere photo montre notre dernier repas avec mes potes, sur le port de Cairns (eh oui on met aussi une chemise desfois).
