We had a good and long night of sleep, exhausted after yesterday’s adventures. As we were taking our time also for breakfast, we started planning the day… and realised we had to rush to the bus! We caught it, and drove to Kuranda, about an hour from Cairns. It’s located in the rainforest, and was highly recommended day-trip when staying at Cairns.

We arrived there late morning, had a coffee at a nice coffee shop in town and went for a hike in the rainforest. We had lunch along the Barron river, and did a bit of souvenir shopping when back in Kuranda.

For the way back, we took the skyrail for a beautiful journey just above the canopy of the rainforest. We stopped at the lookout to Barron Falls, and got a nice ranger guided tour at the next stop, Red Peak. We learnt about sting-trees, the giant Queensland Kauri tree, the back-burning process (prevention of forest fire, among other benefits), and the epiphytes like the basket fern that had puzzled us earlier.

For the last part of the cableway trip, we got the view on the ocean – and what a spectacular view! The skyrail took us down to Smithfield… conveniently located just next to the wake-park. Tim had a go at it, tried wakeboarding this time (successfully). The other went back to Cairns for further souvenir shopping.

We all met at the night market downtown Cairns, bought takeaway food, and had dinner home.

We woke up early, earlier than planned – the excitement maybe – and walked to the wharves to get on a big catamaran. The sea was calm until we passed Fitzroy island, but became quite rough when we entered the open sea. Séverine had bought seasickness pills, it all went smoothly for us… but not for everyone on the boat. 45 min later we arrived at a big pontoon, in the middle of nowhere… or not so much maybe. It was anchored on one of the coral reefs of the Great Barrier Reef. We got into our wetsuits, were handed buoyancy jackets, snorkel sets and fins, and jumped in the water.

We didn’t even need to jump out of the jumping platform – we were already surrounded by « dory » and her family. Just next to the boat, the coral was quite dull, mostly brown or white. But just a few strokes away, we could see scores of small and big fish, yellow, black, striped, often with patches of iridescent colors. And the coral that looked static to start with, became an animated world always moving, as the waves pass by, and as I was more at ease with the snorkel.

Sun came after lunch, highlighting even more the diversity of colours. I saw completely black fish suddenly showing multitudes of small, bright spots. We also took a tour in a boat with a transparent base – although not as nice as when snorkelling, it was interesting to hear about this reef and where to find nemos (clown fish). Séverine got to see one, I didn’t. However, as I was back to the boat after my 4th and final round, I saw a beautiful turtle, majestically moving along the reef.

My phone is not waterproof so I don’t have any pictures of the corals, only memories.

We had diner at home, mac’n cheese!

Today, Cairns! We took the plane from Newcastle, landed mid-afternoon. Timo, Hugo and I enjoyed the swimming pool – even if a bit cold, while Sarah and Séverine went shopping. Timo even did 50 lengths, to swim 1000m for the first time.

After dinner, we took an evening walk in the city center and enjoyed the nice, festive atmosphere of this holiday city. Our plan here includes a trip to the tropical forest and to the coral reef.

We started the day with the Tour de France highlights – not as exciting as the day before but still a good mountain stage. We packed, checked out and went to the nearby Koala Hospital, where we saw lots of rescued koalas. We bought sausage rolls for lunch, another typical Australian thing, that we ate at the Tacking Point lighthouse.

After lunch, we drove along the pacific highway, back to Corlette. It’s good to be back to our base camp, after a week on the road. We watched the sunset on Bagnalls Beach, had diner at Mike’s and went back home to prepare our next trip: Cairns, in northern Queensland.

The day started with the highlights of a fantastic Tour de France stage and an egg-cellent breakfast prepared by the camping staff. It was too windy to go surfing, so we packed, checked out, and delivered the boards back to Chris and Dave. We had a late morning coffee there, talked about our program once in Sydney, Christmas in Bali, and how mentally difficult it is to change plans when we have our mind set on something.

We bought lunch at the Bruns Bakery, said goodbye to the Olsens, left Brunswick Heads, and drove to the Forest Sky Peer over Coffs Harbour for a quick stop.

We arrived at Port Macquarie late afternoon. The kids went to the swimming pool – a very cold one, so cold they had to wear their wetsuits.