Ultra-Adventure in Queensland -- Spring Break 2010! -- PART 2

Sorry for the long wait everyone!  I had a slew of essays and group projects to tackle these past few weeks.

Day 4: Upon waking up for our last day on the Hababi, we were once again directed to stinger suit up and hop into the water for another snorkel.  This last snorkel was pretty cool, but definitely did not top swimming with Elvis and friends.  After that we sped back to Airlie Beach. 

BACK TO AIRLIE BEACH

Our next leg of the trip was an adventure of its own.  Now, we arrived in Airlie at about 11AM, and disembarked the Habibi.  We had rented three cars to drive up the eastern coast to reach Cairns, but could not pick them up until about 2 PM.  We used the time in between to do some simple backpacker things.  For instance, we enjoyed a nice “homeless shower,” as I like to call it, in the public showers at the lagoon; however, this was not just a simple rinse.  After sailing for three days with no shower stalls on our boat, this shower was the whole gamut— wash, rinse, AND repeat.  We seriously did not even mind the attention that we got from passersby as this shower almost humanized us again.

After indulging in some Greek gyros, we later walked up the street to retrieve our vehicles.  The others drove lame Camry’s, but my car was the big daddy of them all – a candy-red Suzuki Swift.  If you are unfamiliar with the legend that is the Sazuki Swift, please refer to the photos and maybe even consider some extra Google’ing.  Anyhow, beginning the drive was… albeit… terrifying! I was so nervous to drive on the other side of the road, but I had to keep my gameface on to convince my passengers (Bobby, Kelsey, and Jenny) that I was confident and chill.  It took me a while to stop driving in the bike path, but soon enough even I was almost convinced that I knew what I was doing!  Playing car games, telling most embarrassing moment stories, and even projectile red soda from Kelsey’s unexpected cacophony did not even faze me!

As we continued, it almost felt like second nature (not first, mind you) to drive on the opposite side, and I was able to relax and enjoy the scenery with my car-mates. The panoramic landscapes were nothing short of gorgeous!  We drove through enormous fields and lush mountainous mountains. We even passed a giant mango!  Apparently Australians love giant roadside attractions – one of the many useless but awesome Aussie facts I have learned in my Australia Now class.  One of the biggest challenges of driving for me was the fact that we kept surpassing cars ahead of us by zooming past in the oncoming traffic lane, which is a very common thing on empty highways throughout Oz.  The lame Camry’s of our group would easily overtake slower cars, but “Team Hotwheels,” as me and my carmates referred to our car group, struggled to make the moves even when I was flooring it!  This also encouraged the other cars to coin the cruel nickname “the little engine that could” for our Sazuki. Team Hotwheels owns!

TOWNSVILLE

 

We arrived in Townsville by sunset.  We had previously heard that Townsville was the most under-rated town in Queensland, but we wanted to check it out for ourselves.  After a pasta dinner at the Italian restaurant next to our hostel, we hit the dance clubs.  Now, Townesville was pretty much the Jersey Shore of Australia, with meathead guys, trashy chicks, and enough self-tanner to feed an entire third world country.  We did have fun dancing and making fun of the weird crowd though.

Day 5: The next morning, we hit the road to travel up the Cairns, home of the Great Barrier Reef.  Once again there was lots of fun car games and overtaking on the highway.  The best part of this drive were the ultra-hilarious road signs like  “Rest stop or death stop,” “Rest if sleepy,” “Survive this drive,” and the side-splitting “Slow down stupid” to name a few.  The signs were sooooooo funny but also a little daunting at times.

CAIRNS AND THE GREAT BARRIER REEF

We arrived in Cairns early that evening.  We stayed at Gilligrans hostel, which was by totally the most luxurious, cleanest, nicest, funnest, awesomest, bestest hostel I have ever stayed in for sure!  The rooms were air-conditioned; the bar had super-fun strobe lights and bumping music playing, and the sandy-bottom pool was compelete with a waterfall. Our stay included free Bolognese dinners, which were tasty but ridiculously small in portion.  For this reason, we had a second awesome roast beef dinner at the Irish pub PJ O’Briens. That night we went out to celebrate our first night in Cairns!

Day 6:

Cape Tribulation: The next morning, our 12-person groups assembled to meet our tour guide for cape Tribulation.  Our tour guide’s name was Peter, a super smart Aussie with a thick accent.  We hopped on the bus and started our tour at Mosman Gorge, where we got to hike through the rainforest and feast our eyes upon a giant river.  We then drove through Port Douglas, one of the ritziest celebrity vacation spots in Queensland. According to Peter, many Holloywood celebrities dress walk around incognito to ward of paparazzi and obsessed fans.  For instance, he spotted pointed out Anglelina Jolie who was mysteriously under the guise of a small Chinese man. (Hardy Hardy Har Har).  After a good laugh, our bus boarded a ferry to cruise across the river to Daintree.  There, we hit up the Daintreee Wild Zoo, where we got to visit come vicious crocs, magnificent blue-headed cassowaries, and hungry wallabies.  Following the zoo, we hiked through the Daintree rainforest at Cape Tribulation.  We saw some awesome plant life there like the hollowed-out and webbed fig trees.  So sick!

After lunch, we got to run around the Cape Trip Beach.  It was so nice to hang out by the beach unafraid of salt-water crocs, unlike Airlie beach. We made human pyramids and took some excellent tourist-y photos there.  From there, we feasted on some ice cream at the Daintree Ice Cream Factory, enjoying delicious native flavors like passion fruit, pineapple, wattle seed, and black sapote.  The tour finished up with a croc river cruise, which was way cool.  My favorite part of the day was easily how Peter would end every single announcement over the bus’s P.A. system with a downward arching tone as he said the infamous Aussie quote, “No worries.”  There were copious Peter impressions to follow this awesome daytrip.  Great day!