For all the rumours that we heard that Cairns was the hottest place on earth, it actually pales in comparison to ol' Maggie or Rockhampton. I'm not complaining, I quite like a little tropical rain, it's quite refreshing after sweating with no cloud in sight. Mom, Jack and I arrived in Cairns on Christmas Eve Eve via plane and arrived at our apartment suprised to find out that the pool was, cold? still salty, but the first semi cool water I'd felt in a while, which was glorious, probably due to the shade around it but whatevah it was grand. We wasted no time in going to the mall? not much else was open and to our dismay it was an insane nightmare. But we pushed through, got a couple choice items and some groceries and got the fuck outa there! That evening we traipsed down to the waterfront area where another urban pool/beach situation was going on, lagoon style pool open at night too and tons of restaurants and activities going on down there as well. We ate some delicious food and called it a night. The Greenwalds arrived that night and the next day we hopped on the uber touristy train to Kurunda, up in the Rainforest.
The trainride was sweaty but nice and Kurunda was a super cute touristy settlement filled with digeredoos and boomerangs and opals, sarongs, bikinis, bracelets, candy, all kinds of crap beckoning you to buy it. We did succeed in picking up a coupla opals, one for Jack's girlfriend and a very beautiful and shimmery ring for mammasita. For lunch Jack went with the Ossie special= roo meat, croc meat and a Fosters. Good idea but bad in practice as the roo meat was so chewy jack took 2 hours to eat it all, and was still chewing when we walked out. We saw some candy making and walked through some markets and then took a gondola over the rainforest back down to Cairns which was only scary when it made a huge thump thump thump at certain parts. Then we went to .... brace yourselves. A drive through BottleShop to pick up some Bundaberg for me and some Pure Blonde for Greenie and Jack and of course some Chardonnay for the mammas.
Christmas Eve we got even deeper into the tourist circut and got on a massive tour boat out to the Great Barrier Reef. Cheesy as it could've been with the scheduled activities and the cheeky staff w/no shoes to go with their laid back attitude and crisp white shorts and blue and white striped shirts, all super tan with bleached hair from all their diving and sailing escapades, it was actually pretty fun. Some seasickness occurred, not for me, but they did have biodegradable bads to puke in and then we were told to throw them overboard because the fish will feast on them. So lets just say Jack did his part in feeding the marine life of the Great Barrier Reef that day. We got to snorkel around this area called Nicholas Quay where billions of birds were nesting and squalking and stinking. But the reef was AMAZING!
Bright rainbow fish the size of my head, wavy pink 80s prom dress colored coral, sharp dark teal tree branch lookin coral, curvy twisting vines of purple bubbly coral, huge bubbling expanses of brain coral, schools of spindly skinny silver fish floatin in front of me. (say that 10x fast)Enormous shell looking things the size of a bathtub with teal insides and weird mouths and purple outsides that open and close like the jaws of life. Colors, colors, colors. I fell so deep into my snorkeling trance that when i surfaced I had gone waay out of where i should've been. That may account for all the cool shit i saw but whatevah! Later on I was given the scuba diving instructions from a guy named, for serious, Fabian. Picture if you can the movie along came polly and the scuba instructor, complete with the long hair, weird unplaceable accent and cutoffs and that's pretty much what he was. Hillarious. Two people left to puke during his talk due to a bit o boozin the night before, and he kindly informed us that you CAN puke into the scuba gear, and for the rest of us to make sure and watch because it will be a feeding frenzy of fish to eat up the puke. Great.
So I got all the directions, but on my stinger suit, got some weights around my hips, sat on the edge and put on my flippers and spit cleaned mask, they loaded me up with the air tank, told me to grab the mouthpiece, put it in and lean forward into the water and begin to breathe under water. HOLY SHIT. Now I love water. but i have never done this before and it definitely takes a bit of unexistential capabilities in order to avoid a panic attack. Okay I'm underwater. Okay i'm breathing. Okay do NOT breathe out your nose, okay do not stop chomping down on this mouthpiece. Or you will probably die. After some drills, some saltwater swallowing and mask clearing i was set. I linked arms with the very nice dutch girl next to me who was linked to our French diving guy and we delved into the depths of the ocean.
It was so Darth Vader it's not even funny, and so dense, I had to clear my ears about every meter or so, we saw schools and schools of the brightest shiniest fish ever, we say a stingray struggle out from its sandy hiding spot and float away, we saw little clownfish nemos in their coral, and we got all the way down to the ocean floor and were permitted to touch one of those big purple and teal shells, it's velvety tongue like rim was inSANITY! and when it moved i totally freaked! but it was really cool, and throughout the hour i have never been so at peace, so afraid, and so out of my element all at once.
I feel like I could do anything now that i've done this and to Michael--- Holy crap I applaud you, it must be insane to do that times a million every day as your job.
Christmas was nice, Jack and I gave mom her shell jewelry and some collage cards and we went to the lagoon and read in the shade and swam, then ate fruit salad, mashed yams and potatoes, green beans, green salad, wine, champagne, beer, and for them shrimp for dinner.
Happy belated Christmas to all! And to all a goodnight!
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