Day 11 – El Arish to Cairns

After a relatively slow morning, we left El Arish at around 8. We were still listening to the audio book so the time passed quickly as we were travelling. I took the turnoff to Paronella Park and we went through more fields of cane and then bananas and avocados – even passion fruit at 25 cents each! The weather was getting better, but as we climbed, it got cooler and showers started up. Just before we got to Paronella, I turned left instead of right (no surprise to those who know me) and instead of finding falls, we found a pleasant drive into a national park and some great views. Coming back into Mena Creek, I found the falls on the right and, after a walk across the bridge, we then went on the hundred metres to Paronella Park. With an entrance fee of $39, it had a lot to live up to. Our guide had been raised in the area and she and her parents had used the facilities before they had been damaged and then fallen into disrepair – so on the guided tour we got many personal anecdotes as well as the normal spiel. It ended up being well worth the cost. After the tour we walked back via the turtle beach and the falls and got some very good photos. We then passed a pub with a good price for lunch, but – the wait was nearly an hour. Instead we pressed on and then detoured to Josephine Falls – very good scenery and good chatting to those we met along the way. Some very nice time lapse photographs which I hope will come out well. After that it was a good run into Cairns, arriving just before 2, and I parked on the street – a public holiday so no parking fees, but tomorrow I can get a secure spot under cover for ARTIE. When I explained who I was, some of the staff remembered me. Then we unpacked enough to secure the bunks – Lynn got a bottom one, but I wasn’t so lucky – and went over to Cairns Central to get a late lunch at about 2:30. Some times you can predict disaster and sometimes it befalls you with no warning – we found Hungry Jacks had just closed for the day! After settling for second best and then doing some shopping at Coles, we went back and settled in. We paid to have a barbecue tea in the hostel in the evening so just did some socialising in the meantime. One of the couples we met were from the Netherlands and we ended up having tea with them, looking at photos and generally having a good chat. They were returning home tomorrow after spending four weeks in Australia. They spent some time with their daughter who worked in Sydney and now was working at Falls Creek and then worked their way up the coast. I rang to confirm details for the trip on Sunday, as well as the pickup time, and after that it was off for the night.