Day 12 – Cairns and Kuranda

In the morning I was up by 6:30 and showered and dressed, but I didn’t seem to disturb the others, who were fast asleep. I went down with the laptop and did some checking and then banking on-line. Pancakes were coming on, and so Lynn came down and the couple from the Netherlands also appeared. We chatted while having breakfast, then wished them well. I spoke to Lynn and we agreed to do Kuranda today. I booked that at the desk in the YHA and then we puttered around until the bus appeared about 9:40 - ten minutes late because of earlier passengers who were slow to get on. We visited other places to pick others up and some of them were also a bit slow. Finally we headed out to the SkyRail Terminal. We will have to visit here again on Tuesday or Wednesday as Lynn is after some souvenirs (they were a bit bulky to carry for the day). We got our tickets and then went up in a gondola. There were great views and we stopped for the rainforest walk and tour. We continued on and then arrived at Kuranda about 11:30. We walked up the main street. After looking and getting a few souvenirs, we had lunch and then wandered down the streets, giving the town a good going over. While I tried to have an ice cream, it melted everywhere and we struck up an conversation with an English couple who enjoyed active touring. That lasted quite a time and then it was time to go and join the train for the return trip. I went to ring Abby for Saturday, but got no answer – apparently Lisa’s mobile was on “silent”. The train ride down was vey interesting and occupied my time, so I rang back once we reached Cairns at 5:30. Abby was more interested in watching a movie than seeing where I was. Before the end of our conversation she had a look and saw how far we had gone. Lynn then went back to the hostel and I went to Coles to get some sausages for tea. Back at the hostel I transferred the photos over and wrote up my blog while Lynn did the washing. Then I cooked the sausages and we had them in bread with coleslaw. We sat with a roommate of mine, Toby from Germany (who is doing a Ph. D. in Maths in Munich and at Yale) and looked through some of the day’s photos and then I went to bed.