Cairns, Kuranda, and Green Island

 First of all: Cairns is cool. It’s a real backpackers city, with a very relaxed laid-back vibe to it. Though I’ve met some pretty cool people before I got to Cairns, this is really the place where  Just like in Brisbane; there’s a sort of beach in the city (only here they call it the lagoon) which is usually pretty busy but the two times I was there there were still some spots left. The weather forecast turns out to be complete shit; meaning that the weather is actually really great here and there’s hardly any rain or clouds at all. A little bit outside of the city there’s also a “real” beach, which was a bit nicer. It’s called Trinity beach and what I liked most about it is that it’s purely visited by locals; there’s not that touristic feeling of Sydney and Cairns.

An amazing beach, almost entirely all to myself

Aside from lying on the beach I really did do some other things though.. Last Wednesday I went to Kuranda, which is a little town in the rainforest. The town itself was, just like Katoomba, slightly dissapointing. This time mostly because it was so clearly flooded with tourists however, not because it looked like a ghost town. There were some really nice things to see there though, like the waterfall that runs down one of the mountaints: 

A much advertised waterfall, of which I don't remember the name

Probably the nicest thing about it was a trip on a riverboat there. The boat was manned by just one guy who had an incredible amount of knowledge about the local wildlife and plantlife, which he really seemed to love to share with us. It’s pretty cool to know a little bit more about the place you visit, and it wasn’t until then that I realized that it’s actually pretty hard to get to know more about the wild- and plantlife: mostly there are just trips to nice sights and people trying to sell you tachy souvenirs. 

On the riverboat :)

As for today; I went to Green Island. Green Island is an island that lies in the middle of the Great Barrier Reef, but here’s what makes it special from the (numerous) other islands out here: there’s a rainforest on it. It’s verry surrealistic to walk around on an island you can cross in half an hour, but that has a rainforest. As it lies in the middle of the great barrier reef, there was also plenty opportunity to snorkel around for a little bit. Though it was probably not even nearly as exciting as diving is going to be, it was pretty cool. Followed around this huge turtle for a while, and that was when I got kinda sad that I didn’t have an underwater camera..

Tomorrow diving at the great barrier reef, and as some may have seen on facebook already: a girl from the hostel gave me a free diving course! Too bad I already signed up for a introductory dive (basically diving with an instructor, but not getting your certificate or anything), but still really a great gift! Usually it costs around 500$ to get your diver’s certificate in Australia (heard it’s cheaper in other countries, but yeah I’m simply not there), but what’s also cool is that it includes 4 extra dives at the great barrier reef! But more about the great barrier reef once I’ve actually dived there..