Saturday, Feb 20, 2016
I had a good night’s rest and got up early to the songs of tropical wildlife, particularly the birds, some of which were not very pleasant because they made a screeching sound. The magpies and the cockatoos are known for making a lot of noise. Fortunately the noise is predominately only heard at sunrise and sometimes at sunset.
May to September is the high tourist season in Cairns, when it is a little cooler. Why? Because it is stifling hot here from October to April due to the high humidity. The temperature in the morning was 31 C ( 88 F ) and it got as high as 35 ( 95 F ) with 75% relative humidity, which, according to the weather stations, make it ” feel like ” 42 degrees. This is not the time for strenuous activities.
It was my first full day in Cairns and I had no plans so, I spent the day acclimating myself to the location and making plans. I made plans for my stay here, my flight back to Sydney as well as, a place to to stay in Sydney until I fly back home.
This location is very tropical, as you can tell of from the street view where I am staying.
There is even a short walkway that is an alternate path along the street that gives you a real tropical feeling as you go through it.
After organizing the rest of my travel I went to the the information site along the beach to organize a few trips. On my way, I considered going for a swim, however, as soon as I got there, I noticed that there was no one in the water along the beautiful ‘ pristine ‘ beach. As I walked along the beach I saw a sign indicating that it wasn’t safe for swimming. Apparently there are a lot of jellyfish, particularly at this time of the season and some can be fatal if you come in contact with them. There was a swim area net in the water but these nets are not always successful in keeping the jellyfish out. You can see the small white outline of the swim net in the water on the right.
Instead of a swim, I walked along the ” boardwalk ” which had a beautiful view of the shops and restaurants nestled among the trees.
I stopped at a cafe and had a light breakfast. I saw this sign in one of the shops and I thought it was worth posting because it reflects how much we rely on wifi these days. Which is rather ironic on my part because I’m using wifi to update my journal, however, in my defence, I’m not doing it while I’m in a restaurant. Instead, I’m just talk to myself.
I entered an information site where the lady helped me organize 2 full-day tours in Cairns. I saw that the building where the information site was located had 2 trees growing through the roof and I found that several of the restaurants and the buildings had done the same. This picture was taken inside the information site building.
If you look closely at the next picture, you will see two trees that are inside the two adjacent restaurants along the beach walk.
After arranging some activities, I took the bus to the nearest shopping area to get some groceries, as well as a hat, because I had lost the one that I had bought in Te Anu to replace my Tilley hat that I had left in the San Francisco airport. I don’t like wearing hats, but its the curse for having a bald head in a hot climate!
Tomorrow will be my first full-day tour, because I was informed that it would be the best day to go on the tour due to storms that were being predicting during the week, which might result in the cancellation of the trip.
Ralf Hamm 