We had an Aussie adventure on the way home from New Caledonia to compare the snorkelling and ended up having a great little holiday in Port Douglas. Stayed in a resort that was nice and enjoyed exploring the cosmopolitan town full of trendy restaurants and shops. From here we did a trip out to the Agincourt Reef on the Quicksilver boat to its well appointed platoon near the drop off of the continental shelf - they had semi submersible rides, helmet dives, great snorkelling and lunch. The ride out was long and nauseating but once you're in the water that eases. Because of the stinger season lycra suites had to be worn to protect you from the deadly stings of the irukandji jelly fish. The helmet dive wasn't as easy as thought - the process of being weighted down and not having control over your experience was daunting, we all had false starts with Oren and Alex staying down the longest, Hollander ended up with a sore ear unable to equalise. But we had to try it! The Quicksilver have a marine biologist talk explaining the corals and fish life of the Great Barrier reef. I learnt about the corals being like a jelly fish with an external solid skeleton which is the coral - forming many shapes like the brain, plates, staghorn's. The animals skin is home to microscopic plants that create the colour and provide 90% of the corals food. Global warming is killing the plants and bleaching the corals which then die off as they loose their food source. Even though this is happening the Quicksilver site surprisingly has alot of colourful coral and large fish and clams. This was slightly different from our experience in New Caledonia as we were swimming off shore and every thing was smaller.
All the tourist attractions in Northern QLD were really well set up for the tourist, we visited Hartley's Crocodile Park and enjoyed the boat ride, holding koala's and a croc, then eating crocodile for lunch! We went to the Mossman Gorge and did a Kuku Yalanji cultural walk and Dreamtime talk. Then went to the Nightfire by Tjapukai Cultural Centre for a fire ceremony, dancing, chanting and a wonderful dinner all run by the local Aboriginal community in Cairns a fantastic representation of Australian Aboriginal culture for the tourist.
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| Pullman Port Douglas Sea Temple Resort - with swim up rooms. |
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| Our pool entry from room |
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| Port Douglas market day |
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| Courthouse Hotel Port Douglas 1878 |
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| St Mary's by the Sea Port Douglas - Hollander's School and Gerringong's Catholic Church name sake. |
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| Mossman River Gorge |
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| Dreamtime Gorge Walk smoking ceremony |
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| Ochre and soap making demonstrations |
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| Kuku Yalanji peoples land |
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| Hartley's Crocodile Park |
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| Cassowary feeding experience. |
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| The beaches are not swimmable in summer due to the irukandji jelly fish. |
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| On the Quicksilver trip to the outer barrier reef - lycra suits. |
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| The scary helmet dive |
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| At the Tjapukai Cultural Center Cairns. |
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| Oren volunteered for the fire making ceremony |
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