Departing from Goldsborough early in the morning, we cruised through to Cairns airport for the arrival of Derek and Ron! It was exciting to see them as it had been a long time now since leaving home. Catching up over some brunch and a stroll through the markets, we stocked up and headed to our accomodation. Sharing stories over some delicious beverages by the pool (more espresso martinis), lead to the four of us going for a pub crawl down the main drag in Cairns. There was even a cheeky 3am Maccas run!
You could only imagine the next day was fairly slow as we packed up, filled the car with groceries and made our way to the oldest rainforest in the world – The Daintree. Taking the coastal road, we had lunch at Wangetti Beach along the way and Derek found his long lost stick mate! Our accomodation for the first night at the Daintree was at Crocodylus. This spectacular hide away in the depths of the rainforest really had you amongst nature. Having to wheelbarrow our gear to a hut wrapped in mesh, housing beds with mozzie nets, this was one spot we weren’t to forget in a hurry.
After a surprisingly good sleep with the animal sounds through the evening, followed by the loud melodious bird calls in the morning, we went to explore this 150 million year old baby of mother nature. Starting with a small boardwalk trail we were amazed by the growth and variety of plants the Daintree had to offer. The info boards along the way did not disappoint with facts throughout the walks – finding that mangroves can’t handle salt water (although growing in such environments) and have adapted by releasing salt into their dead leaves before falling off. We also had a chuckle at the trees that were thriving through holes cut out of the planks of the boardwalk.
Wanting to spoil ourselves we made a much needed stop at the Daintree Ice Cream Factory where they make fresh exotic fruit flavours daily. Ron lead us on a self guided tour through the fruit ochards – very informative! Being slightly held up by a couple of local cassowaries strolling along the bridge, traffic had piled up on the way to another rainforest adventure. It was amazing to see the enormous fan palms which grow up to 2m in diameter for a single leaf. These massive palms not only give great protection from the sun but also keep you dry.
Along the road north to our camp at Cape Tribulation we stopped via the Daintree Tea Company where they harvest and make their own tea for a self serve road side shop. Ron was so excited, he even took up a job picking leaves in the fields! To escape the rain we decided to hit up the cafe for a much needed lunch. We lashed out and ordered the native tasting platter of Emu, Croc and Kangaroo burgers. What delicasys they had in this magical jungle.
The next day took us on a croc tour to see the soul reason for not being able to swim in these prestine waterways. The tour guide had great bogan characteristics explaining to us that he cruises the river in his boat 2-3 times a day, 7 days a week for the past 30 years, up and down, up and down. Going for approximately an hour we ended up spotting a few of these ancient reptiles each varying in size. A small territorial female was found resting by the bank and another further up having a swim. A month prior, the biggest local 500kg, 5m long croc was shot due to eating a drunk tourist. Lucky for us a new big boy had just swam up stream from the ocean – this was the first time the tour guide had seen him!
After the thrill of seeing these beasts we relaxed by the pool back at Ocean Safari. With Mark and Nay staying by the pool, Ron and Derek went canoeing out into the ocean at Cape Trib. Having a blast their tour group lead them on a small land expedition where they learnt about the green ants having a zesty lime taste!
The final day in the Daintree Rainforest we woke to rain bucketing down on the tent. Unfortunately we had lined up to go jungle surfing (ziplining) and with weather like it was, she was going to be interesting! Accustomed to the heavy rain by now we pumped ourselves up and went for it. With staff members suiting us up in harnesses we then all recieved helmets with character names. After a briefing from the tour guides, we found we were going to reach heights of 20m and ziplines 78m long!
To start the run we powered each other up to the first tree platform with a human hamster wheel. Zooming along in tandems we clung onto our partners and smashed through the rain. It was crazy fun! Interesting facts were even told at each tree platform, i.e the average rainfall in the Daintree is 7m/year. On the last few runs we went solo at faster speeds and even cruised upside down! The exhillirating experience ended with a race between pairs from the last tree platform. You can only guess who won!
While already wet and still raining we checked out Emmagen Creek water hole (just north of Cape Trib). This was also the start of the Bloomfield track which was a tease to know we’d be back in a couple of weeks. We chose to not swim at the waterhole as we were already cold drowned rats.
By this stage it was already late arvo so we made our way back over the ferry, after stopping for one last cheeky treat at the Daintree Ice Cream Factory. We burnt back south along the coast where we were to recide at a luxurious appartment for the next 7 days in Palm Cove…
