Arrival in Australia

11 - 13 April

We touched down in Cairns very early (about 04:40) on Tuesday 11 April. Prior research suggested that Australian Immigration Control would be a tortuous process - very strict rules apply regarding what can and can't be brought into the country; for example, if you happen to be carrying any fruit, honey or cold meats on you they MUST be disposed of before passing through customs or you'll be liable to a hefty fine.

It's true that this was perhaps the longest Immigration process we had yet encountered, but the staff were friendly enough and we encountered no problems.

Despite the early start, we found an open cafe at the airport and passed a couple of hours before phoning our hostel for a pickup.

After Asia, Australia seemed like a homecoming... everything in English, normal looking houses and streets, rain, etc.

Cairns is a nice enough city; big on tourism and backpacking, and the gateway to the Great Barrier Reef. It has a restaurant-lined esplanade which lies along a man-made beach and large harbour, and a great many shops and 'hotels'. In the Australian context, a 'hotel' is what the British would call a pub i.e. a drinking establishment.

We grabbed a few hours sleep at the hostel to recover from the flight then headed out into the evening. Cairns backpacker hostels routinely give out meal vouchers which can be used at a somewhat joyless wooden establishment (no offence!) called the Woolshed. We tried the place a couple of times - who can resist a subsidised meal? - but to be honest we found no shortage of better, livelier and more relaxed eateries.

After eating, we found a suitable 'hotel' to have a pint or two in. This had a large video-screen jukebox playing classic rock videos from the 1980s as well as more recent stuff - great!

At the bar, I noticed a number of folk drinking a dark brew which clearly wasn't Guinness. Not fancying a lager (99% of Australian beer closely resembles lager), I ordered a pint of the dark stuff. The barmaid seemed slightly taken aback by this request (and I suddenly noticed that everyone else was drinking halves), but she duly pulled me a pint.

Only on sitting down and taking a good pull of my pint did I realise that it was actually pre-mixed whisky and Coke! This seems fairly normal in Australia...
... I quickly reverted to lager.

Thursday 13 April

Of course, there was no way that we could stay in Cairns without paying a visit to the Great Barrier Reef - one of the most impressive wonders of the natural world.

The day didn't start well; it was pouring with rain as we made our way to the harbour to board our boat.

Then, not too far into the trip, Sharon's usually reliable sea-legs succumbed to the 'motion of the ocean' and she joined the ranks of green-faced, bag-clutching landlubbers on the upper deck.

Sharon had the last laugh though; being the chicken non-swimmer that I am, I didn't last in the ocean for more than ten minutes even despite wearing a rather slinky (Sharon assures me) wetsuit for bouyancy. This is the only -poor- excuse I can offer for the quality of my reef photos which follow

That black looking, spotty, triangular thing in the third photo may be a fish. Sharon took some piccies with a proper waterproof camera which are much better. Honest.