Leaving the North

I’m wondering if you can see all the blogs. When I log in they aren’t all there on display as I expect. I think this is the 4th one since Pajinka. (If you search by month you should be able to see all in the list?)

I discovered in the last couple of days that it’s not easy to become de-institutionalised. When I eventually got to my room at Cairns Colonial Resort on Monday afternoon (I had checked in but room not yet ready so I’d wandered off and done other stuff) – my bag wasn’t there. (For the last 2 weeks our crew has organised to get our bags to the rooms.) and then last night I looked at my watch – how long before dinner? Oh, of course, no one has told me what time to be there…

But here I am at the airport. Weeks ago my ticketing info had said I was going to Terminal 2 in Melbourne. That’s the international terminal. So I knew it was an international flight. But didn’t give it much more thought. But yesterday, wasn’t able to check in online. “Go to the desk.” And then in the middle of the night, a text: go to the international terminal, check in closes 60 min before flight departure. (And it took so long the other day for the taxi to arrive at the hotel, I was out of bed at the crack of dawn. Too many deadlines and uncertainties. As it turned out, the taxi got there quickly and the only hold up has been with my book in name (the Qantas app has me as Kathy, my ID docs are as Kathryn). Much confusion.

but now I have some time to spare. Maybe the last blog will get done before I leave?

Tuesday was wet. I’d gone to central area for a massage ( booked on Monday afternoon I’d passed a reasonable looking place on a town walk) and caught the bus back. Got very wet walking back from the bus stop. So no swimming. (I’d had my eye on Pool #3 – smaller and a bit more exclusive than the other 2.) Wednesday I’d booked a reef trip. All the reef trip companies share a large terminal near the docks so that was convenient. We visited the outer reef. 90 min from Cairns. Apparently 70 nautical miles (whatever that is – forgot to check) out from Cairns and 50 nm directly out from Port Douglas. I had signed up for snorkelling. Done it before without problems. Some were doing scuba. Probably over 100 of us in the water at any time. They had an area roped off – don’t go in front of the boat, so the lookout has a reasonable view at least of what the snorkellers are doing. Lots of colourful fish – I liked the yellow ones best: two sorts, one with a large black spot on bright yellow, the other with 3? Black stripes. Always in pairs. Perhaps 25cm in length. But there were iridescent blues and greens (sometimes both colours on the same biggish fish) and some camouflaged black and tan. Sufficient colour in the coral to make it interesting but usually only as coloured tips rather than whole coloured ‘branches’.

We visited two dive sites. At the second (perhaps the tide was now further out?) the reef was very close to the surface and sometimes out of the water, so we were restricted to swimming round the side. No touching or walking on the reef! Maybe better fish here?

I had a bit of trouble with my face mask. A different design to what I’d previously used, and water leaked into the nose shape. Put me off a bit and a bit awkward clearing it. I probably didn’t stay in quite as long as I might have, but all interesting enough. In the end I just paddled around in the warm water and didn’t bother about the mask/snorkel.

and yesterday was finally a sunny day. Yippee. I got back to the hotel about 5. Put the wet togs back on, and went off to find Pool #3. Finally got there. So the holiday must be over.

Now what about some photos? I think I loaded them up last night. I expect most are self explanatory.

that’s the outer edge of the reef where the waves are breaking.

and coming back into Cairns

And when we got to out berth, there was this much larger ship over there – a cruise ship of the Carnival line, towering over everything.