Westish of Cairns is a place called the Atherton Tablelands.. it’s rainforesty, and slightly cooler than the coast (temperature wise). We headed there after leaving the whitsundays (600km or something).

There were lots of nice rainforesty waterfally walks to do. These two waterfalls (silver and nandroya) were purty..

and nandroya

Not sure if I’ve talked about strangler fig trees before. Amazing trees really, start off life the size of a mustard seed (or so) somewhere high up in a tree (deposited there by bird / whatever). They then send roots down, and eventually end up strangling the host tree (takes about 100 years or so) and then go on living for a further 300 years. Anyway, most impressive.

This pic is of the Curtain Fig tree. So called because when the host tree died, it fell onto another tree, and so more roots were sent down by the fig, creating this curtain.

And there was also the cathedral fig tree, another massive strangler fig.

We also did oppostite ends (so we didn’t have to return the same way) of a walk in the Misty Mountains. They weren’t misty, and the views weren’t great.. but still.. good to stretch the legs.

Well, pictures to follow at some point! but just back from the whitsunday islands. It was a fantastic trip, George, Rob, Sally and Laura (all English) and Kirsten (from Vancouver) and Mhairi and I..

3 days and 2 nights of snorkeling and diving and lazing about (eating good food and drinking a little bit). I was slightly naughty in that I probably shouldn’t have been diving, seeing as I have blocked sinuses.. however, I took sudafed which is supposed to clear them (didn’t seem to do too much).. And I still have blocked ears!. Still, I’m sure it’ll clear up soon enough.

The snorkeling was great fun though, we bought an underwater camera, so hopefully some of the pics will come out. I did get a bit of a slagging for wearing a dress, I was at pains to point out that it was actually a sarong.

Well, might manage to get some pics up now.. we’re sitting in an internet cafe in Airlie Beach. I ripped the network cable out of one of the ‘out of order’ pc’s.. plugged it into Mhairis laptop, and hey presto.. free internet connection.. don’t you love it when people don’t know how to secure a network?

Yup.. now there’s a slideshow(the nicely named pics are Mhairis ;)

Up, and snorkelling before brekkie. Excellent visibility, and lovely coral. I think it was my favourite place. Then diving again after breakfast. This time I wasn’t so lucky… I didn’t feel remotely as comfortable down there, plus the visibility wasn’t quite as good. Anyway, at $40 for 40 mins it was still worth going for it (though my ears have only just gone back to normal – a day later!).

That evening we all went out for beer and pizzia. I tried my hand in the pool competition. I got knocked out, in the first round, by the drunkest man I have ever seen play pool!. I reckon (I hope) he was a great player when sober (and just a really good player when drunk!!) hehehe, I still had 4 balls on the table when he finished.

Not the end of the entire world. Quite yet.

Next morning headed north towards Cairns. 6 days left in our van. I’m really going to miss it a lot.. such a comfortable free way of travelling, can’t reccommend it enough. Looking forward to seeing Domhnall in Perth on the 19th. Should be fun, not quite sure what the plan is there. Mhairi has friends from scotland down in Margaret River, but I’m not sure if Domhnall has time off and wants to climb.. sure we’ll see. And then off to Asia. Time is already flying.

We’d anchored that night in a bay just accross from Whitehaven beach. 7km of pure white silica sand. It really is quite a beautiful place.

I tried to take some arty pictures too. Which probably don’t work at all.. but hey.. gave me something to do for a while!

That evening we had a nice sunset – the evening before we’d not been able to see it.

The lads – being mark and anthony – hadn’t brought any CDs. So the music for the weekend was played off my MP3 player + speakers. Though I think, for some odd reason, the others preferred it when mb was choosing the music.

And why the ozzies didn’t love it when I found (and played as loud as I could) Tie me kangaroo down by Rolf Harris I’ll never understand ;)

Other exciting things, we saw a couple of humpback whales – I was glad I’d brought my binoculars, we didn’t get super close to them. Also, went on my first scuba dive since my last time, in the cayman islands ;) I do have a mild? case of sinusitis (blocked sinuses). You’re not really supposed to go diving if you have it, ‘cos when the pressure changes it’s not easy to equalise. However, I’ve found if I just swallow it does the trick – it did for that dive anyway, lots of fun.

On Friday 9th Mhairi and I headed down to the wharf to meet the rest of our group on the Ambition, our boat for the whitsunday islands. The rest of the passangers were already there – and a lovely bunch of people they were too. Rob and George, from Kent, travelling together and now off to Cairns/Perth to try to find some cash so that they can keep on travelling!. Then there was Sally and Laura, from London – both on holiday – though not for too much longer I think? And finally (besides Mhairi and I!) there was Kirsten, from Vancouver BC.

Everyone got on well from the start, and it really was a most fun couple of days. We met Mark(skipper) and Anthony (everything else – chef and dive instructor mainly!)

So from 10 until 2 ish we sailed off towards whitsunday island itself, taking in a spot of snorkelling after lunch (with time to digest!!). I’d bought my own snorkel the day before, as I’ve become accustomed to the luxury of a purge vavle thingy (so you don’t get salt water in your mouth all the time). I really enjoyed the snorkeling. Mhairi and I bought an underwater camera, so hopefully a few of those pics will come out well..

More food and drink to pass the evening away. Luckily Mhairi got her run in the morning, so she was just about able to relax for the rest of the day ;) hehee, though I think she rather enjoyed reading and chilling!