Today we'd booked on the skyrail. We had to check out first because we have to be at the airport early hours the following morning so there was no point paying for an additional night. we left the bags in storage then waited outside. The minibus was picking us up outside the hostel and taking us to the sky rail entrance. We had booked our ticket online so there was no human interaction just a machine asking for our booking reference. we entered our reference and it gave us our tickets.
Me and Lee had our own little capsule that took us over the tropical rainforest. It was cool. It gave us a different view of Cairns. Turns out its not just about the sea and scuba; it's got a huge tropical rainforest too.
At the first stop we were greeted by a ranger who took us on a free little walk through a small part of the Forrest. He pointed out huge spiders that were hidden in plain view?! Lee didn't even run... He just held his breath and kept behind me (in a sort of 'save yourself' kind of way) there were upside down trees and trees that grew off other trees and apparently snakes.... thankfully we didn't meet any snakes!
We carried on our tour of the rain Forrest in a little museum. It was very factual. It told us about the history to its existence and the wildlife that was and what still remains. Its a tiny place so we didn't spend too long in there instead we jumped in the sky lift capsule and took off deeper into the rainforest. The last stop was a little town called Kuranda. Now just to paint a picture; the people who live here initially came to admire the natural beauty and decided to call it home. It's a tiny village, in the middle of a rainforest with a chilled out, relaxed atmosphere. In the village the people sell everything from expensive photos and opal jewellery to hand made souvenirs on little market tables. The business hours are based on when tourists arrive and leave!
We had postcards that we wanted to send so we were happy when we found the little post office.... Turns out the post office lady wasn't having a good day. Either that or she wasn't from this village. Luckily we only had to ask her for a stamp. The poor woman in front of us got abused. Word of warning; don't ask for tippex here.
Humidity levels were around 90% and it was around 30 degrees so after a little wonder and the post office ordeal we decided to chill out somewhere. We found a little cafe that was multicoloured and decorated in a hippy/ Moroccan-esk feel. I got a delightful chai latte and lee got a huge milkshake. (He couldn't even finish it- yep it was that big)
Just when we thought all the fun was over, we wondered on down to the train station and found the quaintest little station with a steam train waiting for us to board. The Karunda scenic rail. As soon as we stepped inside it felt like we'd gone back in time. I did the whole waving out the window whilst Lee pretended to wave me off. Then Lee jumped on and the train and it took us on a slow decent through the tunnels (hand carved) and past Barron falls. It stopped along the way for us to jump out and get pictures and gave us a commentary on the history of the track and train and what it was used for.
We were told 'men tackled the jungle and mountains not with bulldozers, jackhammers and other modern equipment, but with strategy, fortitude, hand tools, dynamite, buckets and bare hands. Great escarpments were removed from the mountains above the line and every loose rock and overhanging tree had to be removed by hand.' It took over 5 years to build!
It took just under 2 hours for us to reach the bottom then we quickly jumped in our bus for the 15min journey back to the hostel.
We used the rest of the day to wash, read, sunbath. Time flew. Before we knew it we were sitting in the kitchen wondering why we decided to not book a room to wait in. Even if we wouldn't get much sleep we weren't getting picked up until 3 and Mosquitos were everywhere. Lee fell asleep, I read and some people in the hostel played drinking games. I had never heard of the drinking game before. I couldn't help but hear their game. The girl was like fog horn leg horn! She's decided to change the game a little. At first it was just; pic a letter in the alphabet the the had to think of adjectives beginning with that letter. Not as easy as it sounds when the majority of people playing didn't speak English as their first language. To spruce the game up the classy English dictator decided they had to say 'my vagina is....' Wow! After the group got wasted, jumped in the pool, started cooking in the closed kitchen someone who worked there came out and sent them to bed. Quiet time and the last hour flew. Before we knew it we were on getting off the bus and entering the airport.
You can not sleep in Cairns airport. To save money they shut the airport for the time between the last flight and the first flight. We checked in and went straight for a coffee!