Killer Rainforests I am now in Cairns, some 2000kms plus north of Brisbane. We have left the flash floods and rains down in Brisbane the skies are blue and the temperature a wintery 28! We have passed the Tropic of Capricorn and are officially in the Forth North Tropical Queensland. As Caroline is heading off to her 3 day dive spectacular, we visited Kuranda, a village up in the rainforest just North of Cairns. Kuranda is reached by road, cable car or scenic railway. we opted to go up by cable car and come down by the railway. The cablecar is the longest in the world, at over 7km long. It reaches high above the rainforest canopy allowing you to look down through the trees and see what is usually a secret world. From the cable car you can see the green ants nests, perfect balls of leaves attached to branches. The large Ulysses Blue butterflies are iridescent in the morning sun. Or the two cockatoos preening on the branches of the tall Kauri tree. But if you are really lucky you might just catch a glimpse of freshwater crocodile basking on the banks of the Baron river. Just remember, you must never smile at a crocodile. We stopped at the boardwalk and met Ranger Brandon, an Aborginal Park Ranger. He told us about the killer trees and dangers that lurk under the beautiful canopies. Did you know that The vines you see wrapped around the trees grow from the top of the tree down. Birds eat the seeds and their droppings land in the canopy. This germinates a seed that grows down a host tree. The vines are parasites that slowing over 100's of years kill the host tree, and when the tree is hollow and of no more use the vine can sense new trees near by and grows feelers. These feelers attach themselves to a new tree and the processes starts all over again. The ferns that you see every where have thorny spines to there leaves, and these act a deterrent to any thing that might want to eat it, but they too grow feelers with long hook like thorns. These attach themselves to saplings and passing people. The blood vine, gets it's name from the red sap. This sap when added to water dissipates the oxygen. Aboriginals add this sap to a stream. The fish swim through the sap and are stunned with the lack of oxygen. The Aboriginals then spear the fish. The stinging nettle here is not like our little old nettle, oh no. The spines are silica and will penetrate and lodge in the skin causing a stinging sensation that may not kill you but will drive you to distraction. What is the best way to remove these stingers? Waxing the area. The leaves will grow to approx 50cm wide, and settlers were know to think they might make good toilet paper! Can you imagine the pain ! The Cassowary, a native bird, related to the Emu but with a bright blue head and part of it's skull protruding as crest on it's head. The males not the females look after the young and if you approach whilst there are chicks about the Cassowary will jump at you, Karate style with huge claws and attempt to disembowel you. Not to mention snakes like the Python...... Oh and there are spiders as big as my brother in law Lee's hands. There are lovely things like Lemon Myrtle, that smells like lemon sherbets and is a good antiseptic. But this really can be a harsh environment. Kuranda it self is a mass of hippy markets selling everything you can think of and is a great place to wander around for a few hours before taking the train back down to Cairns. The Train was built to help haul timber and gold down the mountains and is now a scenic railway that takes you passed the Baron Gorge. This in the rainy season is a 260 meter granite drop, that gushes with thousands of gallons of water, but in the dry winter months it is still a pretty impressive trickle. You pass through 15 tunnels and over 37 bridges running right by a waterfall. All of this constructed in sweltering heat, by hand in the 1882, when the miners of Herberton were on the brink of total starvation. A route to civilisation was desparately needed. In 1886, the Premier of Queensland, Sir Samuel Griffths turned the first sod for construction of the line. The view you experience today was therefore captured all those years ago by teams of railway men armed only with fortitude, dynamite, bare hands, picks and shovels The Aboriginals believed that Buda-Dji the Carpet Snake, carved out the river the Gorge. But was killed in his quest and his body chopped up and scattered in the gorge. Where it fell are the main points of interest e.g. the falls etc. Oh and by the way Kuranda means Place of the Platypus, but we did not see any! Well Caroline is back on Sunday and we head to Alice Springs and a 3 day bush safari on Monday! This involves sleeping under the stars and walking 7-8km a day so wish me luck ! Love Lynne