It's Pronounced "Cans"

Two days of playing around in the Cairn's rainforest- and it's called a rainforest for a reason...

Day One- a trip to Kuranda- a village splat dab in the middle of the rainforest...

Here's our bus driver and guide, Paul.  More on him later...

Paul directed us to a FABULOUS homemade ice cream stand. 

Of course Ada and I had to try some out.  I got mango.  Fresh mango.  Fresh mango ice cream.

Hoo Boy! " Yum" does not even come close...

A little look around- but we didn't have much time for the Butterfly Gardens, or the Venom Museum ( like I'd ever darken THAT doorstep),  or the Koala Cuddling...

Checked out some hot sauces...

And found great sign in the ladies' bathroom stall...
(you know what a sucker I am for a giggle...) Lots of Chinese visitors, obviously...

Then it was the rainforest cable car ride down the mountain.  It was spectacular, but I didn't get great pics because of the rain.....

Ok...now back to Paul. I didn't notice it until he mentioned it, but he has only one arm.  Lost it as a 3 week old child to cancer.  Hasn't slowed Paul down one bit.  In fact, he's climbed Mount Everest- the first disabled person to do so from the Tibetan side. 

Check out his story.  Great guy.  Great attitude.  Funny as hell.

Next day it was raining hard....but we were off to have a walk around...or so we thought.  As soon as we crossed the street, a wind gust and deluge occurred simultaneously, drenching Ada when her umbrella turned inside out.  I carried forth as she and Marcia returned to the dry comfort of Serenity.

I came across the famous Meldrums Pies. 

Pies are to Aussies what burgers are to Americans, I guess.  Every shop has some. 

I opted for a steak, chilli, and cheese pie. 

It was Glorious with a capital G.  On a wet rainy day, it was the PERFECT mid-morning snack.

Yes, I demolished every single morsel.

I wandered....stumbling upon the Farmer's market...

Soooo many different varieties of bananas.....

We sailed away just as another storm was rolling in...but dry enough to sit on the veranda with my needlepoint and watch the sailaway...

Still no good at selfies, but I am trying.

Off to Cooktown!

The Great Barrier Reef

I can not even begin to explain the fun I had in the two hours we spent out on the Great Barrier Reef.
It was seriously cool. 

And I managed not to get sunburned.

So let me set this up.  The catamaran picked us up from our anchorage off Hamilton Island.  109 of us.  (It was a big catamaran)  It took over 90 minutes to cross the shipping channel and make it to Heart Pontoon (which is a good bigger than the pontoon boat that Ed and Edwin built several decades ago...but I digress)

It even has its own helipad....which doubles as a bird roost.

Some of the girls just opted to take in the scenery...which was just fine.

If you didn't want to snorkel, you could take the semisubmarine....

And still see plenty of the reef...

Aussie humour...

You can see the Heart Pontoon is quite a large facility....moored permanently on the reef.

I don't (yet- yes, Vikki, I will be coming to see you...) have a diving certification, but here is the diving prep area... totally jealous.

With the miniscule jellyfish that abound in the reef, we were advised to don stingersuits...

***PSA***PSA***PSA***
BEACHED BABY WHALE ALERT!  ADVERT EYES IF EASILY OFFENDED.

***PSA***PSA***PSA***

Ok, I'm just gonna let the pics speak for themselves.  Believe it or not all (except the ones taken  by the  underwater photographer) were taken by my GoPro Hero5  (thank you Laird for the birthday present!!!)

ENJOY a tiny tour of a very tiny portion of the Great Barrier Reef!

Three snorkels, two tea breaks (with bikkies--biscuits aka cookies), and two hours later, we headed back, past a gloriously unspoiled white sand beach.

(I wonder if this is what Destin looked like before Big Kahunas???)

And then a bit of a walkabout Hamilton Island before heading back in for a nap!!

Of course there were signs saying "Do Not Feed the Wildlife" but if someone is feeding fries  chips to the birds, who am I not to photograph them....

Just another day in Paradise!!!!!!!!