Cairns - The Great Barrier Reef

The main event for me in Cairns was to dive The Great Barrier Reef, one of the 7 natural wonders of the world.  I hadn't dived for nearly ten years, so this seemed like the perfect place to get back into it, and I can assure you it won't be ten years until I dive again.

Managed to get a picture with Frank, the famous Humpheaded Maori Wrasse. He loves people and apparently has a great memory and recognises many regular divers.

While in Cairns, I actually managed to do 12 dives in total over two overnight liveaboard trips out to the reef.  The first time was on my own, and then I took Eunji out there with me for the second trip.  She isn't a diver, but there were snorkelers on board also.  Fortunately, each trip out starts and finishes with a snorkel for everyone, so I was able to get out there with her a couple of times, which was nice.

First time I'd seen a cuttlefish.  Their colour changing is quite incredible.

Anyway, the first journey out on the reef and I was a smidgen worried about my first dive.  Truth be told, when I first learned to dive I was pretty terrified.  I am not a strong swimmer and deep water has always been a bit scary for me.  When I was in Melbourne, I did a bit of open water swimming with a group of people on a Saturday.  Unbeknownst to me, the first time I showed-up I went with the intermediate group by mistake instead of the beginner group.  To warm-up they swam about 250m out to a buoy.  I was quite confident I could swim that far, so although intimidated, I gave it a go.  However, once I saw the bottom disappear my heart started pounding, and my breathing patterns were interrupted completely, so I had to turn back.

There is another cuttlefish in this picture, but it is so well camouflaged, it is difficult to spot.

This is a feeling I surprisingly never got while diving, it seems to be a surface of the water kind of fear, a fear of sinking.  When you scuba dive though, the idea is to sink, and once I was underwater for the first time, I was comfortable and surprisingly relaxed.  So although a little anxious again this time, all my fears disappeared as soon as I sank below the surface.  To be honest, scuba diving is both one of the most exciting and relaxing activities I have ever done.  What you see underwater is often awe-inspiring, but getting around is super-easy and peaceful once you have some control of your buoyancy.

"I can mention many moments that were unforgettable and revelatory. But the single most revelatory 3 minutes was the first time I put on scuba gear and dived on a coral reef " - David Attenborough.

I was going to get a refresher course, but the instructors thought I'd be alright just going on a couple of guided dives first, which was great anyway because they knew where to go on the reef, making for a better dive.  It is actually quite difficult to navigate if you just go with a buddy sometimes.

The diving was perfect really, all the dives weren't super-deep and there was no current in the water and very little swell, all excellent for reconnecting with the skills.  The lowest I got down to was about 20 metres, but most of the action was at about 10 metres anyway.

There was plenty to see; sharks, giant trevally, turtles, cuttlefish, moray eels, nudibranchs (kind of a colourful slug-like creature), stunning coral structures, and plentiful colourful reef fish.

The highlight of the dives on this first trip was an extremely friendly green turtle that actually approached a few of us right up close, seeming genuinely curious.  A couple of the instructors picked-up some bits of algae/seaweed and offered it to the turtle, which brought it in very close, and it appeared not to be scared of us at all.  Fortunately for me, the cameraman was in the right place at the right time as I turned my head, sensing the turtle was just over my shoulder, and he got the perfect shot.  This picture will definitely be on the wall back home in England.

What a picture!

The second time was even better diving.  It was noticeable right-away how much more control of my buoyancy I had, something that makes diving super-easy and relaxing.

I was quite impressed with Eunji on this trip, I was a little worried that she might not be that comfortable with the snorkeling.  The reason for this is that the Great Barrier Reef is out there in the open ocean, so even though the reef makes the waters calmer, the boat still has to anchor just outside the reef, making for a daunting swim over the abyss to the shallow reef.  It was clear from our first snorkel together that she was pretty nervous and uncomfortable.  She persevered, however, and got gradually happier during that first snorkel.  The next snorkel she did without me with a guide and was back a little before me when I was diving.  The following snorkel we were back at the same time, and then after that she was in the water for far longer than I was.  I think she really enjoyed the trip, not just for the reef itself, but the whole experience on the boat, which was excellent.

The highlight dive for me was the morning dive on the second day.  Straight-away, about 15 metres down under the boat, there were about 15 sharks prowling the sandy sea floor.  These consisted of the usual white-tip reef sharks and also the bigger grey reef sharks, coming it at about 2.5 metres in length.  Other great variety on this dive included nudibranchs, large groupers, turtles, stingrays, and large shoals of fish.

The night dive also brought some interesting sights; one being a large grouper eating a parrot fish and having the tail sticking out of it's mouth.  During night dives you generally see much more predatory behaviour, with giant trevally, in particular, using your torchlight to hunt fish in the dark.

Our room for the night.

I also witnessed the very odd behaviour of a parrot fish.  At night parrot fish blow themselves a mucous bubble which surrounds their whole body, hiding its scent from predators and perhaps acting as an early warning system of an attack.  They then eat this mucous bubble for breakfast in the morning.  Bizarre and fascinating to see.

It was really great to see the changing colours of cuttlefish, one of my favourite creatures on the reef.

It was brilliant to get back out there again so soon, and amazingly, it is only another couple of weeks until my next dive, this time at Poor Knights Island in New Zealand, apparently one of the best sub-tropical dives in the world.  It will take a lot to beat this experience, however, and I'd thoroughly recommend it to anyone coming to Australia, whether you are a diver or not.  Beautiful nature, fantastic food, amazing service, and a very well organised and comfortable boat, which made for happy, enthusiastic guests who all seemed to get along.  The icing on the cake was seeing some humpback whales on the boat on the way back to Cairns, what an experience.

The boat anchored at 3 different dive sites over two days on the reef.

Cycling in Cairns

So basically, I nailed it.  I made the call to cut the cycling short and head to Cairns early to spend about a month and a half there instead of about a week, as originally planned. It was a marvelous decision; instead of suffering through constant headwinds on roads of endless nothing with an increasingly unreliable internet connection for work, I found myself in paradise, and not just a scenic paradise, suited to cocktails on the beach with your feet up, but an adventurer's paradise too.

It was a relief to get to Cairns after a long haul, both on the bike and on the bus.  I was really hoping I liked it there, as I had a good amount of time before I went to New Zealand.

Well, I haven't been disappointed, I love it here.  It really is the perfect place for me, well in Winter at least.  I hear it is unbearably hot and humid in Summer.  Now in Winter it is about 26-29 degrees and sunny every day and cool at night.  On land, you have loads of mountains within 20-30Km away, and longer trips over 2 - 4 days into the Tablelands and rainforests, as well as lots of trail runs closer to town.  In the sea - this area of the world is famous for that part - the Great Barrier Reef.

The beach in Cairns.

I would say the major passion in my life is a love of nature; if you were to analyse the kind of photos I take, you can see this quite clearly.  The two environments I am most fond of are mountains and the oceans.  I hadn't scuba dived for years before I came here, but when I dived in Fiji, I think I experienced some of the most memorable moments of my life.  Snorkeling is great, but scuba diving opens up a new world like nothing else I have ever experienced.  I was gutted I didn't have enough time to dive at Ningaloo (although I did snorkel a bit), I will in the future as I hear it is actually better diving than the Great Barrier Reef, but at least now I can revisit this world again.

Barron Gorge Falls was seriously impressive.  The picture doesn't do it justice.

The coast in this part of Australia is really beautiful, with the mountains so close.  My first journey out of the city was to Kuranda to see the Barron Gorge Falls.  I tentatively headed out of Cairns on the main highway and was worried about traffic.  I needn't have worried though as there was either a cycle path or a wide shoulder all the way until the turn-off.  It was actually the climb to Kuranda that was a little dodgy due to high volumes of traffic.

There were no cars, but some friendly fellow-cyclists.

Before then, however, I actually made a wrong turn.  I was annoyed briefly, but realised I was actually heading to quite a nice area lower down Barron Gorge, so I thought I'd continue and just make the day a little longer.  It was a good call, there were no cars and a very nice road going through the gorge to an end point near a power station.  The bridge to it offered tranquil, scenic views and after a while I was joined by 3 other cyclists.

As I mentioned, the road up to Kuranda was a bit hairy; big trucks and lots of traffic going up a, narrow at times, winding road.  It was quite a long climb, but with weight off the bike, it felt nicely difficult, a good workout, but not absolute hell.  It was nice to be climbing again and not pushing against the wind on a dead-flat road.  These roads into the mountains should give the legs a nice wake-up call before I go to New Zealand.  The climbs there will be relentless.

A fine view over the rainforest from Wright's Lookout.

I had a few extra kilometres to get to Barron Gorge Falls and Wrights Lookout.  I had seen pictures of the falls on Google, and it didn't look that spectacular, and my picture of the falls doesn't look anything special, but when you are there it is quite stunning, there is just not much in the foreground to give a sense of scale.  It's a huge gorge and a most impressive sight.  Most people drive up there or get the train, which winds through the rainforested mountains, but it is always rewarding to put in the hard yards to get somewhere on your own volition.

Trinity Bay Lookout in Port Douglas.

I made a couple more trips out on the bike, the longest of which was out to Port Douglas and back, about 100Km in total.  It was a very picturesque coastal ride, and as a bit of training for New Zealand, I loaded the bike up a bit more.  It was hard work in the warm, humid weather, and it had been a few weeks since I had been so far on the bike, so I felt it a little.  It is amazing how quickly you lose fitness.

Since arriving in Cairns, indeed since Broome, I have been working out quite a lot; running, circuits, and weight training.  I am without doubt feeling fitter, faster, and stronger for it, but it counts for little on the bike.  It is amazing sometimes how specific fitness is.  Fit on the bike, slow and unfit on your feet; quick on your feet and stronger all-round, but then tired over long distances.

I also took a trip out to a local wildlife park to see some crocodiles.  I would love to observe these monsters up-close in the wild, but well, not really.  A close encounter in the wild with a croc is something you may well not walk away from, so there was no option but to see them in captivity.

I was impressed with the park, however, they had a large lagoon that took 20 minutes by boat to get around, which housed most of their crocs, at least the ones that could live side by side without killing the others.  Those troublemakers were left in solitary confinement in smaller enclosures, but they were still large enough.

They are awesome beasts, the biggest of which was about 5.3m long and over 100 years old.  They are one of the few animals I have ever seen that weren't skittish or scared of humans in the least, in fact it was quite clear by their behaviour that, but for the barriers, they would have quite happily dined on any one of us without a second thought.  To hear one growl deeply at close quarters is quite wonderfully terrifying, to come face to face with one in the wild would be scary to say the least.

Pretty much all of the crocs there were problem crocodiles.  They had been captured because they were either threatening livestock, people or pets.  Most of them were named after the last dog they had eaten.  You have to be careful about where you let the dog off the lead here in North Queensland, crocodiles can inhabit almost any waterway, both freshwater and saltwater crocs, however the salties are especially fearsome. 

There were other animals in the park, and I was particularly fascinated by the cassowaries.  If there is one animal in the world that looks more like a dinosaur than a crocodile, it is these birds.  With the crest on their heads they seems like a living dinosaur.  The one in the picture here was very friendly and you could feed it by hand, but in the wild they can be very aggressive and dangerous.  They are actually Australia's heaviest land animal.

There were also plenty of wallabies, kangaroos, koalas (of the smaller, cuter, northern kind), wombats, and more.  It was a very nice park, with wide-open huge enclosures for the animals, most of whom were rescued or injured from traffic accidents.  

All the way across Australia, I have been very impressed of how the country handles it's ecotourism.  It is clear a balance needs to be maintained between allowing access to see wildlife for the public for economic purposes and not disturbing wild animals or habitats, and in pretty much every occasion I have seen, everywhere gets the balance just about right, and besides, making wildlife and wild habitats economically valuable is going to be the surest way of protecting them in the long-term.  Australia is doing a great job of not over-egging the pudding though and maintaining a great respect for it's natural treasures.  There is some argument over the Great Barrier Reef, though, as it has been suffering in recent years, both due to agriculture and mining, as well as rising sea temperatures, so I thought I'd better check it out sooner rather than later.  This write-up is my next post.

Broome to Cairns (by bus, with a little cycling and side trips).

Having finished my cycle tour in Australia in Broome, I spent almost 2 weeks in the town.  Broome is a hard place to get to; there aren't many flights there and those that exist are expensive, and as is typical in Australia, it is pretty isolated.  If you have got to Broome, you have probably expended a great deal of time and effort - not to mention spent a fair amount of money - to be there in the first place.

On their way home after a hard day's work on Cable Beach.

Once in Broome, doing anything interesting is also quite expensive, mainly due to the fact that in an already remote place, the places of interest are even more remote still, and also a very long way away.

I changed the title of this blog because of wanted to diversify my range of adventures a little, whilst still continuing to bicycle tour - there are not many better ways of traveling through a country.

Lots of Boab trees lining the streets of Broome.

Broome is an interesting place, being right next to the Kimberly - a quite unique area of Australia - it has quite a different feel to many other towns and cities in Australia.  Boab trees are everywhere, making things look different ( the story of how these trees are in this part of Australia is still something of a mystery).  Aboriginals are everywhere, mainly doing nothing but sitting around loitering as always, but perhaps more so than in many other towns, some are doing jobs, mostly in the tourist industry as guides in remote or culturally significant areas.  A few others sell art on the street or play the didgeridoo outside shopping areas.

Great colour contrast on the coast around Broome.

Perhaps I sound racist when I talk about aboriginals sometimes, but come to Australia, travel around some towns with significant populations of aboriginals and you might understand why they are so difficult to like.  It is no exaggeration to say that 99% of them do nothing, and many of them have quite an unsavoury feel about them.  They often walk around swearing at each other at the top of their voice, dressed shabbily, and look and smell like they haven't had a wash in about 6 months.

Aboriginals doing something (fishing), on the coast of Port Hedland.

Towns with a high population of aboriginals also experience a lot more crime, and this is a source of great frustration for many locals.  I have often been told about this in conversation.  Some people are sympathetic towards their plight, but most have had enough of them.  Money, charity, and services have been thrown at aboriginal communities, but it appears nothing makes any difference.  One woman told me of her volunteer work with aboriginal families; she started wanting to help, but was mortified by her observations of how aboriginal parents were treating their children, often abandoning them or abusing them.  To be frank, they are a real problem in Australia, and nothing seems to be helping them.  One wonders whether they as a people and culture are cut-out for the modern world at all.

I think aboriginals are at their best when they are totally isolated from any Western influence.  This is not to say that Westerners are to blame for their plight.  Modernity was coming for them and if it hadn't been the British, it would have been the Dutch, the French, or perhaps the Japanese.  I'm guessing they were lucky they didn't get the Japanese, or their culture probably wouldn't exist at all right now.  Pity only stretches so far, sometimes you just need to adapt to survive and thrive.  They aren't doing it, they need to get off their arses, full stop.  Obviously, the British pretty much destroyed their way of life, and this has to be acknowledged, but we can't wind the clock back.  Compassion and charity only go so far, aboriginals need to be encouraged to work, and that requires some tough love.

That said, in survival mode in a remote area, without booze, sugar, and drugs, things feel quite different.  I hope the remote areas of Australia stay remote and untouched, except by a few environmentally low-impacting tourists here and there (like me). 

Slug Island in Talbot Bay.

The greatest and most naturally awe-inspiring area of wilderness in Australia has to be the Kimberly.  I got a taste of this on a long day tour from Broome to the Horizontal Falls in Talbot Bay, part of the Buccaneer Archipelago in the coastal north of the Kimberly region.

The Narrow Gap of the Horizontal Falls

To get there it took an hour by seaplane.  In Talbot Bay there are no airstrips, just two large boats tied together and anchored with a couple of jetties off the side.  I had never experienced flying in a seaplane before, and I got to experience it from the co-pilot's seat.  I guess I was the youngest on the flight, and because of how tricky it was to get into the seat, this might have been the reason I was chosen to sit there.  It was a great experience, yet also slightly unerring as a torrent of warning and information came through my headset, and lots of levers, knobs, and dials were easily knocked in a tight space.  I sat very still, trying not to touch anything important.

As we flew across the Kimberly, the scale of the place really hit home.  There was no one out here for hundreds and hundreds of miles.  The landing was smoother than I expected as we dropped into our headquarters for the day in the bay.  It felt like I was entering Jurassic Park or something, it was ancient and remote, with pristine turquoise blue waters and sharks circling the boats and pontoons.

Soon after landing I got to get up close and personal with these sharks as they had a cage for viewing them.  The water was actually quite murky, but luckily the sharks came in very close.  They were mostly nurse sharks with poor eyesight, using touch to explore around the boat and cage.  This made them a little dangerous as they apparently do a lot of exploring by biting things they sense, i.e. fingers and and other appendages.  The water was murky as many large rivers empty into King Sound and surrounding coastal areas bringing a lot of sediment with them, nourishing the bay.

The wider gap.

A boat trip into Cyclone Bay and then through the Horizontal Falls was quite enthralling.  I had never seen a coastal area like it in Australia.  It had a New Zealand like scale to the coastal cliffs and bays, yet with a uniquely Australian twist.  The Horizontal Falls were quite something; the power of the tide being more evident here than possibly anywhere else in the world, a real marvel of nature.  I got quite a soaking at times in my position right at the front of the boat.

After a couple of trips out on the boat, it was time for another flight, this time a low-level scenic flight of the falls and surrounding coastline, landing 30 minutes later at a place called One Arm Point.  From here we took a 4x4 to Cape Leveque and a beach that could only exist in Australia, with sky blue waters lapping onto a white-sand beach next to iron-rich, colourful red rocks.

We had a delicious barramundi lunch here, as there was a little restaurant nearby.  We then took-off once again and dropped into a small town called Beagle Bay.  Home to a shell and pearl decorated church, built by German missionaries who were under house-arrest in the town during the first world war.  It was a pretty little church with some unique artwork.

The journey back to Broome, in total from One Arm Point was about 4 hours, most of it on characteristically outback red, sandy roads, only driveable using a 4x4 vehicle.  This was another first for me, as obviously I can't ride my bike on such roads.

In fact, these kinds of roads were part of the reason I decided to end my cycling in Broome.  I already have some idea of the kind of tour I want to do in this region in the future on a bike with wider tyres and a lighter load.  Then I can take the iconic Gibb River Road and also head into the Bungle Bungles, something I can't do on my current set-up.  One thing is for sure though, I am not done yet with this region of Australia.  I think the North-West is my favourite area of Australia so far, but boy is it harsh and isolated.  I wouldn't mind also suffering-through the warmer months up here and seeing the turtles on the beaches.  I camped and walked across many isolated beaches that were rookeries between October and March.  However, I dread to think how hot it would be at those times of year - and wet in many regions.

Back to Broome then, and I had some days to wait for my bus to Katherine in the Northern Territory.  I decided to put my hand in my pocket once again, this time for a humpback whale tour, although it wasn't anywhere near as expensive as the Horizontal Falls tour.

First though, I was lucky enough to be in Broome for the monthly "Staircase to the moon" celestial phenomenon, where the moon rises at low tide and creates a stunning effect on the mudflats at the town beach.  The picture below gives some idea of the effect, although it looked beautiful actually being there, with an orangey-red colour and a really intriguing light effect on the water and mudflats.

The Staircase to the Moon.

While I was in Broome, I had a few games of squash, and felt so slow that I knew it was time for a fitness regime to counteract the effect of slowly plodding into the wind on the bike for the past few months.  I also felt a little tubby, so I needed to lose a few pounds.

A huge boab tree in Derby.

I started to get into the habit of working-out every morning; circuit training, 400m sprints, and some speed work.  This gave me a bit of a purpose while in Broome and I continued this in Katherine after one leg of an epic bus trip across half of the country.

I did do some cycling, but no swimming.

The bus driver was more than a little irritated by me having a bike, and he wasn't the last.  4 separate drivers pretty much all complained about it and all grumbled that it wouldn't fit, despite the fact it got in easily every time and I did all the work anyway.  I can sort of understand why they were annoyed, but I had paid extra for it.  I felt like they shouldn't moan about it if the service was offered, and it was starting to grate on me paying extra only to have to argue with every single bus driver.

Katherine Gorge

It was about 22 hours from Broome to Katherine on the bus, and I arrived there at an awkward time, about 5 am.  Too early to check in anywhere, I decided to just suck-up the tiredness and cycle 30Km to Katherine Gorge, check that place out and then cycle back into Katherine for late morning/early afternoon.

I'm glad I went out there, the gorge was very nice and it gave me a chance to stretch my legs and do some exercise after 22 hours of sitting.  When I got back though, I was ready for a good rest, so settled-in to a cheap hostel that let me camp for just $11, a discounted rate for cyclists.

A wallaby looking for food just outside of the visitors centre.

I stayed in Katherine for a few days waiting for the next bus and continued my morning exercise routine.  On the final morning, I headed-out for a run to the hot springs, which were actually very pleasant on quite a chilly morning.  There were few people around at that time also.

After another 8 hours, I had arrived in Tennant Creek at about 2am in the morning.  Tennant Creek is not a great place to be arriving at such a time.  It's not a pretty town and the bars on the windows of every single shop tell you a bit of a story about how safe you feel there.  Fortunately, we were dropped at the far North end of town, so I quickly threw everything on my bike and cycled out of town and found a place to camp.

I had a bit of time the next morning and luckily managed to find a decent gym to have a workout in and get a shower before tackling the biggest trip yet, from Tennant Creek to Townsville, another 28 hours!  I am only now realising how bloody far this trip on the bus was now I am writing about it.

I managed to entertain myself with some podcasts and learning a bit of Japanese, but this was almost as tough as riding.

After a short break in Townsville, and riding along the very beautiful shorefront, the final leg was a paltry 6 hours up to Cairns.  I couldn't wait to get there, in total I had spent 64 hours on the bus over the week!

So, what an epic trip on so many levels.  This is living; it's living the life of a millionaire sometimes, while only working 10 hours a week.  But this trip wasn't just relaxing and sipping pina coladas on the beach, this was hardwork, discipline, suffering, discomfort, and despair intermingled with some of the most awe-inspiring experiences it is possible to imagine.  It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I sure like it.

The North Queensland coast at a little snack break stop from Townsville to Cairns.

Australia isn't finished quite yet, though.  I am now in Cairns for almost a month and a half, and there is plenty of adventure up here, both on land and sea, so looking forward to being in one - incredibly beautiful - place for a while to do some running, hiking, cycling, and scuba diving.  It really really is outdoor heaven in this part of the world.