Monday 23rd February 2015
We were up at 7.15am, as this is really 8.15am body time. We had a chill morning washing and sorting. Breakfast was the familiar Weetbix and coffee. It is a lovely sunny hot morning, so once we were sorted we had a walk out into the town again. We walked along Mowbray Street and saw a strange Irish train – the Faugh a Ballagh, which dates from 1899 and is in the process of being restored. We also saw loads of tadpoles in the stream next to it.
Our walk to took us to the docks and along Wharf Street and Port Douglas Park, several photo ops later we reached the Police Station, which had a big ‘Open’ sign on the door but a smaller ‘out on patrol’ one underneath it. We walked onto Macrossan Street to Coles supermarket again for drinks and bread.
Sue booked a trip for us out to the Great Barrier Reef tomorrow while I walked back to unit and made sandwiches. Sue joined me – the lass she had booked the trip with was from Stoke on Trent! She couldn’t get on the one she wanted to the Outer Reef, but had booked us onto the one to the inner reef and waitlisted us for the other one.
I went to sit by the pool for a bit and Sue sorted clothes. England are playing Scotland it all sorted very well with Moeen and Belly putting on a solid opening partnership. Moeen got his century but then we started to lose quick wickets.
After some discussion, and poring over maps, we made the decision to head up to the Daintree Rain Forest area . We had to drive back out to the 44, then north onto the 14 through Mossman which is quite big place with lots of shops including very big Woolworth’s. Carrying on north to Daintree very green and humid – a lot like New Zealand. We parked up and had a walk down to the river but we didn’t see any crocs. It is still really hot but amazingly green.
Sue took over the driving and we stopped at Daintree Village General store an for ice cream but they had all melted in the freezer! We went for a look at the ferry over the river, it is very much like the Sandbanks Ferry in Dorset, but we didn’t bother going over.
Starting back south, we called at Wonga Beach, which was deserted and then at Newell Beach , which was also deserted. It is still red hot, but we can see storm clouds in the distance over the mountains. Listening to the radio news, it is all all about the Cyclone Marcia clean up, which is entered around Rockhampton, which is a long way south of us – about half way to Brisbane. No mention of England cricket in the sports bulletin, so we assume they won, or it would have been the lead story without a doubt.
After having a walk on Newell Beach Sue drove onto Mossman. We called into the Woolies, but despite its size, there is no cafe, so we headed back to the unit for coffee and a shower. We also found out that England won by 100 plus runs. Christopher was starting his new job as we were sat drinking coffee, but we were thinking abut him.
We got changed and had a walk out to the supermarket. They have flying foxes here too – they are equally as noisy – they are classified as an endangered species, but the numbers we have seen would dispute that. For food we settled on an Italian place called Bucci. For starter we shared salted cod with bread and for main Sue had pan fried local barramundi with Tuscan fennel and orange salad salsa verde. I had Cotoletta Alla Milanese, which is parmesan herb and chilli breaded free range chicken breast with garlic and lemon butter, heirloom tomato and fennel salad.
Our waitress was from Essex! We both had a beer which was missed off bill. Being very honest , we pointed out their mistake, which seemed to take them by surprise! It was a very nice meal, but it was the dearest to date at $100 plus.
We walked back to the unit. I did diary and Sue ironed – Robbie Williams in concert from the Royal Albert Hall was on the TV followed by Coldplay in concert from the Sydney Opera House. We settled down at a reasonable time as we have a fairly early start tomorrow.
Trip 210km
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