Australia - Cairns and The Great Barier Reef

 Next stop was Cairns and I have to say it was the town I liked best. Many years ago I had a penfriend in Australia who moved to Cairns when she got married to a doctor. Unfortunately we lost contact years ago and I can't even remember her surname so was unable to look her up. I did meet her in 1970 when she was travelling round Europe and was staying in Ealing. So Jeanette if you should happen to be reading this - get in touch!

 

 View from hotel.

 

Bats flying at dusk and if you enlarge the picture you will see the crescent moon - not like ours at left or right but at the bottom - looked very strange!

Birds in the zoo which is in the dome of the Casino!

 Then a trip to The Great barrier Reef  - this is the pontoon we were on for the day.

 Fishes through the window and Roy snorkelling!

 Coral from the semi-submersible. Not very easy to get a good picture.

Australia - Part 2

After Melbourne we flew to Alice Springs and immediately did a tour of the town, visiting

 

 the School of the Air 

The Royal Flying Doctor Service

and the Telegraph station.

In the evening we had a barbecue dinner at an outback homestead Earth Sanctuary where the family  have set up a sustainable environment and way of living. Being out in the desert the night sky was amazing - so many stars to see - with no light pollution. 

the next day we drove the 450 km to Uluru.

 A visit to the Rock at sunset - only the sun wasn't playing as it was too cloudy!

 A very early start the next morning - 4.15 - to see the sunrise. This time the sun was a little more obliging and provided some deep purple shadows. A few of the more intrepid on the tour collected a packed breakfast and set out to walk all the way round. Those of us less adventurous headed back to the hotel for a shower and breakfast before heading back to pick up the walkers and do a shorter walk.

This photo shows some of the markings on the rock caused by water erosion. In the evening we had another sunset opportunity but this time at Katja Tjuta after a walk through Walpa Gorge.

 Walpa Gorge

The sun wasn't playing again - lots of cloud!

The following day we had an Aborigine Dot Painting workshop before heading off to Cairns.

All our paintings laid out to dry!  I'm going to have another go at this in my art journal - just waiting for the black gesso to arrive!

I'm Back!

A warning this post will be photo heavy!

So pleased to see that my scheduled posts worked so you may not have realised that I've been missing, but I have! I took a few photos on our fantastic holiday in Oz (over 700!) but don't panic I'm not going to show them all! Just a few and over a few posts so you don't get too bored! After a loooong flight via Hong Kong we arrived at our hotel in Melbourne in the early hours of Sunday morning (we left home on Friday morning at 7am!). The tour started that afternoon so we were able to get a reasonable amount of sleep. In fact we didn't wake till 11am and had missed breakfast so brunched on a MacDonalds!!

View from hotel bedroom

A walk along the riverside in the late morning then it was time to meet our fellow travellers followed by dinner on an old tram while it toured the city.

The next day we had a tour of the city which included a visit to the Shrine of Remembrance, Botanic Gardens and Captain Cook's Cottage and some of the old lanes which are filled with restaurants and coffee shops! In the afternoon we drove to Phillip Island to see the Penguin Parade with stops on the way to see some of the outstanding scenery and a Koala and Kangaroo conservation park.

 

No photos of the penguins though as cameras were not allowed. The flashes would have spooked them ! 

I'll tell you where we went next in another post!