Oh What An Earrrrly Morning!

Tuesday 14 November

We had been dreading the alarm going off at 03.15 this morning, but in fact we got an even earlier wake up call, when Juz phone about 02.15! Just to have a chat!!! We hadn’t talked to her for quite a while so it was good to hear her voice. If she had just left it another hour – it would have been perfect!

We were up with our cases out and I was blogging at 04.15! I need to keep up to date as much as I can. We met everyone else going to Cairns downstairs, and the cases were soon loaded and we were on our way. I still can’t believe just how quickly this trip is going, we are now almost half way through our nine months – when we were at planning stage it seemed like we would be away for a lifetime, but now it seems it will be just an extended break!

As we made our way to the airport, Ruben played the end of the film, as he had promised and we just managed to see the end this time. Darwin Airport is like a provincial airport – not a state capital airport. There are about half a dozen check in desks – all devoted to our flight, although one other plane was leaving about a quarter of an hour earlier than our departure. We safely checked in our luggage – both cases having a large orange “heavy” label attached – mine weighing in at 26.5 kgs and Colins at 24.5 kgs. But they went through without any comment. We only had about half an hour to wait till we boarded. I tried to buy one stamp, but you have to buy a postcard before you can buy any stamps! So I bought three more postcards for the grandchildren and quickly wrote and posted them

Why do people on small planes insist on having their seat right back in the person behin’s lap? I changed seats with Colin so that I could blog on the journey, around eating my yogurt and drinking my mango juice for breakfast – they provided cereals and cake – neither being my favourite foods. We had been given a ‘breakfast box’ last night by the hotel – we should have looked inside and we would have known to put it in the fridge – the yogurt was warm and the fruit slushy this morning, so we left them in our room.

We had a good view of Cairns as we approached – the sky was clear and blue with hardly a wisp of cloud. We could see the hills behind the city, surrounding what looked like a fairly small settlement from the air. As we touched down the pilot told us to move our watches on half an hour – so we are now back to ten hours in front of home. When we landed, Cairns airport was another parochial aiport, with long concrete corridors – they haven’t heard of moving walkways here. The man who was going to take us to our hotel was there waiting as we entered the Arrivals Hall, and looked after our hand luggage while we collected our bags. Cynthia, Fergus and Ruth were there, and so was Henny and Poul (a Danish couple – he’s a surgeon) – apparently they are on the trip as far as Sydney too! But Sue and Norm did not appear to have been on the flight – where were they? Nobody knew what had happened to them, so as soon as we had all collected our luggage the driver led us to the awaiting bus to drive us through Cairns to the hotel – only the driver did not seem to be too sure which hotel. He finally arrived at the Rydges Tradewinds, a large modern hotel right on the Esplanade. By this time it is still only 09.30, so of course our rooms weren’t going to be ready for a couple of hours. No problem to us, we needed to go shopping!

We found our way to the large shopping centre – about fifteen minutes walk away, through streets that seemed entirely devoted to restaurants – will make choosing where to eat easy tonight. The lady on the tour counter in the hotel had given us directions to the camera shop in town, which was right by the entrance door of the shopping mall. Although when you go in you think you know what you want, it’s very easy to become confused by all the information supplied by the ever-attendant salesman. We looked at lots of cameras, before making an “almost” decision on one – those who know Colin, know he never makes a decision quickly! We had to go and find a magazine shop just so he could check it out in “What Camera”, and then think about it again. Finally we’d mulled enough and decided on the Sony T10, one of the small black digital cameras on the market that are fine for just “aim and shoot” photography. It has all the downloading equipment with it and a charger – good news – and it just needed a card, case and extra battery. So now we are all ready to photograph our next trip – hopefully frustration free!

Once we had made our purchase we strolled around the centre – the shops here are not like Bluewater – even the newsagents was set out differently – with racks of magazines on different topics separating the different cards – birthday, anniversary, birth, etc., so whatever you wanted, it wasn’t all together in one section – very confusing. We had a good look around and then settled on “Healthy Options” for an early lunch. They are very fond of wraps, toasted foccatas (Italian bread) and baguettes with really imaginative fillings all over Australia – even in the roadside transport caffs – so we enjoyed a chicken, spinach and guacamole foccata which was scrummy. While we were eating we were serenaded by Christmas carols and then we noticed all the Christmas decorations – trees, garlands, hanging orbs. With the temperature still in the 30’s it seemed very strange. As we walked back to the hotel we noticed Christmas cards in the shops, and notices urging you to “buy now for Christmas” with a discount thrown in. We also noticed that all the signs and information, in the streets and in the shops, such as menus, descriptions of goods, road directions, are shown in Chinese as well as English, reflecting the large numbers of Chinese people who have settled here. We are, of course not too far from mainland China, in relative terms.

We reached the hotel only to find the “handyman” putting up the Christmas trees in the foyer, a huge 20+ foot tree that reached from floor to ceiling, dark green, to be decorated with gold bows and blue lights, and a smaller version waiting nearby. We are obviously going to be inundated from now with seasonal offerings – it just doesn’t seem right – Father Christmas in Billabong swimming shorts! We wandered back along the sea front – where there is a large public swimming pool and lots of tables and benches for picnics, under the mango trees. Most resorts provide public swimming pools because of the endemic Box jelly fish with tentacles around one metre in length, that are found all round the coasts of tropical Australia. They are not at all pleasant, as if they sting you on the body – as opposed to the arms or legs, their venom can kill you.

Our room was ready by this time, on the second floor and overlooking the pool area and the beach. It has a small balcony where we will be able to sit and catch the sun’s rays for most of the day. Another of our important tasks was finding the laundry on either the 3rd or 7th floors. We found two washing machines capable of taking large loads, and two tumble driers in a small room on the 3rd floor and loaded all our dirty washing from the last week or so. The total cost of purchasing the necessary powder (A$ 1), working the washing machine (A$ 3) and tumble drier (A$3), came to the princely sum of approx 3.50 GBP – a lot cheaper than the 30 or 40 we could have paid for the hotel to do it. In Australia, most hotels have washing machines for you to do your own laundry, and rooms then have an iron and ironing board for you to finish the task. I have never known that as a norm in England, but it is a jolly good idea, and saves a fortune, especially as Colin did some ironing while I finished publishing a couple of blogs and emailing – who got the best deal?

We then had a short nap – having searched the television stations for a decent programme. The choice is awful – several Chinese and Japanese programmes to cater for the hoards of immigrants and visitors that come here from those countries, the news at 07.00 and 18.00 (a bit like Britain in the old days), and a couple of channels showing repeats, mainly of old Brit dramas and comedies – the Bill and Dad’s Army! If you want a film you mainly have to pay for it in the smarter hotels (like we have to pay for the safe in our room, if we want to use it!) and hardly any sports channels, only short reports in the news bulletins, except at weekends, when you may get Australian Rules football or cricket. The have a long way to go to catch up with British TV.

Colin has pasta withdrawal symptoms, so tonight was his choice for food. On leaving the hotel, there were hundreds of large black birds flying overhead – about the size of rooks. It was only as it got darker, and the numbers increased, we realized these were bats. They were flying around frantically, making a cawing sound, high above the road. It was almost frightening, as it resembled a seen from “The Birds” film. We had heard bats were a problem in this area, but were not aware of just how much. We searched out an Italian restaurant that had some atmosphere, and good food too, to boot. The one we chose was called La Fettucina. We sat outside under the awning and order pasta and a steak (yes, I am back on the beef kick again – maybe for the last time – as hopefully there will be lots of seafood on offer on this tour. The steak was a fillet, cooked blue and was absolutely delicious – the waitress told us the best steaks in Australia were found in the restaurant, and she may well be right!

After a stroll home, the still warm evening air with the lights of the boats and harbour barrage, blinking red and green out to sea (the tide was way out this afternoon, and it was a bit like Morecombe Bay or Norfolk, you had difficulty seeing the shoreline over the flat sands, but the sea soon comes running at a fair pace once the tide turns). We took a few shots with the new camera, but realized it probably had a night setting – so had to read up further about accessing the menu. We will be trying out more options with it tomorrow.

There was just time for a short blog, and then bed, to catch up on some of the sleep missed last night – and no need to set the alarm (all telephones turned off). Aaaahhhhh . . . . . .