Images from Australia

We are preparing to end our voyage. Paul and I were saying that this has been a really wonderful adventure. We have been so lucky and had a spectacular time.

So we are packing up tonight getting ready to head to Hong Kong for the weekend before heading back to Ontario. Here are a few images from Australia before we say bye.

Sydney Harbour at night.

Sea food anyone?

Paul, Mira and Kate searching for platypus.

Fancy drink at Paul's aunt's nephew's bar in Port Douglas.

Cockatoo in the park.

Freckly girls.

Outback and a termite mound. They are everywhere!

Kate having fun.

Saying goodbye to the beach.

We got to go to the Reef a second time - a couple upstairs in our apartment complex won first place in the Cane Toad races and won a free trip to the reef. They gave us their pass and we did the rest. This time we went to the Opal Reef. Another fantastic day was had by all....

Kate free diving down to look at a clam.

Mira getting friendly with the wildlife.

The crazy snorkelers.

Cheers. mate. s

So what do you do all day?

Hi all, thought you would like to see some photos of our fun... especially since our days are numbered.

Kate is a crocodile and Mira is the box jelly fish.

We are overlooking the 'stinger net' - the protective net that is going to save us from the jellyfish.

We entered in the sandcastle competition - this is our rendition of a salty croc... We wrote in the sand "A Yukon Family Saltwater Crocodile" and the judge thought we were the Yukon Family - like the Smith or Jones Family. We didn't place.

Happy to be on the beach?

Watch out for stingers.

Catching hermit crabs on the beach.

We went up to Cape Tribulation. It is in the Daintree Rainforest. The rainforest comes right down to the sea. It has tons of birds and snakes... look it up.

Kate beside the 12 meter marker for the flooding that takes place in this area.

We did do a croc tour and no, we didn't do any swimming.

Here is old salty.

Along the road to Cape Tribulation, there are lots of warnings about Cassowary crossings. These are huge birds with a horn on their head. We didn't see any in the wild but we saw some on our day in the Rainforest Habitat.

Watch out for these critters.

Kate and the vegetation.

The gang just goofing around.

Take a careful look at this photo. Way back in the back you can see some young woman with her top off and Kate is doing the same :)

Enjoying the sand and sun.

Kate.

Yep, we are here too.

So when you spend two weeks in a town of 3000, you have to look for something fun to do. So we went to the cane toad races at the bar. These toads were brought into Australia to control the Cane Beetle but oops, the cane beetles are found at the top of the sugar cane and the toads don't jump that high. So they have billions of these pests and nothing to kill'em. But it does make for entertaining racing. Kate's ticket was pulled so she encouraged her toad named Fat Bastard. She placed 4th. She did not kiss it... asked mom to do that!

Kate getting Fat Bastard to jump.

End of the race.

That is all from Port Douglas, Queensland for now. cheers. s

Great Barrier Reef - Sweet as....

The pool at our complex... Swimming in the pool was great but...

After consulting our local guru, the manager at our apartment complex here in Port Douglas, Brett, we chose a day that was predicted to be sunny with calm 5-10 knot winds to head out to the Outer Agincourt Ribbon Reefs of the Great Barrier Reef. The day miraculously was all that and more! It was a perfect day on the reef.

The girls were excited and nervous. We were prepared... sea bands, Gravol, warm/cool clothes and our sunnies. The boat took us out to the reef - a smooth 1.5 hour trip. We were briefed on the different marine life and safe snorkeling practices. There are still deadly box jelly fish in the waters in these parts so... wait for it... we had to wear one piece lycra suits. These would protect us from their potentially deadly stingers but more importantly, they protected us from the Australian sun.

We were privileged to have 3 dives. At the first snorkel site, Mira and Kate stayed close to us. We all had swim noodles to help us float around. The sea life was spectacular. It was like swimming in a full aquarium. The coral was colourful and teeming with life. It was the coolest of the three dives -temperature wise, so the girls put on their wet suit over their stinger suits for the next two dives. We were able to name all the main characters from Nemo and Kate and Paul even saw a shark. Kate quickly pulled the lycra suit over her fingers to protect them from the shark!

By the last dive, both girls were snorkeling all over the place. Paul and I were forced to pull our eyes away from the beauty of the deeps to keep track of ever more adventurous children. They were free diving, making shadows over giant clams to encourage them to close and flutter in front of some of the purple plants that grow on the coral and retract when they feel threatened. It was a joy to see. Kate particularly enjoyed chasing the bubbles the divers made below us. Bubble in the sea. One talented diver could even blow air rings.

Heading out of port...

The stinger suit gang!

Smile Mira.

Kate practicing with all her gear.

Looking like experienced snorkelers.

Happy.

Coming back into port.

Clown fish.

On our second dive, we all got to see a turtle. It was beautiful, graceful and lovely to see in the wild.

These gropers are everywhere... there is even one that comes to a local restaurant every evening at 5:00pm - it weighs 250kg. We went by for the show but, well, George is just Ugly.

We all agreed that this was the best day.

Cheers. s

A Fun Day in Australia!!!!!

This is a guest blog by Mira C. Mason.

We went to a wildlife park today. It was so cool. I was amazed at all the different animals & birds of all colours. We saw a cassowary.

It's a big endangered bird. I thought as soon as I saw it that it was stuffed but I was wrong. It was ALIVE!!!! With its colours red, blue and turquoise it was amazing. It had a crown like thing on the top of its head that's brown. Sooo cool!

Then we walked to a wooden walkway on posts. We saw black & yellow birds, red & purple birds and green birds. There were so many birds it looked like a rainbow after that we walked to a spot half way there. We saw a wallaby. It was a red legged wallaby. It was doing yoga, it had its tail tucked under itself so that it looked like it had a tail from its nose then suddenly I saw another. It hopped really high. Then we walked on.

I saw a really cool bird.... it was a parrot, a red and black one and beside it there was a yellow & black parrot. They were yelling at each other in a squawking sort of noise. Then I saw another parrot. It was black & yellow like the other one but it was on a cage. I didn't know what the cage was for but I knew that it was not for the parrot. Then I looked harder... & harder... & harder then I saw it. It was for a koala.

I knew that because there was a koala munching on eucalyptus. It looked so soft and cuddly. I wanted to grab him but I didn't. I just yelled, " Mom... Kate.. Papa!!!" It was so exciting. I was jumping up and down. After a few minutes, they came. I showed them and they too got excited. We looked at him for a while then carried on looking at birds. After a little bit of walking, we found a cockatoo. It was white with a little yellow feather on the top of his head. Mommy, Kate and I said hello to him and he said hello. I was so surprised then me and Kate said hello again and he said it too then we tried again a third time but he didn't say hello then we left.

Kookaburra

Down the trail a little bit but we realized that the koala show was about to start. We walked back on to the koala station. On the back we saw 2 kookaburras on a log. They were black, brown and yellow. We tried to make them sing for us but they didn't.

Owl friend.

Then we saw an owl - he looked at us and looked bored. Then finally we made it back to the koala station. The lady talked about how Koalas eat, live, sleep and mark their territory. It was neat. After that, we went to a counter and got a ticket to hold a koala. It was a once in a life time experience. His name was Grizzly. He was very soft but at the same time kind of rough. He had sharp claws. Kate was too small to hold him so I held him. There was a man that took our photo and Papa took one too.

Mira, Grizzly and Kate

Then we walked to the grasslands. Mommy got some food to feed the kangaroos and wallabies. We went in the enclosure. As soon as we went in the path forked left and there were some wallabies. So we went left first. We took some feed out of the brown paper bag and bent down to try and feed them At first I was nervous but after a while I found it was fun. They are very soft. I know this because they let me pet them. They licked it out of our hands. Some of them were fat from people feeding them. After that we decided to go right instead so we walked back a couple of meters and went right. There were lots of birds trying to get some feed. We gave them some but not much because the kangaroos were coming up next. Then all of a sudden hopping around were kangaroos, 10-15 of them. One of them beside the path was really big. We thought a Big Red maybe? He stared to come closer and closer and then he came and fed out of our hands. He was so cool. He licked all the food out of our hands then waited for more. Next we went to the free kangaroos. They are kind of very odd looking kind of like a koala and kangaroo cross.

Mira and Big Red?

Kate feeding a kangaroo

Tree Kangaroo

After that we went to the crocs. We were almost on the bridge when we saw an emu. Mom wanted to try to feed it and it pecked the food out of her hand almost biting it. Papa, Kate & I were all on the bridge but the emu wouldn't let mom on. After a minute of trying to get by the emu finally gave in and Mommy ran for it.

Mom feeing a Emu

The bridge was very windy. It took a while for us to see the crocs because they are so good at camouflage but we saw them. They are 1 meter to 1.5 meters long.

Fresh Water Croc

We went around another bend and we found the salt water crocs. He was 3 m. long maybe even bigger after that we got off the bridge. Wow!!!

Salt Water Croc

Cheers mates, Mira C. Mason