Cairns et. al.

Kuranda Rain Forest: To get to Kuranda, we took an antique train. It takes about an hour making a stop at a scenic overlook station.

Kuranda Rain Forest: The train wound up through the mountains past some pretty stunning waterfalls. The tracks are a hundred years old and the bridges over the chasms were mostly of wooden construction. Sounds scary but in truth it felt safe enough.

Kuranda Rain Forest: As we got higher, the climate got wetter. The warm Pacific ocean air bumps up against these mountains which creates the rainfall.

Opps, this picture really belongs in the Alice Springs section but I'm too lazy to move it. It is one of the desert creatures we saw while there. We were informed the horned toad eats ants ... up to 9,000 a day of the little piss ants.

Kuranda Rain Forest: Once we got to the small town of Kuranda, we stopped in a little "petting zoo" which had kangaroos you could feed, Koalas that were patient enough to hold, and crocodiles we steered pretty well clear of. We then took the gondola back. This is really the way to see a rain forest. The gondola skims along just above the trees and it's in the tree tops that all the action is. All the birds. Most of the flowers. The ride back ... some 9 kilometers stopped at two stations where you could get out and walk around the rain forest at ground level. It was really pretty neat.

Kuranda Rain Forest: It's hard to describe the density of the rain forest but this and the next 2 pictures capture it pretty well.

Kuranda Rain Forest

Kuranda Rain Forest

Kuranda Rain Forest: Petting zoo.

Kuranda Rain Forest: Petting zoo.

Kuranda Rain Forest: Petting zoo.

Kuranda Rain Forest: Petting zoo.

Undara Lava Tubes: We actually had a day too many in Cairns so we booked an unlikely day trip to the Undara lava Tubes. In order to get there we took a bus which made a stop at Ravenshoe (pronounced ravens-hoe) where they had this neat wind farm. The bus ride was as thrilling as the destination. Much of the drive was on single-lane paved roads with broad dirt shoulders. The bus, or any other vehicle for that matter, drives square in the middle of the paved single lane. Traffic is light so until you meet an oncoming vehicle things go pretty smoothly. Then there is this little game of chicken played by our bus in this case, and say, a 4 trailer road train. Closing at well over a hundred miles an hour, both move to their respective left, one set of wheels on the pavement and one set of wheels on the dirt. They flash past each other faster than your life can flash before your eyes, and then swing back onto the pavement to await the next encounter.

Undara Lava Tubes: Formed by a now-extinct volcano, the lava tube in this case extends for more than 100 kilometers. Because water collect around them, they are a moist habitat for trees in the otherwise dry landscape. We saw a satellite photo and it is easy to follow the lava tube by following the trees. In fact it is easier to see where they are this way than from the ground. Mostly they are below the level ground and have been buried by erosion.

Undara Lava Tubes: Much of the 100-kilometer length has collapsed. The longest un-collapsed section is 6 kilometers. In the summer, bats live in the tubes, and their droppings attract spiders, which attract frogs, which in turn attract snakes. To hear it described, the snakes are as plentiful as an Indian Jones movie. Just a suggestion ... don't go in the summer.

Daintree Rain Forest: ... height. By growing tall, a tree can get closer to the light. By growing flowers and thereby seeds high in the tree, the birds will scatter seeds maximizing the survival prospects for the species. Because of the low light, many plants and trees grow very slowly. We saw trees that were half a millennia old.

Daintree Rain Forest: As I mentioned before, the rain forest is dense. So dense in fact, it is nearly dark at ground level. Plants being what they are need light to convert sunlight into plant matter and all the rain forest plants, trees and flowers have adapted to maximize their chances of success. Broad leaves and ...

Daintree Rain Forest: Although warm and wet, an ideal environment for plants and trees to grow, the low light actually creates a harsh survival environment for plants. and the different species seem to compete in a sort of photosynthesis Olympics.

Daintree Rain Forest: Cape Tribulation is the only place in the world where two World Heritage Sites border each other ... The Daintree Rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef (more on that later). We traveled there by bus and it's a short leisurely ride. The rivers of the rainforest flow into the ocean and in the brackish waters near the coast live salt water crocodiles. During the drive the bus driver told crocodile stories.

Daintree Rain Forest: Many many of the plants are climbing plants using tendrils to grab ahold of and climb a symbiotic host.

Daintree Rain Forest: And evolution spawns some bizarre solutions to the survival problem.

Daintree Rain Forest: Here we were far from the coast and the risk of crocodiles was essentially zero. Therefore, pools in this rocky river were natural swimming holes and a cool retreat from the ocean which is invaded by box jellyfish this time of year.