The Australian Bar B Q last night was a lot of fun. Of course there was food galore and the wine and champagne flowed freely again. I tried alligator meat, kangaroo and emu. I was going to try a “BUG”, which is like a miniature lobster, brown in colour, but I left my plate for a few minutes to go and look for my friend Shirley who got lost trying to return to the table we were sharing with other friends. When I got back, my plate had been cleared away and my bug was gone. Oh well—I didn’t really want to eat one – I was only going to eat it in order to be able to say I had done it.
There was limited seating in the dining room last night, because most people went to the Bar B Q, which was really crowded. Everyone seemed to be having a good time. A band of 3 local musicians entertained us with Australian music and song (violin, guitar and bass violin). A couple of the crew were barefoot in a vat of grapes pressing them for wine.
The above are some of the Pilipino crew who were serving the food.
After the meal, there was a live show in the Queen’s Lounge, a movie in the theatre, singing in the Piano Bar and dancing to live music until 11:30 in the Ocean Lounge and until midnight up above on the Sports Deck. Lots of fun to be had.
This morning I was on a tour called “Tropical Rainforest and Aboriginal Adventure.” It poured buckets of rain all day long – - how appropriate. There were clear plastic umbrellas available for all of us as we left the ship. We are certainly well looked after here. We boarded a bus which should have taken a half hour to reach our destination, but on the way, we were stopped for about 45 minutes, because a large tree had fallen across the road and we had to wait until a work crew could come and clear this up.
The location where we went, is also an animal preserve with native Australian animals on display, so we saw kangaroos, alligators, emus, dingoes and koala bears. Those animals are so beautiful and the kangaroos were so tame that we were feeding them again.
Fortunately the paths we followed to get to see the displays were all covered, so we didn’t get wet, even though the rain never let up.
After visiting the animals, we were led to the location where some male aborigines put on a show which was meant to give us an idea of their dances and the sound of their musical instruments – all very touristy. They then showed us how to throw boomerangs and people were given a chance to try it. It’s not as easy as it looks.
The final part of our visit there took us onto amphibious vehicles for a drive through the rainforest. ( These vehicles are like the ones used to land troops during the second world war.) The man who drove spoke with a broad Australian accent and the vehicle made so much noise, that even though he used a microphone, it was difficult to hear his comments. From what I could make out, when we stopped to view certain things, he had a great sense of humour. We drove up and down steep hills through the jungle and then into a body of water. All the time the driver was giving a commentary about the beauty and magic of the rainforest. Too bad I couldn’t hear a lot of it.
This was a five hour tour and the only food available was cookies, chips and drinks. My lunch was a cookie made with macadamia nuts and a mango drink. I really looked forward to our evening meal. During the ride back , we passed through the main streets of Cairns which were in very close proximity to the ship and I would have loved to go for a walk and explore, but it was still pouring buckets, so I opted to stay inside.
Cairns is our last stop in Australia. Now we are heading for Asia
Did you have a chance to go to the Great Barrier Reef? I remember when I was in Cairns, I enjoyed walking about the little streets near the port. I remember seeing the big tour ships. Going out to the Reef was my highlight. The snorkelling there was amazing.
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