Combovers Things To Do Before You're Bald

A Traveller’s Diary of Oz

Cairns, adrenaline, adventure and friends!

Most backpackers on their Gappy tend to start in Sydney and wind their way up the East-Coast, buying up dilapidated station-wagons in Travellers' auto-markets or working for a month and signing their life and sleep away to an Oz Experience bus.

I chose the reverse, landing in Cairns, small and beautiful. In Queensland, Cairns is the last major urban hotspot before the untameable tropical jungle reigns king, sure ther's Port Douglas but this is little more than a town for the likes of Julia Robert and Clooney. In fact, there is no useable road from Cairns to Cape York, Queensland's Frontier Town and supplies are shipped in from Darwin.

Cairns is party town, the great benefit to those savvy enough to be there in the Winter is that whilst tourism dollars decrease aroudn the country, prices are lowered to reflect the drop in tourism. But Queensland doesn't suffer from the Souther Hemipshere Winter, in fact it's the best time to go. Temperatures are consistently warm, the sun basks the Region in sunlight for weeks on end and the humidity is within acceptable ranges. During the summer, the air is a furnace whilst constant 100% Humidity is like wearing a hot, wet blanket the entire day. A/C units work overtime and the inhabitants shelter isnide for the sweltering heat of the day.

During my first week, I did the usual, gorged on cheap takeaway food and alcohol, had a few horror-stories of 'terrors from the deep' wanting to jump my bones and signed myself up for a bungee-jump/white-water rafting combination. I've never WWR before but the close proximity of the Barron and Tully Rivers is a playground for Beginners and Intermediates. The Barron River fluctuates between a trickle and a torrent, since the Hydro-electric dam was constructed across it. Twice a day the sluices are opened and the river swells, providing the Grade 2-3 rapids that give newbie paddlers a decent 45-minute ride. The guides were fun and competitive which brought out a nice feeling of comradeship with fellow raft-mates during the afternoon, I would recommend Raging Thunder to others.

A.J.Hackett is well-known as the inventor of the commercial bungee-jump model. Now, he's got 'jump' sites everywhere! The thing about bungee-jumping, is that there's no skill. Unlike WWR, there's no increasing grades, only increasing heights and whilst a 200-m Bridge-jump might seem more daunting than a 47-m platform, the only requisite you need is Mass. So whilst I enjoyed my bungee immensely, I still ended up doing a 200m monster in Wanaka and if I'm honest, could've saved myself some money and bypassed A.J. Hackett Cairns. Still, the 'jump-menu' and vairety of options to jump was a decent gimmick and extra-jumps are offered at a considerable discount, if you buy 5 jumps then you get unlimited free jumps thereafter. Swan-Dive, Blindfold, Hang-from-a-rail, tombstone, running-jump and even BMX-launch are all possible.

After this, I found myself wandering what to do? I'd made a few acquintances but no real friends as yet, no invitations to car-share or rent a campervan. I always knew, before I went that people are the key, meeting and making friends is so essential to enjoying travelling (for me) that I signed upto a volunteer work exchange. That's right, I chose to spend a month working, for food and board, pottering around someone's property doing odd-jobs. Maybe I was lucky, but this turned out to be the best decision I could have made. I ended up on an ex-crocodile farm, working for a typical hard-yakka, hard-playing Aussie bloke and his international volunteer crew. A french couple, 2 German mates and 1 crazy Danish bloke made for a wild time. With a beach 5 mins. away, a secluded, secret waterfall and chillingly refreshing splash pool a 45-minute hike into the bush, much fun was had and much XXXX Gold was drunk. Nearing the end of my time there, I wondered what was next, but was pleasantly surprised when the French couple asked me to car-share for a roadtrip to Alice and Australia's enigmatic icon, Ayer's Rock!

I'll continue the adventure in my next post! And now a link from our sponsors, no post is complete without one!

Family Vacations
Discover great ideas for your next family vacation getaway.