Cairns: Kuranda and Botanical Garden

We got up early (4:45 a.m.) because we had to leave early to reach our destination on time. We saw a lot of bats! After a bit of a delay, we left around 5:35 a.m. I slept a bit longer in the car. At Smithfield Terminal, we took the shuttle bus to Fairview Station, where we had to wait quite a while (we watched the horse, ate a sandwich, and two of the group got stung by some kind of creature, a bee?) before the train we'd bought our tickets for arrived. It was a "Scenic Railway" to Kuranda. And scenic it was indeed! We saw a few waterfalls, had beautiful views of the countryside/mountains, etc. It was hot, though, because such an old-fashioned train doesn't have air conditioning. Along the way, the train stopped at a large waterfall for a quick peek. Once in Kuranda, we wandered around the markets and the shopping street. We also visited an Aboriginal art gallery, which was beautiful! We even did a little geocache with Cynthia and Angela, haha. Oh, and I saw a jackfruit tree! It's so cool that these kinds of plants grow outside and produce fruit. We also had a quick look around the visitor center, where I saw a cool spider and a walking stick insect in a terrarium. I heard some Dutch babbling at the cash register, so I thought, let's be really sociable and walk up to random people to strike up a conversation. Well, I'm so glad I did! It started off well when I asked if they were Dutch and got a "yeah, duh" kind of response back, which was nice. The conversation was fine otherwise; the two older women were from Den Helder, in some obscure village. Then I was asked: "I hear you have an accent. You're not Dutch, are you? Where are you from?" ………. From the Netherlands?? I feel like I still speak decent Dutch, but who knows. I actually think they're just not used to accents outside their village. My friends thought it was funny when I told them about it afterward, surprised. After the visitor center, we wandered back through the main shopping street—it's not that big, actually, a pretty small village. We picked up a drink somewhere (sugar cane lime and ginger juice; I later found out that Arthur had apparently bought the exact same thing when he was in Kuranda, telepathy or something). Then we came to a thrift store where we admired a couple who both had a parrot on their shoulder. They noticed, and then we were allowed to hold the parrot for a moment: Oh, wow! A parrot on my arm right there on the street, I didn't expect that. What a beautiful creature <3

Then it was time to go, this time taking the Skyrail back! The gondola made a few stops along the way where we could have a look around. Once back down, we had a few last hours, so we drove back to Cairns (I drove this time!), where we went to an art museum. A nice escape from the sun, haha (I was turning red, because I'd been smart enough not to put on sunscreen). After the art museum, we drove to the Botanical Gardens. I had a blast taking pictures of plants, because there were so many beautiful, cool, and unfamiliar plants! And of course, a lot I recognized from Leurs. I also saw some strange spiders, with a crab-like body. Apparently, that was the first spider to be named in Australia.

Sadly, every vacation must come to an end. So we drove to the car wash to give the car a good cleaning with laser spray and vacuum cleaners. I'd never been to a car wash before, so I thought those water jets on the window looked pretty cool. We returned the car at the airport and then waited for our flight and had a bite to eat at Hungry Jack's (that's what Burger King is called in Australia). We slept a bit on the flight. After that, we went to Wingstop with Sunny and Angela; apparently, it's an American chain they're fans of. It was indeed delicious. We ate our food at their student complex and then finally went home, tired.