Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Australian Adventure, Part 2!

The next part of our trip was a favorite for everyone. Once again I took a zillion pictures. This is probably going to be overload but since this blog is mostly for my records I don't want to leave anything out. So if you're brave, or just bored, read on!
After a few fun filled, but rainy days in Sydney we were looking forward to some warmer weather. We jumped on yet another plane and flew to Cairns. It is up towards the very top on the North East side of Australia. We were only there long enough to get our rental car and then started our drive to Port Douglas. We had been told that it's a beautaiful drive along the coast but unfortunately it got dark right as we were leaving so we weren't able to enjoy it that night. It was extremely curvy though which made it plenty interesting! We got to Port Douglas at about 7 or so and got settled in the house and then grabbed a quick bite to eat at a fabulous restraunt called Zinc which we went to a couple more times while we were there because it was so good. In the morning we woke up and got aquatinted with the town. It wasn't
long before we had all fallen in love. It's a tiny little town and has the best feel to it. It's the closest town to the barrier reef. The weather while we were there was around 80 degrees the whole time and was perfect!
This is the house that we stayed in. It was called the Garrick house. We had an apartment style place with two bedrooms, a kitchen, and a big living space. My mom and Kelly had their own apartment. It was perfect! We also had a big balcony at the front of the house that we spent a lot of time on first thing in the morning, listening to the cool birds.
A picture of my cute boys enjoying the view from our balcony.
This picture is taken from our balcony. We had a swimming pool in the front yard as well but only went their once. The beach is much more exciting :)
This is a picture of the beach just one street over from our house. It's called 4 mile beach, and it's amazing. It's absolutely beautiful, but the sand is compact enough to comfortably walk or jog on, but also great for playing in and making sand castles. We could have spends days on end here!
Aidan and Baylee sharing a smoothie the first morning we were there.
This was Mason's very first experience with the beach. I think he loved it more than anyone. He loved the water! He also loved the sand though, and just kept picking up handfuls of it and taking it to the water and throwing it and then doing that over and over. It was so fun to watch the kids experience and fall in love with the beach.
As soon as the kids started making sand castles Mason would run over and knock them over, and anytime he saw a hole in the sand he would climb into it and start filling it up. So stinking cute!
The only time he cried on the beach was when we had to leave and this time. He had face planted. Such a sad, but cute face! lol
I didn't think it was possible but Mason has become even more attached to Nanny on this trip. He went from a mommy's boy to a Nanny's boy. If she is around he insists that she hold him. He just can't get enough of her. Luck for him, the feeling is mutual :)
We found a super cute Gelato shop and it became an almost nightly treat to stop in for a scoop. So yummy!
The second day we were there we went on a snorkeling trip! We took this big boat over to an Island called the Lower Isles, which is part of the Great Barrier Reef.
Miss sassy pants was pouting about something on the boat ride over.
The ride out was a littel over an hour. Mason definitely worked on getting his "sea legs." He wanted to walk aroudn constantly, but the boat was pretty bouncy so it was pretty entertaining to watch him try to get around.
This is the beautiful island. It has this cute little Lighthouse on it. By the time we left the tide had dropped so much that a lot of the reef surrounding it was exposed and it was connected to anouther island by a sand bar.
Aidan did really good snorkeling for his first time! He loved it as long as he was near the shore. When is started getting a little deeper and murkier he got nervous which is understandable, but there was still a lot of fish and coral to see close to shore.
Mason was a good spectator. He was just happy to be back on the beach and in the sand.
Baylee actually did pretty good too, but eventually hitched a ride on dad's back and was able to see things from there.


Barry and I went out with Kelly for a little bit while my mom watched the kids and we were able to see a bunch of turtles. It was so fun! Such a cool expretience, and we all had a great time!
The next day we traveled back towards Cairns. This time we were able to enjoy the shoreline drive and it was awesome. We also saw quite a few fields of wallabies. We went to an aboriginal village call Tjapukai (Jap a ky). We watched some performances, and got to learn how to throw boomerangs and spears. Aidan says this was one of his favorite things we did.
When we got there someone painted all of the kids faces.
Then we watched them do some dances and songs to didgeridoo music.
Aidan and Baylee even got to get up on the stage and dance with them. So cute!
This is Baylee throwing the boomerang.
And Aidan throwing the spear.
Then the kids each got to paint their own boomerangs to bring home with them. They loved it!
It was so fun and so fascinating to learn about some of the aboriginal's history.
A couple hours later we went took a sky rail over the top of the rainforest. It was about a forty five minute ride total and was AMAZING!! So beautiful!
These pictures don't even do it justice but it is huge! It is the oldest rainforest in the world. That river you see in the background is the Barron river.
We got dropped off at a little town in the middle of the village called Kuranda. We had lunch there and walked around all the little shops.
Cute little Mugger waiting for his lunch.
He found a fountain and entertained himself for quite a while.

My little Crocodile Dundee!
We got off the tram at a lookout spot and got to walk through the rainforest. It was so beautiful We had a great day.
The next morning my mom and I went for a long walk on the beach and got to watch the sunrise.
Afterwards, we all decided to spend our last day in Port Douglas doing our favorite thing......playing on the beach!




We had to stop and get gelato one more time before leaving. We were all really sad to leave Port Douglas. Luckily we still had two weeks of vacation left and we had so much more fun ahead of us in Melbourne and more!
I am actually typing this on June 19th and we head to the airport to go home first thing in the morning. We are soooo sad to be leaving, especially since Barry won't be joining us for a couple weeks, but we have had the most amazing time! We have made so many memories and experienced things that we will remember forever! I have so much more to post about but will have to do it once we get home. See you soon Mates!

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