After my dive trip plans were canceled, I organised a day trip to Kuranda, a cute little village in the mountains. I took the Kuranda Skyrail to get there, which used to be the longest on the planet until they built a longer one in Hong Kong. It was a little scary to be hanging from one littlebar attached to one cable so high above the rainforest! At this point I laughed to myself that I was supposed to be recovering in bed, Never let it be said that a flu got the best of Melanie!

Oh, and an amazing coincidence happened on the way to the Skyrail – I ran into my Irish friend Maike from my jackaroo course in June! We hadn’t crossed paths since Brisbane, so imagine how surprised we were to run across each other of all places in Cairns, and on the same tour. I joined up with her and her three girl mates (from England) for the day of sightseeing.

Kuranda was interesting and there was a lot of Indigenous handiwork and shopping, plus beautiful rainforest walks, but really we only required a few hours to see everything. If you wanted to explore all the bushwalks you could use the entire day.

The best part of the trip was the scenic train ride back on the Kuranda Scenic Train. breathtaking views! We learned quite a bit about its history, which I’ll not bore you with, except that it wasn’t originally built as the tourist attraction it mainly is today. The relaxing rocking of the train, with the breeze from the open window and the countryside rolling by, was a perfect end to the day. The train even stopped for 15 minutes at the Barron Falls to let all the passengers get out, have a stretch and take photos of the waterfall.

Stay tuned! Next episode, more scuba diving on the Great Barrier Reef.