Gourmets' Delight

Friday, 13 July 2012

Yesterday, summer arrived! With a vengeance! The clouds disappeared, the sun came out and all the moisture from the previous days rose from the ground!

The morning was just the usual grocery shopping and after lunch we headed for the Esplanade for a walk– and an ice cream. We actually tried to walk on the grass as much as possible and keep to the shade from the trees; it has been a long time since we have done that. The backpackers were out in force around the Lagoon pool, with lots of white bodies that probably wont see daylight again for at least a week! By not walking on the boardwalk/path, we actually discovered a walk of remembrance leading up to the war memorial – the flame of remembrance was a very stylised sculpture.

During the past week, some bright spark suggested the eight of us have a formal dinner before Denise and Barry depart tomorrow. Courses were allocated and the venue settled – under our awning would be transformed somehow. I was given the entrée course and after much thought, and suggestions from Denise, settled on bruschetta (using my fresh basil from my own little garden pot) and Tasmanian smoked salmon, served on crunchy bread. Carlene cooked a leg of lamb to accompany Denise’s baked and steamed vegetables; James volunteered his “famous” pancakes to be served with Maureen’s tropical fruit salad. Needless to say, we all went to bed absolutely stuffed!

Today has been overcast by once again, very hot with the temperature about 32 degrees and humidity over 80%. This morning, feeling the need for a walk after last night’s dinner, we settled for a brisk (as fast as we could, anyway, given the atmospheric conditions) walk along the Freshwater Creek pathway for an hour. The humidity felt like 100% among the rain forest vegetation!

Swims have been the order of the day, with some heading for the pool – Cat very quickly changed his mind and decided the air conditioner was a much better option.

Wet Season

Wednesday, 11 July 2012

In the last two days, Cairns has broken its all time record for the amount of rain to fall in July – and it all fell in one day! It most definitely rained, and, of course, the humidity sat at about 90% even when it wasn’t raining.

Yesterday was a fairly quiet day, apart from arranging a quote for AAMI to have our awning replaced. (We did discover during the downpour that the new “skylights” in the awning did allow the rain to fall straight through.) We visited the recommended repairer and then had to wait for someone to come to the caravan park and measure the awning during the afternoon.

Today, AAMI rang to say they had received the quote and contacted the repairer – we now have to wait for the new awning to arrive in Cairns and then arrange for it to be installed. This will mean taking the caravan off-site for a few hours, which shouldn’t be too much of a drama.

This morning we headed into Cairns Central so that Les could visit the Telstra shop and change his mobile plan. While we were in the shopping centre, I found a doona cover for the caravan – it is now all nicely ironed and on the bed. Cat thought it showed his eyes to advantage and has taken to sitting on the bed.

It is very, very hot this afternoon and very, very humid – the air conditioner has actually been switched on!

It's Raining

Cheer, cheer, the red and the white ...

Monday, 9 July 2012

Cat wore his red and white scarf for most of yesterday morning, still on a high after Sydney’s win the previous evening.

Sunday was a fairly quiet day, with a visit to a local shopping centre for supplies being the highlight of the morning. The afternoon just seemed to disappear, as did the surrounding hills when the rain arrived. We watched the video of “Red Dog” last night – it was lovely to learn the story behind the statue we saw at Dampier a couple of years ago.

We have made the decision to fly to Cape York on a day trip and this morning we needed to visit the office of Daintree Air to pay our deposit and weigh in. We spent over half an hour doing an in-depth study of Cairns Airport’s roadway system, before learning that Daintree Air are on the opposite side of the runway! We plan to fly on the 25th July, weather permitting.

Unfortunately, weather wasn’t really permitting anything today – raining heavily by this time – so, when the rains come all good tourists go shopping. We decided to check out the local DFO and the fist store we saw just happened to be Ralph Lauren – Les’ favourite outfitter – and they had 70% reductions on all their stock. We saved a LOT of money!!!

Although very wet, it is still a rather pleasant 25 degrees.

Celebrations

Happy birthday, Carlene

Maureen, James, Carlene, Rex

Denise, Barry, Pauline, Les

Saturday, 7 July 2012

Yesterday was Carlene’s birthday, so to start her day off, Les downloaded “Happy Birthday” by Patsy Biscoe onto his iPad and we played this (rather loudly) through her bedroom window at 8.30 am, much to the amusement of all the neighbours. We combined to give her a small party for morning tea, complete with sponge cake and candles.

During the afternoon, we were surprised to see the Killacks drive past and spent a pleasant couple of hours catching up on family news.

Then we went out to dinner to celebrate our wedding anniversary this week and Carlene’s birthday. We had selected a restaurant on the Esplanade in Cairns and enjoyed a very nice meal and some very nice company. James and Maureen from Canberra joined us as well and we had the pleasure of being looked after by a lovely young lady from France. As we left the restaurant (at the very late hour of probably 9.30!), I was invited to dance by a local indigenous male, who did seem to be very happy and I was able to quickly pass him on to the next tourist. Then, as we were crossing the road, Les seemed to have disappeared and we then realised a group of locals had him in a headlock and were taking him to have a few beers and a few girls!

This morning was very overcast and very, very humid. We decided a nice long walk was needed, so drove into the Esplanade area again and parked right at the end – then discovered it was 2.5 km to the lagoon and return. The tide was nearly in and it was easy walking along the pathway and boardwalk, with a flock of sleepy pelicans providing a photo opportunity for all the tourists. When we arrived at the lagoon, the local Saturday market was in full swing, so we had a browse before returning. Some large, blow-up balls were giving plenty of amusement to the youngsters, who climbed inside and had to roll the balls around a course. Unfortunately, the ice cream shop didn’t open until noon.

Thursday in Cairns

Thursday, 5 July 2012

Happy Independence Day yesterday for all the Americans out there.

We had a very enjoyable game of bowls on Tuesday evening, Edge Hill was a nice club and we were made feel very welcome. We played triples and I was “thrilled” to be given the position of skip – never played on carpet before and had no idea what the standard of play was like. However, my team did very well and we won both our games. There really seemed to be a fair mix of experienced and new players, so we all fitted in very well. Les was a little non-plussed when his skip asked him if Denise was his daughter! Everyone else found the question rather amusing.

Yesterday morning was time for some pampering for one of use, while the other stayed home and made morning coffee for the neighbours, who just seem to arrive with empty mugs in hand. During the afternoon, we went to the Crystal Cascades for a walk, along with Barry and Denise; Carlene and Rex had disappeared on their own. It was a lovely walk along the Freshwater Creek, through the lush rain forest. We saw plenty of fish but no turtles. Denise and I did wonder about a couple of “gnomes” we spotted!

Following the usual happy hour, we made a mad dash to Palm Cove to watch the full moon rise out of the Coral Sea. As the traffic was quite heavy, we were starting to wonder if we would arrive in time – the moon started to break the surface just as we pulled up. Such a magic sight.

Today has been fairly quiet, as the neighbours have gone to Kuranda for the day. I headed into Cairns for some retail therapy and some bank business, while Les had a day to himself and managed to catch up on all the little jobs.

The caravan park has a few resident thick knees, or bush curlews, which take great delight in coming to life after dark and keeping everyone awake with their loud cries, which sound like a cross between a baby crying and cats mating!

The weather has been sunny but a bit breezy the last couple of days – still a very pleasant 25 degrees though.

41 Years

Tuesday, 3 July 2012


Today is our 41st wedding anniversary.

As we are really living in Cairns until the beginning of September, I have decided to only update the blog every couple of days, unless we actually do something exciting.

Yesterday morning was spent completing some legal paperwork which required the services of a JP. So it was off to the Court House, with the hope that no one saw us entering or leaving. We had to go through a full security check just to get in – bag search, empty pockets, metal detector – and the lady did assure us that they definitely needed to search everyone coming into the building. We have never seen so many no smoking signs outside a building – they were all a metre apart! The remainder of the day was spent just enjoying the sun and lovely blue skies.

Today we ended up making morning coffee for our neighbours – Barry was gasping for coffee by 8.30 am! Cat had a few friends turn up for a visit as well, first Bilby (friend of Barry), then Teddy (Rex’s friend) and finally Kooky (follows James around), but I don’t think he was all that impressed with the attention.

We headed into the CBD for a celebratory lunch (will go out to dinner on Friday), a walk along the esplanade and, of course, it would have been very rude of us to walk past Movenpick without buying an ice cream. Tonight, we are all heading to the local bowls club for a game.

Still Cairns

Sunday, 1 July 2012

Very hot and very humid today, with clear blue skies this afternoon.

This morning we girls had some time out on our own and visited Rusty’s market to stock up on cheap fruit and vegetables – avocadoes were only 5 for $2 and cantaloupes $1! We stopped off at the local bowls club on the way back to find out when we can have a game – Tuesday evening sounded the best time.

Just before lunch, Carlene and Rex asked the owners if they could move their caravan to the vacant site next to us, which meant the three couples would all be in a row. Not a problem and they were soon moved and set up. This afternoon, James and Maureen also arrived – and they are on the site next to the one vacated by Carlene and Rex! Happy hour may become a little noisy this afternoon.

While the others went for a swim in the unheated pool, Les and I went for a walk along the river bank (a nice new path has been recently constructed), watched the fish and turtles and cooled off a bit under the trees. We found a cassowary plum tree – the fruit needs to pass through a cassowary to germinate. Cat wasn’t impressed.