Flying over the Great Barrier Reef
11th January, Cairns.
Every Sunday morning in the area known as Woree, there's a private sale 4WD and van market. Given our luck (or rather lack of it) in finding decent camper vans we decided to give this a try. Working on the basis that we'd seen the VW Kombi last night at 10pm and the car market was at 8am we should get a chance to see what's there and still have time to put in an offer on the Kombi. As it turned out, there was just a handful of vans there, and we didn't want to wait around hours for more to arrive and then miss out on the Kombi. So at 8:20, sat in the McDonalds next door, I rang up and offered $2100 for the VW, and the seller accepted $2200 (approx £880).
It was all very exciting - finally it felt like the adventure could really begin. We'd been in Cairns too long already. I know that when you walk around the shopping mall and start to recognise the regulars (and that's not the people working there) that you've been there too long. We can't set off just yet, though - the van needs to be put through a road-worthiness inspection and we'll need to get the registration moved across. Then there's the insurance to consider and also the fittings that it's currently lacking. Having said all that, it's a van that's worth spending a bit of money on - we were hooked immediately without any fittings in it, so if we do a good job with it selling it on later should not be a great problem.
Flying over the Reef
In the afternooon, Paul came over to the hostel and took us up to Cairns airport for our next little adventure - a 1 and a half hour flight over the reef.
Our chariot - a Cessna light aircraft.
We had seen plenty of flyers (no pun intended) for reef flights but they all worked out quite expensive. Paul, on the other hand, was building up his flying hours and could offer a lot longer for a lot less (by way of comparison, one heli-tour cost $98 for a ten minute scenic flight, while we would be getting 90 minutes for $145 each - about £55 each).
Within ten minutes of taking off we were getting very close to Green Island and then beyond that we headed north and followed the various reefs (Saxon, Norman, Hastings) all the way up as far as Cape Tribulation.
Green Island.
One of the many amazing reefs we flew over at 500 feet.
Flying over the reef was fantastic. We could see some of the coral very clearly, even from five hundred feet in the air. The water looked inviting, sparkling away in the sunlight. I really wanted to go for a dip again, but given our current mode of transport, that was not gonna happen. Hopefully. At one point, we spotted a huge turtle coming up to the surface to take a few breaths of fresh air while elsewhere I could make out the shape of a fairly good sized shark just under the surface. The thing that amazed me is the difference from being under water, when there does not seem to be any pattern or logic to the reefs to the view from above where definite patterns start to emerge.
Once we reached Cape Tribulation, Paul banked left and followed the coastline back to Cairns. He let me take control as we flew past Port Douglas. I kept things pretty gentle - no hard banking to the left or right or sudden stomach-wrenching dives! Paul, on the other hand, demonstrated a hard turn in this little plane for our entertainment. We all felt the increased G-force and as I looked out of my window to the right, I could see that we were moving around a fixed point; it was as if I had my right hand out full-stretch, anchored on the floor, and was walking my body round in a circle, like some kind of breakdancing manouevre.
A creek near Daintree Rainforest - crocs be here!
The flight over the reef was easily the best part of the flight, but following the coast back was good too. We had already been treated to similar great views of the rainforest on the Kuranda Skyrail – although, this time from a greater height. The white sanded beaches looked like borders to the rich dark green tapestry of trees. Paul told us that the creeks below were crocodile territory – no swimming around here then! Once we got back within range of the airport, we had to maintain a steady course until flight control could bring us in. No more hard banking for us!