Cairns, Qld 2August2022 90km

 Cairns, Qld 2August2022 90km

Made our wet way up into Cairns proper and set-up in the Coconut Caravan Park. It is huge. There are 10,000 families here. The pools are seething, but the water feels so good after the heat of the day. One pool even has a half decent water-slide that we had to elbow young persons out of the way to use. We went and found all the shops we needed to complete our various ensembles for the forthcoming trip to Cape York. The one singular thing that strikes you about Cairns is that its so busy: traffic, people, noise. everything in a rush and bustle, just like a really city. Give me Charters Topwers or maybe Kununurra any day. First night in we bought a pizza from the in-park shop / cafe and I am pleased to say it was pretty good. The bottle of local plonk may have helped....

Today we were going to do nothing, except pack the bags and make sure all was in readiness. However a ‘thing’ on my neck had other ideas and as it was getting bigger and angrier we thought the best thing to do was go and see a quack. Which of course is nigh on impossible (see reference to big city) as they are either all fully booked or not taking new patients. It is useless trying to explain that I will only bother them the once and as they have an appointment open in the next hour it may as well be me as anyone or more likely, no one. No dice. No way. It’s on the same plateau as the cafes that won’t cook bacon and eggs after 11am because that’s what it says on their menu, even though the grills are on and the cook is standing there doing nothing.  We finally found one (doctor, not cafe!) that agreed to see me, which was a relief. Filled in the ubiquitous form and finally got the call to go in and see... the nurse. Which was great because she knew exactly what to do and how to do it and her and Judy had a lovely time sticking sharp things into the swollen area and squeezing puss and blood and other oozy stuff out of it. I then saw the doctor who took a look, concurred with the nurses thoughts and gave me a script for some antibiotics.

Before we went to the quack, we had an hour or so to kill so we drove up to Trinity Beach, where we once spent some lovely time at the Coral Coast appartments. It was such a lovely laid back totally unspoilt place. But now, wow. The big money has arrived and transformed the place into Double Bay-By-The-Sea. Its really nice and all but now well out of ordinary folks’ reach.

Trinity Beach Qld. Not sure why they need lifeguards. Its a s flat as a tack and has 23 things in the water that can kill you in sub-two second time...

We had lunch at a cafe (there’s always a cafe somewhere) and wandered back to the park.

Judy fussed over the bags and what to take and what to leave out until she had had quite enough fun and declared its as being “all good”.

Tomorrow we move the van to the holding pen and catch a cab into town to start our adventure.