Day 31: I fly to Queensland and go platypus spotting

Well, first you've got to get there... My flight from Adelaide to Cairns left at 7:30 am. Fortunately Adelaide is not a huge city, and the airport is a 15-minute taxi ride from the center, where I was staying. I added in some traffic/going wrong time, and my new friend Kate booked a taxi for me, to pick me up from outside the theatre at 5:45 am. The flat I had been staying at was down an alley, through a yard and up a couple of flights of stairs, so I arranged to be picked up in front.

I was out there a few minutes early. No taxi. This was bad. I find that pre-booked taxis usually arrive earlier than when you booked them for, and if they don't arrive by the booking time, they usually do not arrive at all. Luckily Kate gave me the number of the taxi firm, and at 5:55 I try to ring them. The call will not go through on my phone. There are no taxis on the street. There is virtually no traffic on the street! I wonder if I should chance going to the coach station, a five-minute walk away, but the taxis there seem to meet arriving long-distance buses, and I don't think any will be arriving at this time in the morning.

Finally I see a woman coming down the street. I ask her where I can get a taxi, and she rings a company on her phone. It is the same company that let me down, and she seems to have problems explaining where we are. We are directly across from the market, a major landmark, and right next to Her Majesty's Theatre, a major venue, but they want to know the name of the non-signposted alley, even though there is no need to drive down that alley! The woman leaves me on my own to wait, equally grateful to her for her help and fretting that it was all in vain. Finally, a full fifteen minutes later, a taxi pulls up and I'm at the airport in ten minutes, two minutes before check-in for my flight closes.

Cairns is hot and steamy, but my hotel is airy and nice, and I have time for a dip in the pool.

At 2:00 PM I was picked up at my hotel for a Wait-a-While Rainforest tour. It was almost a private tour; the only other patron was a Finnish chick. The driver/guide had a strange Australian accent; I soon realized he was from Lancashire. We first stopped at a park in the city (we were still in Cairns) to see some Agile Wallabies.

I'm not sure there are any Clumsy Wallabies out there, but these were pretty cute...

Perfect pouch position; two generations can feed at the same time!

This is a green ant nest. You can see a few on the left. We were persuaded to each lick an ant. Yes, you read correctly. The ants emit a secretion that is safe for human consumption and actually is quite tasty, sort of lemon-limey. If you don't believe me, you can read more about it here.

Siesta time for the flying foxes...

In Danbulla State Forest we went for a short hike and saw this giant Cathedral Fig tree.

It began to rain - after all, it was the rainforest - but as the sky turned dreary, the forest floor remained colourful.

The tour included a stop for tea and biscuits at Lake Barrine. This was tea out of a thermos and biscuits from a waterproof Tupperware container, sitting on a wet picnic bench wearing rain ponchos under golf umbrellas. That's why I have no photos.

But then it stopped raining and we headed out to see some platypuses. You look for concentric circles on the surface of the water...

Here you can see a little bit more...

A Comb-crested Jicana, or Lily Trotter, or Jesus Bird, among the lily pads....

There were also a lot of Saw-Shelled Turtles in the water.

We did not see him!

We had dinner at a country restaurant in Yungaburra. We were the only diners. When we emerged it was completely dark and we went back to the rainforest. I thought I heard a familiar sound and yes, roosting in the trees by the road were a few wild chickens. Jungle fowl!

I knew these were considered a pest in New Zealand, and I understand why they need to be eradicated there, but I think the common Brush-tailed Possum is pretty darn cute! Images in Google mostly seem to be linked to possum eradicating services in Australia, so this poor guy doesn't seem to be very popular even in his homeland.

Apologies for the blurry image but it was difficult to focus in the dark and this guy only paused for a second. This is a Long-Nosed Bandicoot. We saw several scampering through the foliage.

The moon that night was spectacular.

And what do we have here? It's a Mountain Pygmy Possum!

Here's a better view, although the leaves give him a green beard here...

And that's it, folks! It was hard work getting these last shots; I saw a lot more than I was able to photograph, but sadly, we did not see a Tree Kangaroo, though we tried a few places. We were traipsing around in the dark for about three hours, and I was delivered back to my hotel at nearly 1:00 am.