Cairns

For us, Cairns seemed to be a great city. We have already left the Northern Territory, we are in Queensland. Flight ook about two hours. It's easy to manage a transport to the hostals or hotels (about 10 AU$) per person). Actually, our hostel included airport transfer. We stayed in Caravella Backpackers, quite a good hostel, even not perfect. There was some queue at reception... but they were quite helpful, helped us to choose where to go in the Coral Reef, which company... where to eat croc meat... dinner is included in the room, a light dish in a local pub with good atmosphere. There we found the second group of spainsh people we saw along our trip.

 

Urulu and Ayers Rock

Urulu, together with the Sydney's Opera, are probably the most known Australia's symbols Urulu is an enigmatic monolitic which changes its color depending on the suns location. It's brown on the midday hours and almost orange in the dawn and dusk, with red and purple colors. This hill is 350 meters high and its a secret place of the aborigens, the anangu.

   

 Acording to them, Urulu tells the story about two snakes who created the earth. We arrived Sydney and, inmediatly, we took a new flight aiming to Ayers Rock airport. We landed about 6 AM, surprisingly punctual... Quantas is a good company, not like British Airways. So we took next flight about 7.30.
The flight took about 3 hours, over the Outback. If you can, choose the seats on the left side on the plane. There, you'll have the best views of the Urulu. Better than any other trekking. You'll also be able to see the "Olgas". It was one of the most astonishing moments of the whole trip. In that moment, we finally understood that we were in Australia. Down under

.  

 Ayer's Rock airport is like a toy, those you can only see on the movies. It gets just two flights per day, on one only lane. There are free buses to the resorts, some minutes away. That area is well integrated into the landscape. There are many kinds of accomodations, from hostels to luxury hotels. We stayed on the YHA hostel, in a 4 people room, but just occupied by us and a japanese girl.

Cape Tribulation

Departing from Cairns we took a tour to the isolated Cape Tribulation. There are many ways to get there but we chose a one day tour so it stops on the way and show you things, for more or less the same price. The guide was very nice, and he had a tarantula as a pet. It was funny when it run away through the bus and the French girls screamed like crazy.

We stayed 4 days in Cape Tribulation. There's not much to do except to relax and enjoy the feeling of being away from the civilized world. We did a night exploration tour. Be sure to be the first of the crowd. We also did some kayaking, a very nice experience! Sometimes you can see turtles, but we weren't very lucky this time.

In the beach we had a very interesting meeting... with a wild cassowary! Be careful as they are dangerous!

If you want, you can swim in the open water... BUT... you must take care of the salt crocodriles! and, most of all... the jelly fishes!!! the most dangerous animal of the world. One bite, and you pass away...

We stayed at the Beach House, at the St.Crispin cabins, supposed to be the best of the resort. Well, it was nice, but it is not far from the bar, and, inexplicably, there are british who come all the way to there just to play pool and drink beer late into the night... F*CK!!!

Sydney

After visiting Queensland we took last internal plane to Sidney. No trouble this time. There in Sidney we stayed at the Original's Backpackers, recommended by the Lonely Planet guidebook. It was fair, clean, quiet, but the toilet, shared, quite crappy. Walking around we headed to the Opera House, through a park crowded with BIG bats!

After that, of course, we visited the famous Opera House, but we didn't get inside. We know there are guided visits though.

Apart from that, we visited an area called "The Rocks" an old fishermen quarter, with restaurants where there must be good fish. Not very interesting, actually.

The day after we took a ferry to Manly Beach, a borough where you can find nice beaches, surfers, surf shops and good atmosphere.

We thought about entering the Sydney Tower, but there was a three hours queue, so we gave it up. I would recommend to be there at very first time in the morning, if you are resolute to get in. I have heard that you can climb to the top of the famous Sydney bridge. Now I regret I didn't do it...

The rest of the time we spent in Sydney was basically shopping, most of it surf shops (Billabong, Quicksilver, etc...) as they were on sale. And, of course, feeling gloomy about the trip coming to an end... :-/