Thursday 1st March

We set off this morning south along the James Cook Highway towards Cairns. This is a beautiful drive where the road runs by the sea for most of its length.

We wanted to go from just north of Cairns to Kuranda on the Skyrail, riding over the rainforest by cable car for a distance of just over nine kilometres.
http://www.skyrail.com.au/

We had some fantastic views of the rainforest below and in the distance.

As we approached the middle station we had a wonderful view of Barron Falls, which has a drop of 853 feet in total.

We were able to leave the cable car and get closer views of the falls.

We spent a couple of hours in Kuranda before returning on the cable car.
As the weather had been very good all day, later in the afternoon we revisited Mossman Gorge. The water was running more slowly and was much clearer than yesterday.

We were able to get down to a small sandy beach and cool our feet in the clear water. It reminded us very much of Stenkrith in Kirkby Stephen, but on a larger scale.

In the evening we drove into Port Douglas for dinner where we saw and heard several thousand birds arriving to land in a few big trees at one end of the main street.

Large flocks swooped from tree to tree and around the buildings making a deafening noise.