We spent 3 days up in the Daintree Rainforest staying in an Eco Resort in Cape Tribulation.  The Daintree is listed World Heritage site and is home to a variety of plants and animals. On out visit we managed to spot a wild pig, various iguanas and plenty of lovely rainforest birds. Cape tribulation is where the rainforest and coast meet and the beaches are lovely but you have to watch to crocs!!

De retour à Darwin, nous laissons notre van (avec un pincement au coeur) dans les terribles Territoires du Nord pour nous envoler vers Cairns avec les parents.

Les mauvaises conditions météorologiques nous privent de la Grande Barrière de Corail en début de semaine... Qu'à cela ne tienne, nous voilà partis pour la Rain Forest avec au programme balades au milieux des lianes et des enchevêtrements de racines de mangroves. Bien différent de la Grande Barrière de corail, mais tout aussi impressionnant! A retenir: cette balade à la tombée de la nuit à la recherche d'un Casoar... une espèce d'énorme oiseau terrestre préhistorique mais en vain...

Great accomodation in Cape Tribulation. The owner (Rob) has some cabins in the middle of the rainforest, even with a room that is partly covered with mozzie-sheet. So, in the morning you wake up looking directly into the forest. They provide excellent breakfast (with exotic and rare fruit) and information on the area. We stayed there for several days to explore the rainforest walks, rivers and beaches.

Today I went to a new hotel.  We had a little tour of the Rainforist and the Natuves.  he told us a little about the wepens and the Instruments.

Joshua

Today Geoff and I slept in and had only a short time to get ready before meeting the kids for breakfast.  After breakkie we all got into a van and headed to Daintree.  It was 1 and 1/2 hours along the coast.  We arrived at a beautiful eco lodge in the middle of a rainforest millions of years older than the Amazon!  We are staying in tree top huts, with beautiful views of the surrounding rainforest.  We have a jacuzzi tub on our balcony that the kids we jealous of!  There is a net that we can use and create a sort of tent all around our bed.  We went on a walk through the rainforest with a local aboriginal man who showed us heaps of really cools things.  One in five rainforest plants is poisonous, and the aboringinals have developed ways of testing and treating all of them.  We saw a sacred waterfall where to this day men over the age of puberty are not allowed to enter.  Geoff had to remain behind.  We also had the opportunity to try eating green ant butts!  Kate and I we daring enough to give it a go.  Very citrusy, though not something I would eat all the time!  We also learned about many of the medicinal uses of the local fauna.  We are now enjoying a relaxing quiet evning at the hotel.

-Mokah-

Angelal, you really missed out on one of the best flavours in the World by not tasting the Wattleseed ice cream at the Cape Tribulation outlet of the Daintree Ice Cream Company.

The coffee, chocolate, hazelnut blend of Wattleseed is as good, if not better than the individual flavors and simply delicious. I wonder how many other travelers visit exotic places and pass up on life's experiences because they "are unsure if they'd like it"?

Anyway, luckily, even timid travelers from the US can now get Wattleseed ice cream from Vosges Chocolates in new York, Las Vegas and Chicago. Just look them up on the web. I believe that they even air-freight it around the US to less advantaged but eager to learn gourmands.

Of course, if you want to make your own ice cream, just get some Wattleseed online.

As we left the Daintree Rainforest Discovery Centre, the lovely staff at the cafe told us about an ice cream place that was just 10 minutes north, on the way to Cape Tribulation. Never ones to pass up an opportunity for sweet frozen dairy products, we decided to call in and sample their wares.

All the ice creams are made on the premises from tropical fruits grown in the company's own orchards. The flavours available during the year vary as only fruit in season is used for the ice cream. The available flavours change every day and are displayed clearly on the board.

The way this little boutique ice creamery operates is a bit different from your usual ice cream shop. Firstly, the ice cream is primarily sold as a fixed sample pack - four flavours in a rather large cup for $5. Pretty good value, really.

Our four flavours for the day were prune, apricot, coconut and wattleseed. Rachel and I both don't like prunes, and I had no idea what wattleseed tasted like. So I managed to convince to lady behind the counter to sell us two cups with two flavours of our choosing (which was passionfruit and coconut). I was happy to pay the same price as the sample cup - I just didn't want to be wasteful by throwing most of the sample cup away. But she only charged us $1.50 a scoop :)

As we left the Daintree Rainforest Discovery Centre, the lovely staff at the cafe told us about an ice cream place that was on the way to Cape Tribulation. Rachel and I, never ones to pass up an opportunity for frozen, and sweetened dairy products, decided to call in and sample their wares.

All the ice creams are made from tropical fruits grown in the company's own orchards. The flavours available during the year vary as only in season fruit is used for the ice cream. The available flavours change every day and are displayed clearly on the board.

The way this little boutique ice creamery operates is a bit different from your usual ice cream shop. Firstly, the ice cream is primarily sold as a fixed sample pack - four flavours in a rather large cup for $5. Pretty good value, really.

Our four flavours for the day were prune, apricot, coconut and wattleseed. Rachel and I both don't like prunes, and I had no idea what wattleseed tasted like. So I managed to convince to lady behind the counter to sell us two cups with two flavours of our choosing (which was passionfruit and coconut). I was happy to pay the same price as the sample cup - I just didn't want to be wasteful by throwing most of the sample cup away. But she only charged us $1.50 a scoop :)

Fortunately, since Rachel and I didn't have much to drink at the wedding last night, it was reasonably easy to get out of bed at 8am :) We managed to pack our things up quite quickly, as we'd prepared most of our packing yesterday before leaving for the wedding, and made it to breakfast just before 9.

After eating so much the night before, we decided to just stick to the 'continental' breakfast included with our room rather than ordering a fry up from the menu. It was just as well because after a few tiny pastries and a couple of slices of fruit, I was done! Luckily, Nadine and Ben came to breakfast just as Rachel and I were getting ready to leave so we were able to say goodbye before hitting the road. They thought we were crazy to be tackling the Daintree and Cape Tribulation in a day, as it's about a 2.5-3 hour drive each way. It didn't bother us much because we're on holidays and were planning to stop a few times on the way.