Cairns it!

DAY 1
Location: Cairns
Temp: 28 C
Activities: Cairns shopping mall, Esplande, lagoon, Solar freakin' eclipse

Accommodations: Tropic Days

Sit down.

I flew out of Honolulu International Airport at 2:20 p.m. on a beautiful Wednesday afternoon, landed in Guam at 6:15 p.m. in time to see the blood-red sun set on Thursday, and ran to catch my next leg out of Guam to Cairns where this adventure just takes off.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I had to check in to get my passport verified in Honolulu and my boarding pass at the front, only to have the reps tell me the flight might already be closed. But she checked me in and told me to hurry to the gate which, of course, was at the second to last gate at the terminal. So I ran only to find I still had plenty of time. Well, not plenty but enough to take a seat and debate weather or not to purchase a water bottle. I somehow snagged a seat in first and merrily boarded the plane and had trouble finding an open bin to deposit my backpack. When I mentioned this to my seatmate, he told me he knew where an open bin was and got up to stow it. I was touched. We settled in and I snapped up the newspapers the flight attendants offered, reading articles on Guam and doing puzzles to pass the time until our captain announced we would land in Guam at 6:30 p.m. Uh oh. My connecting flight leaves at 6:50. The next flight from Guam to Cairns was in three days.

I mentioned my plight to my seatmate and after already having discovered he was from there, I inquired after his knowledge of the area. "What do I do if I'm held over for three days, Riz?" And he filled me in. It's a lot like Hawaii, he told me, and offered what beaches to hit, what sorts of food to eat, and so on. Surprisingly it didn't really bother me if I did get held over in Guam.  This was all part of the adventure. After the dinner rush, Riz and I talked for hours about traveling, family, crazy anecdotes, even erring on the side of philosophy a bit. It suited me just fine to chat to pass the time, particularly with such an interesting seatmate! Riz and I exchanged contact, his number for my blog, for whatever happened at this airport.

We landed at 6:15 p.m., thank goodness, and I located the departure board and gate number and ran for it. Guam has a small airport. Lucky lucky me. I got seated in the row with the stiff armrests and didn't get to sleep like I'd hoped, but I did snatch some minutes where I found my jaw hanging open. And I was fed and fed on the first flight and fed again on the second! Wow! I saw Papa Guinea pass below and groaned when I saw the pouring rain over Cairns, but hoped for the best. By this point I regretted not buying a bottle of water.

Landing, I disembarked and wound my way to customs where they checked my passport against my visa, stamped my incoming passenger card, questioned my light load "22 days all in that backpack?", and asked after food and agriculture. I went through each check point smiling like an idiot because I couldn't get enough of the Aussie accent. I barely remembered to exchange my petty cash for AUD to pay my shuttle fare and my driver came up to me immediately afterward "Are you Rochelle? Yeah, get in that bus now."

I did as ordered and piled onto the shuttle, paid my way with my colorful foreign notes, and went on the hairiest ride in my life.

Our driver was supposed to be off work at midnight. When I sat down it was 12:18 a.m. And he knew it. We went ripping around Cairns like we were in some soapbox derby, whipping corners and shifting gears hard enough to throw me into the seat in front, while I freaked at each passing car about to "hit" us before it oh so casually passed on the right. Of course, I was the last to get off and I thanked the driver profusely for waiting past his work hours and fumbled with the gate keycode to get in. I walked forward looking for the safe that held my keys, completely missed it, and asked a hosteler where to find the safe. He guided me to the safe and used his phone as a flashlight while I stumbled over another keycode lock and got my key. This nice young man also guided me to my room where I inadvertently woke all my roommates closing the door. I stuffed everything under my bed and went to sleep right then, in my dress clothes, no brushed teeth or anything and dreamt about a begging humpback whale eyeing my sandwich at the pier.

I got up early and booked passage to the Daintree forest and a Great Barrier Reef dive and passed by a man I'd said good morning to and he stopped me. He and his assistant are journalists and we grilled each other on our plans. He told me to get changed and join them to the city to which I readily agreed. I got scolded for wearing tennis shoes, which labeled me as a Yank, and switched to my slippers so I could fit right in. I toured Cairns proper with Thomas and Sarah and snapped some pictures of the lagoon. 

My new friends Thomas and Sarah hard at work around the lagoon in Cairns proper. Thomas set my Australian trip straight right off from dress to debit and this greenhorn is grateful.

As we walked along the pier we paused at a video camera and asked what was up. "You don't know what's going on? It's a solar eclipse!" And this videographer handed us pairs of solar viewing glasses and lo' and behold, between the perfectly positioned gap of morning rain showers, was this gorgeous solar eclipse. I was blown away. And then the videographer turned his camera on us.

The May 10, 2013 solar eclipse in Cairns! We were lucky enough to see it through the shifting cloud cover. I shot this through my sunglasses. Experience a better rendition here!  

Hardly eight hours into my trip and I'm already making the Australian news. Crikey! Is this really how this whole thing is going to fly? 

We headed back toward the shops and Sarah helped me buy some cheap grocery goods  and sun tan lotion which I hope will save me some cash over the next few days as my daytrips cost me a pretty penny. We came back for lunch, I ate, checked my mail on the hostel's free WiFi, and got invited to join Thomas, Sarah and one of my roommates, Toma, nice girl on working holiday from Germany, to the lagoon for a swim. 

Fish fountains at the lagoon in Cairns. The water was a bit chilly, but not enough to keep me out of it.

Which again, I readily agreed to. I spoke with Sarah in the lagoon until it got to cold to stand, went up to dry, and Thomas and Sarah left and I stayed back with Toma until late afternoon. Toma who had explored the city yesterday, knew the shuttle pickup that brought us back to the hostel just in time to escape the encroaching weather, of which I hope will behave the next few days.

But I sincerely wonder how I can top today. Already. First day in Australia has been an absolute adventure!