Stephens Family Vacation - Australia 2025
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An uneventful, albeit lonnnnnnnng, ride over the Pacific and now we wait for our connecting flight to Cairns. |
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Water Fill
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Coffee Stop
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Arrived Palm Cove: Qantas from Brisbane to Cairns. Qantas sure does nicer free snacks than Canadian airlines do. We were going to have to wait two hours for a shuttle to Palm Cove but we discovered that a taxi cost the same as two adult shuttle tickets, so taxi we did. |
Palm Cove first impressions:
Our first stop in Palm Cove was to niece Nicole’s place. She, her husband Brion and their son, Levi, were there, along with Brent’s brother Doug and his daughter, Lisa, and the other Australian niece, Stephanie, with her husband, Diego, and their two kids, Jack and Zaya. We had a great visit with them all, and it’s so great to see how well all three nieces are doing.
After a couple of hours, exhaustion pushed us on and we stopped in at the nearby convenience store (with Lisa) to provision up and then went for Thai dinner.
The photos are: the view from our hotel room, the cockatoo on the tree outside of Nicole and Brion’s, Lisa posing with the camel balls, some cool spooky trees and the Thai restaurant. |
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Recon and Shopping: We had breakfast at our hotel - the ‘bitey’ cheese was very tasty and bitey. Then we hopped the local bus and went into Cairns for recon re: day trip to Kuranda, and getting back to Cairns next Sunday. Then we got back on the bus straight back towards Palm Cove and got off at Clifton Beach where the proper grocery store is. We bought some groceries and walked the rest of the way back to Palm Cove with the spoils of our shopping trip. |
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Walk Before Dinner - Palm Cove: Brion has to head back to Melbourne tomorrow so Steph suggested we all go out for dinner tonight. Brent and I went for a short walk along the esplanade to the Palm Cove Jetty before meeting everyone at the tavern. |
Palm Cove - Tiger Prawn Tony’s
We had a relaxing day today hanging with Levi as Nicole took Brion off to the airport to head home.
We did some planning today with the gang - Nicole in person and everyone else on the WhatsApp - to go to Hartley's Crocodile Adventures tomorrow and then Kuranda on Thursday.
We’re still pretty jet lagged so after we left the Cummings household we went for a meal at Tiger Prawn Tony’s and then home to pass out. |
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Tiger Prawn Tony's
Hartley’s Crocodile Adventures
Today we *all went to Hartley’s Crocodile Adventures up the road. It’s a really great place with a variety of shows and displays. We saw a snake show and a crocodile show, rode on a boat tour through the croc waters and walked around looking at the displays, including cassowaries, wombats, wallabies, kookaburras, sooty owls, flying foxes (enormous bats) and more.
*Diego isn’t feeling well and wasn’t able to join us. |
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Rhonda & Brent
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Renee the snake handler
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Steph, Zaya, Jack, Levi, Lisa
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Doug, Brent, Zaya, Steph, Jack
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Cocodrillo
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Fruit Bats (Flying Foxes)
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Kookaburra
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Owl
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Cassowary
Australia's most dangerous bird
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Lisa and Levi pet a Wallaby
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Levi, Lisa, Doug, Brent
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Crocodile Show
Today we took a day trip to Kuranda - scenic train on the way up, and Skyrail on the way down.
Kuranda is a tiny touristy town in the mountains. We kinda split up while we were there. Brent and I had Roo Pie at the Rainforest View Cafe, and the others… did other stuff.
Coming down on the Skyrail was great. The views were amazing and there were three stops/transfers along the way where we got off and had a look around. |
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Rhonda & Brent
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Getting Tickets
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Doug, Brent, Lisa
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Levi, Lisa
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Nicole, Levi
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Front of our Train
As seen from the back of our train
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Sky Train
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Lisa, Doug, Levi, Nicole
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Levi, Brent, Lisa
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View from Sky Train
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View from Sky Train
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View from Sky Train
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Brent, Doug
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Falls Partway Down on Sky Train Trip
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Falls Partway Down on Sky Train Trip
It’s just a chest cold
I’ve had a painful (in the lungs) cough for a couple of days now so when Brent went off to the chemist today I asked him to grab me a Covid test. He came back with this nifty little thing that tests for Covid AND RSV AND Flu A and B.
All of my tests were negative so I guess by process of elimination I just have a cold. It’s good news. We’re leaving Palm Cove tomorrow so hopefully I’m recovered quickly for the remaining adventures. |
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The Dreaded Nose Swab
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COVID Neg, Flu Neg, RSV Neg
Must be just a cold
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