Toad in the Hole

Toad in the Hole
Cairns, Australia

Cairns, Australia

The start of our East Coast adventure begins in Cairns, we had been lucky enough to secure ourselves another Helpx job and had everything crossed that it would be an improvement on our first job in Malaysia. One problem that we had was that our flight from Perth arrived in Cairns at 5am and given the time difference this left us arriving in Cairns wanting to do nothing but go straight to bed so we decided to treat ourselves to a room so we could sleep all morning and wake up refreshed and ready to go to our Helpx host that evening. So with hotels being extortionate and requiring us to pay for 2 nights as we arrived so early we started to look on Airbnb, a new booking website where people rent out spare rooms and are generally much more flexible than hotels. The Airbnb that we booked had the added bonus of offering an airport collection even at 5am. Here we met Lindy and Arch. We had a good chat with them en-route from the airport and then headed straight to bed to the sound of kookaburras laughing in the trees. I am pretty sure that doctors could scrap some of their anti-depressant prescriptions and could hand out cd’s with the sound of kookaburras laughing, you can’t help but laugh along at the image of a lot of little old men sat in the trees having a good old belly laugh.

The next afternoon we finally got up and dressed and our day didn’t start too well with Tim somehow breaking a contact lens and losing half of it in his eye. After a lot of stress, poking and eye drops we eventually found it and continued our day. We went upstairs to see Lindy and Arch and to apologise for being so anti-sociable when we arrived and ended up having several cups of coffee and some great chats about our and their travels. We told them all about our helpx job that we were headed too and they were mortified at the prospect and were so concerned waving us off that evening.

So we finally got to meet Britta our new helpx host and our home for the next two weeks. Britta is originally from Germany and has just become an Australian after 10 years in the Country. She lives on her own with her two dogs (Lenny and Monty) and takes in helpxers to help walk the dogs, clean the pool and house and to keep the garden in order. This is our perfect Helpx role requiring just 2 hours per days so you can still explore the area. We were going to be buying a camper van here so knew we would need some time to buy it, clean it and kit it out ready for our travels down the coast.

On our journey to her house Britta was telling us a story about a dog that had been out in the park and had bitten a man apparently, we were only half taking it all in as it was all so overwhelming being whisked across Cairns by a stranger but all became clear when we got to her house and saw the huge yellow signs on the gates warning of a dangerous dog on the premises, oh S&*t, it was her dog she was telling us about….. The next surprise came when we walked into the yard to be greated by two very excited dogs one of which we had just been told was a dangerous dog when Tim was told not to look at, acknowledge or touch the other dog as he is afraid of men. Thankfully within about 10 mminutes both dogs were our best friends and all was good (although Tim took about 4 days to fully settle and accept that they were not going to eat him).

Thankfully Britta was a dream host and we had the most wonderful stay with her, we swept, mowed, cleaned the pool, re-covered Lenny’s sofa and most importantly spent hours every evening chatting and playing cards putting the world to rights. Very quickly Britta became like our best friend and we were no longer strangers which made this stay just wonderful. Lenny the big boy and apparently the dangerous dog is 8 years old and whilst he is a big boy at nearly 8 stone he was as soft as could be and just spent his days trying to avoid his annoying brother. Monty is the new puppy, just a year old and full of energy. Poor Monty had only recently moved in and the stress of leaving the shelter had triggered mange so he was slowly but surely losing all his hair and making my job of sweeping a never ending task. Monty had another habit, chewing, nothing was safe, papers, sticks, razors, bras, teddys and even the brand new covered sofa was on the menu, thanks Monty!

Our airbnb friends Lindy and Arch were keeping in touch with us, keen to find out how we were after we left their house and they were extremely relieved to hear that all was well. They invited us to join them on a day trip to the Tablelands to Lake Eacham. We had a truly lovely day with Lindy and Arch, but I learn a very important lesson this trip. In Australia a picnic is not the same as in the UK where you roll out some sandwiches, crisps, fruit and cans of fizzy drink. No in Australia and in Lindy and Arch’s world a picnic means that we head to a BBQ and roll out steaks, fresh made salads and coffee from a cafetiere. Just so you know Lindy, we didn’t turn up to the picnic empty handed we were just too embarrassed to get out our soggy sandwiches and crisps! Thank you Lindy & Arch for a lovely day out and super wonderful ‘picnic’ lunch.

Aside from dog walking and cleaning we were spending our time in Cairns searching for our perfect camper van to continue our travels. There was not a huge amount of choice on Gumtree and after a trip to the Wicked depot we were showed the worst heap of metal we have ever seen. It had a kangaroo hit count scratched into the roof and someone else had named it “heap of s&*t” which was nice and left me with no doubt that I ever wanted to be anywhere near a wicked van ever again. We were beginning to panic, when a van appeared. It was not the usual cheap, broken down van that has been driven to the moon and back by hundreds of backpackers who have all had a go at respraying or painting it. No this was a beautiful clean and white Toyota hiace poptop which had been owned by a retired musician who used it for festivals and had loved and looked after it so it was not showing its 24 years at all. She was a beauty and I was in love. Tim was also slightly smitten but he really likes a bargain and with a van like this there is not much bargaining. The negotiations commenced, I left Tim to it and hid in the garden with Britta and the boys. Tim returned with a long face and said he couldn’t get the price he wanted. I was devastated and after 20 minutes of using my best strong arm tactics Tim was back on the phone offering the last price the seller offered. He got the answerphone so we had a long wait to see if it still stood. Eventually we got a call and it was a done deal, we were going to be the proud owners of possibly the poshest van any backpacker has ever bought. We decided that she was going to be called La Toya the Toyota, a good trailer trash name, because that is what we are now, trailer trash!

After a few more days of stress trying to get my own money out of the bank and transferred to an Australian account we were sorted, we now had our own home and wheels for the first time in over a year. Next it was off to Kmart and Big W to kit her out.

Having our own transport meant that we could finally see a few of the attractions around Cairns in the last few days before we set off on our travels. First up Hartley’s Crocodile Farm. This is actually a farm in the traditional sense, they farm crocodiles for their skins and so one section of the farm was just full of young crocs growing into shoes and handbags. If only there was a way to tell them to scuff up their skins to ensure a long and relaxed life at the park. The farm does also have quite an extensive collection of huge mature crocs most of which are rescue crocs who have been caught in the wild and are now used for breeding. One particular croc that is in the park that has a story that has stayed with me is ‘Sollie’ so named because that is the name of the dog that it ate on Christmas day in 1988, thankfully the dog was the first to make it into the creek that day…. The croc
farm puts on a great show, taking you out in a boat to feed the crocs so that they are jumping up at the side of the boat. Once you have heard a croc feeding the sound will stay with you forever, when their jaw snaps shut it is just like a loud dull clap, not a noise I want to hear when I am not in the safety of a boat. Along with the selection of crocs there were also some of the cuter furrier Australian animals. We were in need of a marsupial fix so were very pleased to see some wallabies, koalas and the not so cute Cassowary. The highlight of the day was definitely the crocodile show, where they try to show you the death roll and how high the crocodile can jump. The thing about this show was that the croc seemed to have some kind of problem with the trainer and spent the majority of the show stalking him. The small children behind us asked their parents if the man was going to get eaten. I am pretty sure he was asking himself the same question. This was definitely not a case of putting on an act to entertain the audience this man was terrified and the croc was out to get him. It had rained quite a lot in the day before we were there and the pool was deeper than usual making it pretty easy for the croc to play hide and stalk. Utterly entertaining, but I can confirm no one was eaten other than one unlucky chicken. See ya later alligater,,, in a while crocodile,,, boom boom.

Our next and last trip was a ride on the Sky Rail up through the rainforest to the hippie town of Kuranda. Tim and I are pretty fond of cable cars in case you hadn’t already worked out from seeing us go up every cable car between jersey and here and each trip just gets better and better. The Sky Rail up to Kuanda has the added benefit of two stops en-route, one with a walk around a part of the rainforest and the other to stop and look at the Barron Falls. We were very lucky that we chose to go on the Sky rail first thing in the morning so the sun was shining and we enjoyed a nice relaxed walk around the two stops. The Barron Falls were a little bit lacking as there had not been enough rain for them to be in full flow, but you could see from the smooth water beaten rocks that they must be pretty spectacular after the rains. Kuranda at the top of the Sky rail is a small township with a population of around 1,600 people. It is a little less humid than Cairns as it is high in the Hinterland surrounded by rainforest with lots of lovely walks and wildlife. We however opted not to bother with any walks and ate our way around Kuranda. We started with coffee and donuts with cream then moved along the street, had a look around some galleries of photos and aboriginal art, then had a trundle around a market selling all sorts of hippie trinkets and ended our journey with a proper Aussie pie. All in all it was a good day out and we still had the journey back down the sky rail to look forward to. Aside from the much fun to be had taking photos of ourself in a glass box hovering above the rainforest they were also doing maintenance of something during our descent so every few minutes we stopped for what seemed like an eternity hung swinging in the breeze over the forest below. When we finally got moving gradually the view deteriorated and we realised that we were actually up in the rain clouds. It was pretty fun looking at all the wet people queuing to go up the sky rail to escape the downpour, ha ha! Going through the clouds was pretty cool and eventually after a day up in the lovely sunny Kuranda we broke through the clouds into a bleak and rainy Cairns.

We had our last weekend with Britta and the boys, playing cards and also with the rain now coming down strong playing a new game… catch the cane toad and freeze it. Some genius in the 1930’s introduced Cane Toads to Australia to catch the cane beetles which were damaging crops. The crazy part of this story is that the toads live on the floor and cannot climb cane and the beetles live safely at the top of the cane… so needless to say the cane toads had no impact on the beetles or the cane and have now firmly made their mark on Queensland by being one of the most invasive pests ever to hop the land. The problem that we had with cane toads is that they are highly toxic to pets so if your cat or dog was to catch and lick a cane toad it is going to have an acid trip, whilst this might be enjoyable for your pets, it is also fatal as some toads are more toxic than others. Britta’s dogs were particularly taken with cane toads, particularly Monty and the evening routine was that Monty would run across the garden, we would follow suit, Monty would sneek a lick of the toad before we got there and would proceed to foam at the mouth and behave quite strangely. We then play chase the dog to rinse out his mouth with a hose and to ensure that he doesn’t keel over whilst also catching the toad so Lenny doesn’t decide to have a lick whilst seeing what all the commotion is about. This became a nightly game in the garden and resulted in rather large collection of cane toads. Sadly as the toads are such a pest, they do need to be killed and the most humane way to do so is to freeze them so the toads were quickly dispensed into a Tupperware box and placed in the freezer. Mental note, don’t arrive home drunk at Britta’s looking for a frozen microwave meal!

So our last day and after all our tours we needed to get the house and garden looking spick and span, so we mowed, we swept, we raked and hovered to get the house, pool and garden all perfect.

It was so so sad saying farewell to Britta and her furry babies, but it was time to take to the roads and explore the coast of Queensland.

With our new baby La Toya we set off on our first road trip, first stop Mission Beach!