Cairns Haul Out Day

Today was the big day. We were having Kosmos hauled out of the water so her bottom could be painted. We were somewhat nervous since we had just read an article in Passagemaker magazine about another Nordhavn that had been dropped during haul out and completely destroyed.

The Norship boatyard is located just two miles up the river. The marina is right where the river meets the ocean. On the right hand side as you go up the river is an industrial area. There is a cruise ship terminal, a small navy base, and several boatyards. On the left side of the river is an endless expanse of mangrove trees with moorings lining the banks. There is a boat on almost every mooring all the way up to the yard.

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We found the correct yard and pulled into the only slip. A couple Continue reading

The Tropical Forest Dome

On The Esplanade, a block or so from the marina is a casino. It is the building with the odd shaped black roof that you saw in the last post. We saw big casino signs on the building. We thought the roof design was just a neat architectural style, but we did find it odd that the casino has lots of trees growing along the roof line. There are big signs that say casino all over it. It turns out that Continue reading

Walking Around Cairns

To the right of the marina, the walkway along the water continues past the construction zone, paralleling the ocean. Cairns has no natural beach there used to be a mangrove forest along the water and now it is just empty mud flats, so the ocean isn’t a real pretty view. You can’t swim in the ocean, especially because crocodiles live in mud. Just beyond the marina begins a long park that the walkway runs through. The park goes on for quite a ways. In the section of the park closest to the marina there is an enormous “lagoon”, which is a man made shallow swimming pool that has a small bit of sand on one side to give it a beach feel. This picture only shows a small portion of the “lagoon”. The pool is really nice and it seems to always be packed with people.

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There are a lot of trees in the park. Most of them look newer, like they were recently planted, but there are also quite a few older trees. The more mature trees have heaps of birds in them, and as you walk along the boardwalk they all chirp so loudly that it seems like they are screaming at one another. If you look carefully, you can see Continue reading

Diving the Barrier Reef and Eating Bugs

Continued from yesterday”¦..

After the second dive lunch was served. It was a nice lunch with salad fixings and sandwich fixings, pasta salad and potato salad. We scarfed our food while the boat traveled to the next site, called Gone Again.

Forty minutes after finishing the last dive, we were back in for the third dive. Talk about pushing the limits on the surface interval between dives! This was another Continue reading