Australia Three- Billy Tea Safari

..to the Daintree and Cape Tribulation

The second day trip we went on from Cairns was with a company called "Billy Tea Safaris". They came highly recommended as a tour company offering small personalised 4WD trips that are guaranteed to run even with only 2 people booked! They're also Eco Tourism accredited and have experienced guides with extensive local knowledge as well as being really friendly.

We were picked up from the end of the road just before 7am and met our tour guide John, a really enthusiastic guy with a bushy beard 🙂 We were the first on the bus so sat up the front to enjoy the scenery. After picking up ~15 more people we headed up the coast along the Captain Cook Highway to the Daintree River Cruise Centre.

We boarded a boat and travelled along the river past the mangrove forests, with our guide pointing out loads of things to look at along the way. We saw many different birds- herons, kingfishers- a green tree snake, and lots of crocodiles!

There were even some little hatchlings which we "aww"-ed over. They were kind of cute, until you realise they grow up to be 2m long monsters! We saw the dominant male of the area, Scarface- he was huge!

On the other side of the river we continued our journey north, with a stop off at the Alexandra Range lookout to take some photos of the amazing views out across the Daintree Rainforest to the Coral Sea.

Then we went round one of the National Park boardwalks through the rainforest, with our tour guide telling us heaps of interesting info about the plants. Didn't see any cassowaries though!

After our walk it was time to head to Lync Haven, an animal refuge centre. Here we had lunch, which consisted of massive steaks and sausages cooked on a BBQ, salad, pasta with pesto, potato salad etc- really tasty! There were also kangaroos to feed, and various snakes to look at including a black headed python which I stroked 🙂

After lunch we drove to Emmagen Creek for a paddle in the clear fresh water...(Billy Tea Safaris are the only tour operator that come here so no crowds!)

...and a tasting session of lots of local fruit- custard apple, papaya, passionfruit, pineapple, banana, starfruit, black sapote (or the chocolate pudding fruit), jackfruit- quite a lot I hadn't tried before!

Custard Apple

Starfruit

Black Sapote

Jackfruit

My favourite was still passion fruit though, yum!

Passionfruit

We also had some billy tea brewed in the traditional way with Daintree tea leaves in a billy can.

From there we drove to Cape Tribulation where the rainforest meets the sea. We walked along the beach under the palm trees which was very nice. It's such a beautiful landscape.

Our final stop was the Daintree Ice Cream Company where we tasted their 4 flavours of the day- pineapple, banana, black sapote and wattleseed- an interesting combination, but a lovely refreshing snack at the end of the day. All the fruits used to make the ice cream is grown locally on the property too.

Then we headed back over the river on the cable ferry and down to Cairns on the windy coastal road. There were lots of sugar cane fields, cows with "friendly birds" (they were sitting on their backs) surrounding them, a field full of wallabies and osprey nests on electric poles.