North Queensland: Annual Family Trip

The five day forecast shows icons of clouds, rain and lightning. The annual trip up to the tropics of North Queensland was already off to a bad start. We touched down in Cairns Airport on the 23rd of December and immediately retrieve our transport from the local car rental. Dad is his gregarious self, with the hire car folk exchanging holiday pleasantries. The KIA Carnival would be our primary mode of transport for the next few days. We loaded up the car and started our journey north up to Port Douglas. The weather forecast was accurate, with temperatures hovering between the 26-30 degrees punctuated by the high humidity and the constant fall of rain.

First stop,Woolworths. We stocked up on groceries, enough food for breakfast and lunch. We would eat breakfast and lunch everyday treating ourselves to the odd meal out in Port Douglas. With the weather so prohibitive, we opted for the following itinerary: Day 1, The Daintree. Day 2, Hike. Day 3, The Great Barrier Reef.

Day 1, went off without a hitch, the roads were fairly quiet, which probably had to do with the fact that it was pouring torrential rain. We drove up north, taking the ferry across the river (we would lose the return ticket), through to the famous Daintree Ice Cream Shop, which led us on the Great Jackfruit Hunt of 2018. Armed with the directions from a 15 year old teenager, we drove 30 minutes at 10 km/hour all peering out the sides of the car looking for the fabled wild jackfruits. We continued up to Cape Tribulation before we conceded that it was probably time to admit defeat head back to Port Douglas. We stopped by a roadside fruit vendor and managed to purchase some jackfruit. Success!

Day 2, Christmas Day. The weather has cleared up a little bit. We started the morning off with a hike around town. Christmas Day would be the best weather of the trip, which was an understatement. With most of the shops closed, we spent our time in the apartment watching the Carols on TV, lazing in the pool and continuously grazing on food.

Day 3, Boxing Day. The Great Barrier Reef. We woke early and triple checked the apartment before our departure. Unfortunately the weather had since taken a u-turn and was quite wet. We decided to do the tour from Cairns and started off early to get to the ferry terminal by 8. Unfortunately, the weather was deemed too rough and all tours were canceled. We had our breakfast and decided to explore Cairns, with our morning at the Aquarium, lunch at a Vietnamese Restaurant and the afternoon navigating the Cairns Boxing Day Sales crowd.

"I like your grinder, it's really big" - Dad to the gay barista

Australia

It's safe to say that weddings usually dictate my Australian visits. Given that this is the period in our lives where people are tying the knot, you can almost always expect a handful of invites throughout the course of the year. The hard part is deciding which to attend, obviously you want to attend them all, but this isn't feasible. The upside of these ceremonies is that it makes it easier to catch up with people. Lots of people in one place always makes reacquainting easier.

The groom, a close friend from University, who now when I think back has been through a lot with me. He was kind enough to let me stay with his family in Vietnam during our "End of University" South East Asia trip,  during this trip we discussed our interests to move to Europe and surely enough a few years later we were both living in London. He moved back after his Working Holiday expired to be with his now wife. It was a no-brainer that I would return for his Wedding. It was my first "Westie" wedding, held in Crystal Palace which was a massive affair. With over 500 attendees and with enough food and alcohol to host an awards night it was a spectacular night.

It had been a good six months since I was back and decided to make a trip out of it. Headed up to Queensland's Great Barrier Reef where I spent a few days unwinding and taking my mind off the mess of living in Hong Kong. Introduced to my first Scuba Diving experience (Loved it, will have to get my open water some time). This trip also coincided with my 30th Birthday, secretly I was happy to be escaping the craziness of Hong Kong, as I know how a birthday party ends up in LKF. Albert kindly arranged a surprised birthday down in the city. I was suspicious but the turn out genuinely shocked me. Uni friends, family friends, cousins, parents, couldn't have asked for a better 30th!

Great trip, really enjoyed my time back home. Home cooked food, familiar faces, great weather and fresh air. The house is so quiet without Sam kind of eerie in a sense. This was one of the first times I thought about returning back home to Sydney.