AUSTRALIA DAY TWELVE 3/14/19 “Jungle Visit”

I thought it would be hard to beat the great day we had at the Great Barrier Reef yesterday and I was right. Today we headed to the Daintree Rain Forest. Darrin warned us that this would not be full of monkeys and wildlife like we saw in Costa Rica. We had a guided walk through part of the park with an Aboriginal guide. He was very informative about the local vegetation and wildlife (although we saw very little of the later). He also explained a great deal about how tribal healers would use some of the natural plants for medicinal purposes. He demonstrated how to prepare a lotion useful for sunburns. It was very interesting for me as a doctor to hear this information. One of our tour members asked if he learned these healing methods from his father or grandfather to which he said, “No, I learned it on Google” (just kidding, he said his uncle taught him).

We also had another short tour of a different section of the park by our OAT guide Darrin. He is a picture of the two of us below.

After the park we headed back toward town to have lunch. Once again we had barramundi which we have been told is Australia’s most popular fish. I have enjoyed it immensely. We also had a variety of exotic fruit served with the fish. One of the restaurant owners explained what each item was and gave us some fun facts. Unfortunately it was too much information for me to process at one time but it still was enjoyable.

After lunch and on our way back to the hotel we also stopped at Rex Lookout, for a view of the ocean. I am so glad we stopped because I had to take a picture.

Tomorrow we head for Sydney the last stop on our tour.