Day 6. We went to pick up the van we had rented to start the road-tip part of our vacation. I was excited since I had never been on a proper road trip. We got the model of van with a shower and toilet because Hendrik wanted the luxury, if it was up to me, I would have gone for the basic model. We had to watch a DVD which showed us how to operate everything and I wanted to hold on to the DVD for the future, but we weren’t allowed.
Then we were brought to our new home for the next month. We were excited to see that it was a Britz, and not a backpacker campervan which meant we were upgraded to the newer model since the one we had ordered wasn’t available, but it was huge. It was the size of a small bus. We were both quite terrified of the look of the thing since neither of us had ever driven anything that size. We wondered whether we needed a special license but AU allows any tourist to drive a bus if they want, I guess. It was daunting. So we had a bus with the stick on the opposite side than we were used to and we had to drive on the wrong side of the road. At least we were well trained from Ireland to drive on the wrong side of the road. Hendrik had to drive it first because there was no way I was getting behind the wheel.
I was one terrified passenger though and gritted my teeth and tensed my muscles as Hendrik inched the vehicle out of the rental lot. He stalled quite a bit, and I was only glad we got the vehicle in a small quiet town and not Sydney. It was a hair-raising start to a vacation. We loaded our suitcases and then decided to drive to Kuranda a small tourist trap village in the mountains surrounded by a rainforest. We saw it on a lot of brochures and it was close to Cairns so we thought why not. We drove to the sky rail which is a gondola that takes you up to Kuranda but it was so expensive to ride we decided it wasn’t worth it.
Since Hendrik was determined not to drive the whole month he said I should try in the parking lot which I did. I stalled over and over again and ran over curbs that he soon took the wheel from me, which I didn’t mind since I was shaking.
We decided to drive to Kuranda instead, which was a really bad idea since the roads were windy and narrow and we were first timers driving a heavy bus. I clenched my muscles and held my breath on every turn, and when we finally got to Kuranda it was deserted. Everything was closed. Apparently all the tour buses from Cairns come there in the morning so by the afternoon the town shuts down so there was nothing to do. One last pie shop was opened and we asked the owner where the tourist train was since we had seen it on many brochures. “There’s no tourist train here, but a real one that goes to Cairns like you have in London or New York.” Right, except that it was designed for tourists and only went twice a day, but we thought it was hilarious that he compared Kuranda to New York and London. With nothing else to do we went on a rainforest boardwalk. It was nice and relaxing to be out of our bus.
Afterwards Hendrik decided I was going to drive again. To get out of the mountain top parking lot I had to go up a small hill on which I stalled, of course, and had a car behind me. I had trouble starting the engine and whenever it did start I would stall again so I panicked and Hendrik had to take over and my dread for driving the bus became worse.
We regretted going to Kuranda and decided to go into a nearest campsite and the nearest one was around port Douglas. At least after the descent from Kuranda the road became straighter but it was also dark. Once checked in we were both trembling and hating the bus, me especially since I didn’t want to drive it. Our first day on the road and we were already behind schedule because according to plan we were supposed to be in Cape Tribulation. To make things even worse we realized we left our stuffed bear, Walibi (not to be confused with an AU Wallaby) at the hotel in Cairns.