"Sarvo's stinking hot!"

The Australian tendency to shorten words and phrases gives me the chance to learn a new lingo in a country still not independent from Britain.  And since classes and field trips have started, with the arrival of our 24 students, I also get the chance to learn about the flora, fauna, and life of the Atherton Tablelands.

 

The Scorpion Reclaimer of the Quincin Quarry!

 

  

Landscape near Lake Bromfeld (note the storm in the distance)

 

  

I didn't rotate this image, but see if you can find the Lace Monitor...

  

Audrey and I 

Audrey (the student affairs manager),  Monika (another intern), and I kicked off our semester by spending a weekend in Cairns before the students' arrival.  Having been spoiled by our elevation on the Tablelands that saved us from the scorching heat and humidity of Cairns, we could easily perceive the progressive rise in temperature as we drove down the winding road.  Actually, we needed gas, but since the gas station was closed at 5:30 on a Saturday afternoon, we took the long way to Cairns via Malanda, and encountered another problem when traffic was backed up because a tree had fallen across the road.  But we made it to Cairns late in the evening, got a hostel, and had time to sample the nightlife before crashing unexpectedly early.  On Sunday morning, my walk to St. Monica's led me past trees filled with bats screeching and flitting about in the dark blue early morning sky.  Inside the church, I was surprised to view the world's largest themed stained glass window display, depicting the story of creation in 24 windows.  But the main attraction in Cairns is the esplanade, a saltwater pool made right on the edge of the ocean to compensate for the dirty, stinger-filled ocean water and the lack of sandy beach itself.  Although I like to swim, I admit I was glad to leave the Cairns furnace and return back to the rainforest where it's 15 degrees F cooler.

The Esplanade

The student arrival on Monday brought us back to Cairns.  Luckily for the students, however, our encounter with what was possibly a venomous redbelly snake in the classroom occurred before they'd even set foot on site.  While Monika and I looked on, ready to bolt at the first sign of the snake tearing toward us, Piggy used the snake hook to gently pick it up and release it somewhere behind the center.  I stuck around for a while afterwards on the computers until I realized that I had to turn off the lights behind the building where the feisty serpent had been released.  I cut my work short and quickly hunted for the lightswitch before our red-bellied antagonist returned for her human midnight snack.

 

My walk to the Center every morning

Luckily for me, however, that wasn't our only encounter with a venomous snake!  During our walk around the site, ducking under hanging vines, weaving through gnarled trunks, and brushing past ferns, we topped a hill where Audrey suddenly told us to stop.  A beautiful brown-colored snake was basking in the trail, but alerted by our presence, it raised its head and looked straight at us.  We waited there until the other group, led by Tim (one of the research staff here), approached from the opposite direction and called out to them to stop.  While Tim was quite sure it was an Eastern brown snake, he couldn't definitively say it wasn't a taipan, the deadliest snake in the world.

My friend, the Eastern Brown

 

The rainforest

 

 Eucalypt forest on the way out past Herberton

 

Lake Barrine

On Thursday the students split into groups and were dropped off in various towns to explore the histories of these places as a field exercise.  If the students had any reason to stress about this, their adrenaline levels were nowhere near those of mine and Monika.  This was a good excuse for us to go driving.  Operating a manual transmission vehicle is a challenge, but combine that with a right-side driver's seat, left-handed shifting, left side of the road driving, and everything in kilometers per hour, and you might understand why I was willing to go first and get the initial experience overwith.  Since the turn signal is now on the right side of the wheel, you might also understand why a large van might be careening down the road under a clear blue sky with the windshield wipers going.  But after only a single day of trial driving I was fortunate enough to be surprised into driving by myself into Yungaburra and back on a Saturday evening, erring only once by driving the wrong way on a one-way street and saved by a woman bystander who was frantically waving me over to the other lane.  The following day I succeeded in driving on my own via verbal directions (albeit a very simple trip).  But...  there's a first time for everything.

 

Malanda Falls

 

 

A skink

 

Boyd's Forest Dragon

I have to keep reminding myself that the animals bounding away through the brush are not rabbits, they're wallabies.  And the critters scurrying about in the scrub are not groundhogs, they're musky rat kangaroos.  And the incessant, shrill chirping, buzzing, screeching, and croaking comes from the zillions of insects that lurk about invisible in the vines and leaves of the forest around me.  During our geology lab excursion across the Tablelands lace monitors were just hanging out high on the tree trunks, skinks were chilling on smaller saplings, and a tree kangaroo was barely visible in the canopy at Malanda Falls.  Not all the wildlife is so glorious, however.  Tramp through the rainforest, and you'll find an easy way to donate blood to the myriad leeches that flock to your calves and ankles the instant you set foot in a fern.  Not to mention that there are dozens of rhinoceros beetles and moths just dying to get into your room and fly about you while you sleep.

  My mission, however, is to find the elusive echidna that's said to be hanging around site.    ...No wuckers, mate.  I'll find him.