Day One Thousand One Hundred and Eighty Two

Thursday 6th September

Today we drove North form Port Douglas to Cape Tribulation.

We started by driving to the Mossman Gorge and started by going to the Visitor centre.

http://www.mossmangorge.com.au/

We then hopped on one of their shuttle buses and headed up tot he Gorge. Was very pleasant and we walked the board walks up the gorge until we reached the rope bridge (now very much made of steel). Was nice to see the gorge. We walked back down alongside the gorge to spots where people can swim and contains lots of fish. Pics below.

We left the Mossman Gorge and headed North. We caught the ferry across the Daintree River, the same ferry I crossed with Hazel, Nick and Anna some eleven years earlier. It's a bigger ferry now. We then drove North to Cape Tribulation, basically the furthest point on the east cost with tarmac/bitumen road. We stopped at the beach for a while before heading back south. We saw some amusing road signs on route too.

We drove back to Port Douglas and relaxed at the hotel. We then went out for the most amazing dinner ever at a Restaurant called Nautilus. Here is the website, 

http://www.nautilus-restaurant.com.au/

More importantly here is what we ate...best food ever

Crisp Skin Belly of Pork w/Granny Smith apple soufflé, petite piccalilli & cider dressing

Lemon Myrtle Spanner Crab Potstickers w/Shaved palm heart salad, peanut crumble & pineapple caramel

Coral Snapper Fish Special

Lightly Smoked Duck Breast w/Master stock braised leg, sauce bigarade, sweet potato, bok choy & consommé

Pear Tarte Tatin w/
Cinnamon anglaise & burnt honey ice cream

Caramel Banana & Mascarpone Cheesecake w/Vanilla sable & chocolate peanut butter ice cream

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Eighty One

Wednesday 5th September

Today we took a trip out to the Inner Barrier Reef, the low Isles to be precise. Here is a pictorial story of the day

Port Douglas and Low Isles

 








We sailed from Port Douglas to Low Isles. Approx 8 nautical miles. Low Isles is where they brought Steve Irwin to be helicoptered to Hospital after his fatal encounter with a Stingray. Reassuringly as we were snorkeling on the reef they gave us this piece of information and advised us to avoid boxing in any stingrays whilst snorkeling...Great.... Poor old Steve was long gone before he arrived on Low Isle.

Below is the island after we arrived and anchored up. From here we took a small tender boat to the beach form where we both snorkeled before lunch.

Low Isle

On the sail out....

After Lunch the Sharks started to circle the boat, the skipper chucking in prawn heads lured them in...

Our toy island

Our toy boat...

Around this point Kate decides ot go swimming with the Sharks, I stayed firmly on the boat as any good husband would in such a situation.

Crazy wife...

Kate swims off into the distance 

Way too far from the boat...

Mid afternoon we set sail back ot Port Douglas, the wind was up so we did it under sail which was nice.

Once back in Port Douglas we went back to Hotel for a bit then went for an easy dinner at the iron Bar pub. All that sea air meant we were tired and we went to bed at about 10pm.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Eighty

Tuesday 4th September

Happy Birthday Chris

I got up and went to the bakery to pick up some pastries for breakfast. Once we had eaten we moved to the pool and sat there for a big part of the day.  Here is the view from our loungers

Our room was just on left next to the pool. We had lunch at our loungers. After swim we changed and wandered into town in the car and then drove up to the lookout overlooking 4 mile beach.

We spoke to Kates brother Chris to wish him a happy Birthday.

In the evening we went to Bucci, the original restaurant to the Bucci that opened recently in Brisbane.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Nine

Monday 3rd September

Today we packed up our bags and headed off on holiday to Port Douglas. Bill drove us to the airport at lunchtime and we took the three hour flight up to Cairns. We got to Cairns at around 5pm and then picked up our hire car and drove north for about an hour and finally arrived in Port Douglas.

We are staying at the Peppers Beach Club

http://www.peppers.com.au/beach-club/

The room is very nice, just near the pool. We wondered into town for dinner and had a steak at the Iron Bar.

Headed back to the hotel and relaxed.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Eight

Sunday 2nd September

Kate spoke to Bill in Adelaide to wish him a happy Fathers Day. We started doing washing and getting ready for our trip to Port Douglas tomorrow. We had an earlier Skype call with folks in UK in the evening before driving out to the airport to pick up Bill and Carol. They had a good time in Adelaide.

 

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Seven

Saturday 1st September

We did some shopping in the morning and I got a new shirt. In the afternoon we watched the AFL - Sydney v Geelong.

We had dinner at home in the evening.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Six

Friday 31st August

A easy day at work and then I headed home in the afternoon and helped Kate with some job applications. In the evening we tried to go to the new Japanese restaurant on the High Street around the corner but it was full so we walked back tot he house, grabbed the car and Kate drove us down to the nearby Thai place in Castlecrag and had a very nice meal there instead.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Five

Thursday 30th August

Kate dropped me at the station and I headed off to work. Kate drove Bill and Carol to the airport as they are off to Adelaide for the weekend. We are looking after the pets while they are away.

Kate picked me up from the station and we had a quiet night at home.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Four

Wednesday 29th August

Day two of the workshop and a quite productive day with lots of good ideas being generated. Everyone has taken away a lot of actions to complete and proposal documents to write.  At least it feels like something has been achieved with good plans going forwards. Once done I did some office tidy up and then came home.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Three

Tuesday 28th August

In to work for day one of our two day workshop discussing the future of the events, how we can work better and more efficiently. Was an interesting day, a few heated conversations and grumpy people including myself, probably through tiredness and because we all care about the success of the event going forwards.

Once the day was wrapped up headed home again. There was a BBQ that I could have gone too but just need to catch up on sleep and see some of Kate after my prolonged absence.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy Two

Monday 27th August

The day after event, headed into the office and dispatched 4 of the others to go out and about returning items and putting the event to bed. That took most of the day and while they were out and about I tried to make some sense of the massive pile of event equipment filling one end of the office.

Came home not too late as I was pretty tired.

Dinner at home and then off to bed to catch up on Z'ssssssss

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy One

Sunday 26th August

Got up at 6am and drove back to Event Control Centre to help close the event down. Last team came in to Finish just before 8am and then it was full swing packing up control and others at the Finish. Only drama was a broken rear windscreen on one of the vans on Sunday morning.

We finished the pack up before heading to the city. Here are some pics before we went.

Back at the office we unloaded 2 trucks and 4 vans worth of gear before they were driven back to the van hire place.

Once everything was done we all headed to the pub for some lunch and drinks. Of course there was some planking to be done before that....

All in all a very smooth, uneventful event, the best kind.

Came home and crashed out!

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Seventy

Saturday 25th August

Got home from overnight shift at about 6.45am and hit the sack. Heard Bill and Carol heading out to do their volunteering shift in the morning. They were delivering volunteer food out to all the volunteers today.

Got up late morning and had some lunch.

At about 1.30 I drove Kate out to the Finish to do her volunteering shift, here she is seen at the check in desk.

I left Kate there and drove over to the Control Centre to see how things were going and sort some gear out.

Headed back to the Finish at about 8pm and did a few things there while Kate finished up her shift.

We both drove home and went to bed.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Sixty Nine

Friday 24th August

Up early and headed over to the finish site to meet the contractors. Spent all day until about 5pm overseeing the building of the finish. Here is a picture of the finished result (The gantry and finish chute).

I headed home to get some dinner and rest before heading back to Event Control Centre (ECC) for a 10pm start to manage logistics overnight. Friday is notoriously difficult to fill with staff and with everything happening in parallel you run out of people for things, hence putting myself on the overnighter. All went very smoothly.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Sixty Eight

Thursday 23rd August

A strange day as I'm not usually in the office on a Thursday pre event, however decided I could get lots done and didn't need to be out on site. 

It got very interesting in the afternoon as Gale Force winds came through Sydney bringing down power lines, trees etc. I did make everyone stop doing stuff for an hour or two in the afternoon if they were working under trees for their own safety.

In addition to that we had a bush fire at the start for more excitement.

At 5pm I headed to ECC to help with final set up and then headed home for dinner.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Sixty Seven

Wednesday 22nd August

Got up at 6am, first light and drove out to section 7 to string up a safety rope for walkers (and the trail marking teams tomorrow). Did that quite quickly and then headed into work.

I spent day on phone to teams from Melbourne who arrived yesterday who were out overseeing the marquee builds at Checkpoints 3 and 4.

We went out and collected a number of vans and trucks during the day and then in the afternoon went to Kennards to load up the 2 trucks. Below is picture of the chaos we caused there.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Sixty Six

Tuesday 21st August

Got up at 6am in the morning to complete final scheduling and create PDFs for the staff. 

Later in the morning Kate and I had the excitement of the RTA, really my most favourite place in the world. We planned to nip in, register the car in NSW and get our new driving licences. 

This plan fell apart when...

I forgot my UK licence so could not prove I had three years of valid licence (despite this being checked in QLD)

Kate happened ot marry me less than three years ago so again could not get her licence, net result we could not register the car in NSW as it was last registered here in her maiden name.

So back to car park, put the number plates back on the car and drive home to get necessary ID

Drive back to RTA, unscrew number plates and go through the whole fun again....

Once that was done and we dodged the senile pensioners collecting their heavy goods licences we drove home and then I drove into work to hand out schedules.

Came home later in the evening, had dinner and crashed again.

Day One Thousand One Hundred and Sixty Five

Monday 20th August

Headed into work early and carried on with final event prep. Worked late and didn't get home until 8pm. Crashed in front of telly after some dinner.