Trippin': Cairns - The Wildlife Habitat

On the third day in Cairns, we went on this rainforest and cape tribulation tour. I booked the tour as part of this combo dive and rainfores package. Sometimes i wonder if i may be wasting my time and money by booking tours but i really thot that this was worth it. Since there really isn't anything to do in cairns, i enjoyed getting the chance to do some hiking, learning and sight seeing. Shane was our driver as well as tour guide and i totally super loved him! Such a nice guy. I thot he spoke really well and was very entertained with his stories and learned a lot from him. It was a long drive to our first destination in Port Douglas which would be the The Wildlife Habitat. One of Shane's first few things he talked about was how the aussies love giving everyone and everything nicknames. His own nickname from his mum was Shano. For some reason, i kept calling him Shaneo which although a bit brittish, i felt it had a better sound to it and ignored him every time he tried to correct me. Haha. SHANEO! He also went into great detail about the discovery of australia and more specifically, cape tribulation. I'm not sure how much history I want to discuss here since anyone reading this could easily look this information up themselves but i'll talk about the one or two things that i found to be interesting. The dutch were the first to land on what is now australia. But because they landed on the western side which is desolate and nearly unlivable with it being extremely hot and desert like, they pretty much left and didn't think it was worth staking any claim to it. It was the british who finally claimed it as theirs when the explorer captain james cook landed at what is now cape tribulation on the northeastern side of australia. The beach area where he landed has large reefs that grow right up and out of the waters. His boat crashed into these reefs and nearly sank it. With his boat stuck in the reefs, his bad mood has been said to reflect how he named his discoveries in this area: cape tribulation, mount sorrow, desperation point. Also, when shaneo initally talked about captain cook, for some reason i thot he was talking about captain HOOK and was all like, OH MY GAWD HE WAS REAL? ... maybe the lost boys are in these forests RIGHT NOW! I'm stupid. Please forgive me. So we arrive at the wildlife habitat. I'm still battling internally the whole idea of captured animals and their exploitation by humans. On one hand, i really wanted to see kangaroos and koalas up close but on the other hand, i feel it's just so selfish of me to think that it's okay because ultimately, this is not their home and it's not where they belong. I don't think humans have the right to determine whether or not a species is over-populated just because we are at the top of the food chain. So in my muddled area of transition, i personally decided to make compromises with myself that since i was allowing myself to see these confined animals, then i wouldn't let myself touch them. Does that even make any sense? It did to me at the time. Baby steps right? So i didn't pet them and i didn't feed them. Oh yeah, i guess i should mention that there was an open kangaroo habitat where these different types of k'roos were hopping about wherever they please. It's pretty exciting for us tourists to be able to meet these furries up close and be able to feed them. I was a bit disturbed by how hungry they were. I kept telling myself it was because it was so early in the morning and it was their breakfast. Let's hope that was the case. I know that mochi and middle sistar really wanted the chance to hold a koala and take pictures with them. Although i was a bit devastated by this idea, i'm not the type to preach my opinions to anyone because they can make their own decisions and do whatever they want to do. Luckily, koala time didn't start til later in the day and we would have left well before then. Small victory!