Day 11- Train Rides, Koala Bears, and Boomerangs

Today we took a scenic train ride from Cairns to a little town in the mountain.  The scenery from the train was so cool.  We saw some really pretty mountains and some waterfalls.  On the train ride we also did our Inquiry.  My group did one on different colored plants.  Our question was will there be more yellow, blue or red plants in the fores? We each picked a color.  We were responsible for keeping track of how many plants of that color that we saw.  I counted red plants, jenny counted yellow plants and Kellie counted blue plants.  We did this while we were on the train.  Our hypothesis was that there would be the most red plants.  Our data was red:14 yellow:13 and blue:7.  So our hypothesis was correct.  A question that I had after doing this experiment was why are there more yellow and red plants than green plants? Some sources of error could be that we could have missed some when we were looking out the other side of the train or if we were distracted by the people around us. 

When we got to the town we ate some lunch and then we were determined to find where we could hold a koala.  Alec, our tour guide said that you could do that here so we did.  It took us a little while to find it but we eventually did.  We were all so excited!  All of us got our picture taken and got to hold it.  It was so cute and soft.  We all had big smiles on our faces.  It was one of the best moments on the trip.  I am so glad that I got to do that. 

Then we went to the rain forest tour.  We went on a gondola to get there.  The tour only lasted about 10 minutes, but we saw some really cool plants there. Then in the gondola station we saw some huge spiders.  It was cool and terrifying at the same time.  The spiders were all on the roof just sitting there but I was afraid that one would come down in front of me. 

After that we went to see some Aboriginal shows.  It was really interesting to see some of their dances and we got to see someone play the didgeridoo.  It was so cool.  We also got to see some of their weapons and got to throw a spear and boomerang.  It was a lot of fun.  Now we have to say good-bye to New Zealand and Australia.  I hope that someday I can return because this trip has been the best.  I am going to miss it.