Where are the Cassowaries?

Before I talk about the search to see a cassowary, I wanted to mention Yasi, the cyclone that hit up near Cairns last night.  The two major towns in the area, Cairns and Townsville, were spared major damage, but it sounds like Mission Beach, the town where we stayed with Sarah and Hannah, had severe damage.  We hope the fabulous little hotel where we stayed is okay. 

When we first got to the Mission Beach area we saw so many signs warning cars to be careful not to hit cassowaries.

Cassowaries are a large flightless bird third in size only to the ostrich and emu.  They are an important species in the rainforests because they eat fallen fruit whole and distribute the seeds.  Here is a picture of one Ben and I saw at Sydney Wildlife World.



We were excited to get into the rainforest and see one, but unfortunatley we never saw one.  We did stop for pictures in front of the big cassowary sculpture.

 
When we went to the waterfalls we saw a sign for tree kangaroos.

We didn't see a tree kangaroo either.  We have had pretty good luck spotting wildlife so I guess it is to be expected to not always be so lucky.  Mission Beach was great.  We loved having the pool and beach right there.  I ran on the beach a couple of times.  There were miles of hard packed sand that were great to run on.  Sarah and Hannah even walked down to the stinger net to swim.  It is stinger (jellyfish) season so it was only safe to swim in the areas of the beach with a stinger net.  Time to show the girls Tasmania!