Blog
- INTERNATIONAL FLIGHTS TO RESUME -
After a long pause of 18 months so far, and what will be close to two years of a hold on our African safaris, there are definitely glimmers of hope emerging and we are really looking forward to coming out of our chrysalis and spreading our wings again very soon.
It's the start of the winter school holidays in Australia, our favourite time of year in Far North Queensland. There’s lots of good news in this month’s blog and plenty to warm your heart from Africa.
In March this year, twenty years after the first genetic studies identified that central and west Africa's forest elephants were genetically distinct from savannah elephants, the IUCN finally recognised forest elephants as a separate species.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better. —Albert Einstein
Last week the Australian government released news that from 1st April the cost of flights from Sydney, Melbourne and Darwin to Cairns will be discounted by 50% up til the end of July. If you've been thinking of taking that nature holiday somewhere within a couple of hours flight-time here s your chance to grab a cheap flight and experience the restorative benefits of North Queensland's ancient rainforests, stunning reef and outback savannahs. Matson & Ridley Safaris now offers a booking service for our favourite operators in North Queensland to offer you our choice of explorations and adventures with the best guides and accommodation options available. Travel operators in Cairns are really doing it tough due to their heavy reliance on international tourism, so your travel dollars will really make a difference up here. If you are thinking of heading up this way, please drop us a line and we'd love to help you plan your escape back to nature.
You'd be forgiven for growing a little despondent when it comes to the rollercoaster ride of travelling at the moment, with the Covid-19 pandemic continuing to wreak havoc across the planet and many people still in lockdown. Here in Far North Queensland, our tourism industry has taken an enormous hit from the border closures, and across the safari countries in Africa, there is huge unemployment as a result of the lack of international travel upon which they rely. But with Queensland opening its borders to most of the rest of Australia now, and the vaccine starting to roll out across the world, there is good reason for optimism as we enter 2021.