15. – 18. November

As we haven't decided what to do in Cairns we are exploring the country a bit more – and are going to the Daintree National Park where we're going to stay close to Cape Tribulation. We just stopped briefly in Port Douglas, took the ferry to cross the Daintree River and booked some local tours.

We booked a campsite within the Daintree National Park; the National Park has one camp site: Noah’s Beach. This is the cheapest option to camp. As this camp site doesn’t offer showers we could finally use our solar shower. We just filled water into a black bag, placed it into the sun so the water can get warm and then we had our camp shower. The camp site was so close to the beach we could hear the waves rolling onto shore. We had our breakfast at the beach together with the crabs.

We ended up taking a snorkelling tour from Cape Tribulation – the Reef is closer than in Cairns so you should stay longer at it. The tour was ok – although I’m not sure if we spent more time at the reef than on a tour departing in Cairns – but we were probably less people on the boat. We had to get into a beach-buggy first which carried us to the main boat. Then we headed out to see – to the MacKays Reef probably 20km offshore. We did two snorkelling tours and Tom belonged to the lucky one getting close to a turtle. I just saw a lot of corals (different shapes and colours), several fishes (small, colourful, big, eating coral, fighting each other), sea-urchin, sea-stars. Some in our group even saw some rays. We didn't wear a stinger or wet-suit – just our swimmers but the water was nice, clear and warm. To get into the water we had to get off the back of the boat – down the little stairs and then jump into the water. The lunch was ok although not much choice and no seafood at all. On the way back we set sail but I guess this was just a show as the engines were running all the time. In the end I liked the tour (probably as I didn't get seasick) but the boat could have been in a much better shape.

The next local adventure was horse riding through the rainforest and along the beach. We went to the staples and got a horse assigned (Tom's was Big Chief and I got Topaz). Then we got into the saddle and off we went. Topaz was the only female horse and she was not really fond of the males so I had to keep distance – much easier said than actually done. We were all riding in a line, most time just at walking pace  but we also tried faster movements. My horse belonged to the older horses so she was happy to walk but didn't really want to go any faster. We were lucky to do the beach trip as it was close to high tide and sometimes they can't access the beach then. After the beach we went back into the rainforest to their waterhole somewhere on the farm. That was amazing. We had morning tea and then our dip into the water – cold and clear. We even fed the fishes – they like crackers and came so close you could have catch them with your hands. Then we came to the final stretch and it happened what has to happen – I fall off the horse. Don't laugh, it's not funny and did hurt. Luckily I just scratched my underarm and bruised my hip so I was a bit worried about the coming nights.

Then we did a Night Walk through the rainforest – most rainforest is on private land so you've to pay to see any part of it. We got picked up and driven to the property and started to walk. The walk was around 2h through the rainforest. Unfortunately we didn't see much wildlife – just a cane toad (they are really ugly), some spiders and two Boyh-Dragons – and of course we saw the trees. They guide explained a lot although we're not sure if he really knew what he was talking about (the wild pig is a pest but the cane toad not???). Just a few days ago one big tree came down and took several others with him so there is a hole in the forest and new trees can grow into the canopy. At this place we saw some luminescent fungi – just visible in darkness.

Then it was time for our last Cape Tribulation adventure – jungle surfing (www.junglesurfing.com.au). This is organised by the same guys as the night walk we did earlier. So back to that property and get fitted into the harness and the helmets. Every helmet had its own name – Tom was James Bond and I was Barbie, other names were Borat, Harry Potter, Tarzan, Nemo etc. Then we walked to the first platform, got attached to the lines and it started. The first line was actually going uphill so we couldn't surf but had to get winched by the guys – was quite hard work for them. The other lines were all downhill so we could slide down powered by gravity. On some line you actually had to go with a partner but not together in one harness just directly behind each other. In the end it was fun although not good as zip-lining on Kauai (Hawaii).

Now we left Cape Tribulation in direction Cooktown via the Bloomfield-Track. This meant around 80km gravel road through forests and mountains along the coastline. We even had to cross some rivers and one should be tidal.

At the first crossing we stopped and walked to the safe swimming hole but didn't go for a swim. The second crossing was refreshing as we had to check and see the depth and path. Apart from that and some steep ascents and descents (low gear is a good idea to go quite slowly) the track was not so difficult – let see what I'm saying when we're returning. Just before Cooktown we stopped at the Black Mountain lookout. If you look at the Black Mountains you think the whole mountain did burn – completely black. But actually the visible stones which are covered by a fungi are responsible for the black appearance.

 

 

12. – 14. November

It's still raining! We're going to Cairns but stopped at the Josephine Falls – just to have a look and decide if we should come back when no rain is about. The falls are good – 3 falls forming one fall. You can actually swim at the lowest section (but it can be dangerous – 2 swimmer had to be rescued just days before as the water was suddenly rising – flesh flooding). The upper section is not accessible at all – you can just watch from a platform – but the view is brilliant.

Back in Cairns we took a cabin in a caravan park (not possible to pitch a tent and the cabin didn't cost more than a camp site anyway). Unfortunately we learnt that the guys in Cairns can't help us lifting the car – they can't supply heavy duty coils so we have to look somewhere else. This time we did the first “tourist thing” in Cairns – we visited the zoo in the dome. It's a nice little zoo featuring a crocodile, some cockatoos, frogmouths,,, and the ticket is actually valid for 5 days... so you could return. Big Bird, one really tame black cockatoo, is a character. If you stretch your arm into his direction he will crawl up to have a close look at you. I couldn't get him off – he was too fascinated by my cap (especially the little dot on top of it). We walked around on our own and then joined the feed-walk. Really interesting and informative. The frogmouth and kookaburra have interesting eating habits - they ensure they prey is dead by knocking the head sideways onto a hard surface. We even saw this habit in the wild while having lunch at Lake Tinaroo. Unfortunately the crocodile wasn't fed when we were there – it's on a diet on Friday and Saturday.

4. - 11. November

We left Cairns quite late – we had to wait for a dry tent and got the minutes right... as it started to rain after we finished packing – and drove via Kuranda, Mareeba to Chillagoe. In Chillagoe we visited some limestone caves – one by a guided tour and two self guided which were all interesting and completely different. The guided tour was called “Donna Cave” and offered several cave formations; the Madonna, different stalactites and stalagmites, false floors, cave corals... we even saw some micro-bats and cave cockroaches but none pythons. The self-guided caves were more self-exploring caves as you had to crawl into them and watch your head. Unfortunately these caves didn't show any (nice/special/remarkable) cave formation just quite tricky pass-ways. We also had a look at some Aborigines paintings and the Balancing Rocks.

Our next stop was Mareeba, the 'coffee capital' of Australia. We stayed at the Granite Gorge Nature Park, had a swim in the creek, did the walk around the granite boulder stones, petted some rock wallabies (and had to watch that they're not steeling our dinner). In Mareeba we visited “the Coffee Works” a museum and a coffee roaster. They had around 2000 different coffee machines on display (some might be around 400 years old).

We stayed at the Rocky Creek Memorial Park, a free camp area where you could stay for a maximum of 72 hours which we did although it was not planned but the park was convenient located. We drove around the Lake Tinaroo which got created for irrigation purposes – the Baron river is damed. The drive around the lake was good – we stopped at all possible camp sites within the National Park. They all looked different, had all some water-views but not really accessible for swimming... Further on the Lakes Drive we stopped at the Mobo Creek Crater. This was a nice walk through the forest along a creek which flows into a lake which is surrounded by basalt rocks. The scientist are not sure if there was a volcano crater or if something else has caused this formation. In this area you find several fig trees as well and two are of special look; Cathedral Fig Tree and Curtain Fig Tree.

The Cathedral Tree is around 50m high and covers an area of 2000m2 and the branches are in perfect distance from each other. The Curtain Fig Tree got its name from the roots which are going down like a curtain. This formation happens if a Fig tree collapses onto another tree which gives him support so the roots of the Fig Tree can go vertical to the ground.

Then we looked at the two maars existing here – we even swam in one which is called Lake Eacham. You can swim in the Lake Barrine as well but it's more used for boat cruises. The water was not as cold as expected but still deep. We also watched the turtles which live in the lake – they are special as they could breath through their belly and can stay much longer under water.

Then we visited Herberton, the oldest town in the tablelands. They did some tin mining and could still try your luck and find some tin in the creeks.

After that we drove to Mt. Hypipamee NP to have a look at the crater and the dinner waterfall. Every time we stop at a crater we're surprised as they don't look like the ones on Hawaii or in the Eifel. This Crater is covered with water but it doesn't drop vertical – it drops in an angle but it's not fully explored yet. They know that the water level starts at 50m below the  crater-rim, goes down around 60m and then it curves around and drops further 50m but what happens after that nobody knows yet. There might be a connection to the creek but the water level hasn't changed so it's unlikely. The Dinner Falls look really good and we came up with several explanation why they're called Dinner Falls: there are 4 different falls starting with a cascade and then 3 real falls so dinner is served in 3 courses or the fall were discovered at around dinner time and the guys were hungry. We walked the falls upstream and tested the water as every fall formed a little pool. Unfortunately we didn't swim as it was a little bit to chilly and rainy.

Our final stop was the Malanda Falls and we hoped to have a swim there but the pool didn't look natural – it was more like a swimming pool just filled by a waterfall. But the highlight of the day was still around the corner. When we were ready to leave we saw something climbing up a tree – it was a tree kangaroo. We got quickly the camera and started to take pictures before the crowd was getting too big. It turned out to be a lucky day as tree kangaroos are rare and we saw two (the mother and the joey) close by. Several locals stopped and said it was the first time for them to see them as close as this – just 3m up in the tree. And we finally we've seen Platypus in the wild. Ok, it was actually on a fish farm but they were still in their natural habitat (slow flowing creek) and just appearing for 7 seconds. It was lucky we had the guide with us as otherwise we would have looked for something completely different. But now it has started to rain like it will never stop – this means our first night not in a tent. So we stopped at a motel but it was fully booked [it seemed a lot of people suddenly discovered the comfort of a solid roof]. So we left the Atherton Tablelands and stayed in Innisfall.

31 October – 3 November

On leaving we turned to Mc Kinlay to have get a Crocodiles Dundee Burger. The pub was open but we couldn't see any staff around so we couldn't check if they offer such a burger or not. We had our lunch at the roadhouse next door – I call this burger now “Crocodile Dundee Burger”. Unfortunately we spent around an hour at the roadhouse, suddenly there were three of four trucks turning up, so we didn't reach our planned first stop. But this is not a big problem so we were just staying in Julia Creek. At the moment a new rush of German tourist must have arrived – our fellow campers in Mt. Isa and Julia Creek are German...

The next stop was in Richmond to get the tyre checked again as it was still losing air during the night. The guy fixed it from the inside. We thought that there was another hole but apparently not. Richmond has an artificial lake. You can actually swim in the lake but it was already covered by several kids so we didn't go for a swim and drove to Hughenden instead. We decided to stay at the caravan park as it offered a 33m swimming pool – it's the local pool but we had 24/7 access. We visited the local museum, drove to Mt. Walker, did the 4WD Basalt by Way and headed to the Porcupine Gorge National Park. Mt. Walker is the closest local mountain which offers 6 different lookouts so you have nearly a 360degree view – we enjoyed the views twice – during the day and for the sunset. The 4WD Basalt by Way is a dirt road created for tourist so they can see a lot of the surrounding. We were lucky that the road was open as the map indicated it should have been closed – but just two gates were closed. We left them as we found them – closed of course after we had passed. Originally we planned to stay in the National Park as camping and swimming was allowed but were happy not to as you had to walk a long way to the swimming hole. The swimming area was in the gorge which was around 1km downhill and no shower facilities. The gorge itself was good – you could see several layers of stones, different fishes swimming around. The gorge should drop around 150m but it was not visible at the camp-site much better to see at the lookout probably 10km away. T he road was interesting as well as it was marked with some historical and curious sites like graves of a mailman and unknown persons, bottle trees, whistling bore, matchbox creek [a wagon-load of matches exploded at the creek].

Then it was time to leave Hughenden and travelling in direction Cairns via the Undarra Volcanic National Park which is around 300km away from Hughenden (mainly dirt road). The most challenging part was the road-works on the sealed section. We booked one Lava Tubes tour as you can't visit the National Park on your own – only by guided tours. The Lava Tubes were formed million years ago when the Undarra Volcano erupted. There have to the right circumstances that Lava Tubes can be formed; falling altitude, existing Basalt rocks, constant flow of Lava. It's believed that the Undarra Volcano erupted for around 25 years – just spewing Lava at such a grade that it could flow “downstream”, cool down on the surface and kept the Lava inside flowing so the Tubes could be formed. You say Tubes although it's just one long tube but separated by several roof-collapses. In these roof-collapses you find habitat islands/ refugees like a special kind of rainforest which can only survive as the Basalt stones create a border against the bush-fires necessary for the survival of the other trees. The Tubes themselves are a refugee for micro-bats which was our dilemma. We booked a 4 tubes tour but could only access three as one was closed due to breeding bats. But nobody told us – otherwise we would have just booked the tour of 2 Lava Tubes. Then we walked on volcano rim and headed to the Atherton Tablelands. We stopped at the Millstream Falls, the widest waterfall in QLD. Then we drove to Cairns where we stayed two nights and returned into the Tablelands to escape the heavy rain forecasted for Cairns.

20-23 October

We left Mt. Isa for the round trip – Camooweal, Lawn Hill National Park, Normanton, Karumba, Mt. Isa.

In Camooweal we wanted to have a look at the caves but forgot the  abseiling equipment so no chance of getting close. So we didn't waste any time and headed the 200km dirt road to come to Lawn Hill National Park. On the way we passed through a road-work [upgrading the highway – I hope they're building some shady rest-area.

On this trip we had to cross some rivers. It's really interesting – suddenly you see a bit more green and different trees (quite often some kind of palms) and then the water is there... At the first crossing we didn't test the depth as we could still the ground but stopped after to have a little walk. I walked back through the water. It was unbelievable how strong the current was and how slippery the road was. I really had to  ensure a stable food before the next step. Then we stopped at the area called “Riversleigh site D”. At this site they found some fossils and erected an information shelter and a discovery walk. It was informative but not a must-see. Shortly after this stop we stopped again; this time I had to test the depth of the river-crossing. I was just halfway through (already noticing we had to cross on the right side) when I ran back out of the water... there was a truck coming from the other side and I assumed it had travelled the crossing before. Suddenly the water was murky but I hadn't to test the depth any more but had to cross it on foot anyway as Tom was waiting on the other side.

Then we arrived in Adel's Grove and decided to stay at that (expansive) place instead of camping in the National Park as there should be less shade. We picked a nice shady camp site and went for a swim. They even offered tubes to relax in the water and had a platform in the middle of the river. Adel's Grove had also a restaurant with a really expansive set course dinner but reasonable lunch menu [Aussi Burger with Chips for $12].

The next day we explored the Lawn Hill National Park also called  Buddjamilla National Park. The park offers 6 walks and lots of swimming. We just did the 3 eastern walks; on top of a cliff (Island stack) offering good surrounding views of the gorge and bushland, along the cascades where no water was running and to an Aborigine site called Barking Dog. It should be possible to see a freshwater crocodile in this area but the only wildlife we saw were grasshoppers and fishes. After the walks we relaxed in the shade close to the creek and I had a quick swim. We came back in the evening to see the sunset but as with most sunsets it was not that amazing.

The next day we did the walks on the western side: to the waterfalls and to the Upper Gorge. Of course we had to start early to avoid the burning sun. We walked to the waterfalls first but they were occupied by backpackers so we decided to keep on walking. We already took some pictures from the waterfalls as they looked like an oasis when you climbed down the cliff – several palm trees, the waterfalls, just beautiful. The walk to the Upper Gorge led between the cliff and the water so we kept looking for freshwater crocodiles but saw none even not at the creek-bank. We just saw several turtles. The next lookout (on top of the cliff) gave good views of the gorge but you couldn't really see where it started, most likely off a spring. Then we walked back to the waterfalls to have our swim and it was amazing. We had to glide slowly in to avoid direct contact with the fishes which kept looking at us. The waterfalls were strong although they just fall about 100cm. It was hard to reach them, you could hardly hold you position so the massage just lasted about 30 seconds.

In the afternoon a bus-load of seniors arrived at Adel's Grove – I guess the managers were caught off guard as they were running around to prepare more rooms.

15-19 October

Mt. Isa is a city with over 20.000 habitants most due to the mining companies... it is a big mining area for copper, zinc and lead. We visited the Hard Mine which is a museum in an old mine shaft so the visitor could get the hands-on feeling being under the earth. They had several of the big machines on display all in working order as we experienced – we drove in with the “rail carriage”, could use one of the drills and the guide operated several other machines which filled the hole walkway and made so much noises we had to have earmuffs on. Before we could even enter the mine we we dressed as miners – orange complete suit or coat, gum boots and had to wear the battery for the helmet torch.

The Mt. Isa Mine is still working and they are blasting twice a day at around eight. You can feel the shock-waves (I guess it's similar to an earthquake). The other day we drove out to Lake Moondarra – the recreation area close to town. With good luck you can even swim in the lake and of course you can fish (the next competition will be on 25^th October) – maybe we could do some wild camping here as the caravan  park is getting expansive. We just hope not to see to many Aborigines in the park. The Aborigines in the city are like a ‘pest’ (at least to us) most likely just sitting around doing nothing and so many look weird (swollen lips, deformed legs...) as long as we can avoid them. 

We had luck no Aborigines in the park but a lot of peacocks. They were really doing a big show for us – showing their wheels a lot – i'm not sure if they wanted to impress us or the female peacocks. We've spent the whole afternoon at Lake Moondarra but didn't go for a swim as there were too many algae and the water edge was green. 

The other day we opted for the Surface Mine Tour – all into a big bus and driving onto the mine grounds. First we drove around the mine and had a look at the staff parking and the big elevator. Then we went onto the ground where they're transforming one part to an open cut mine. They are still working on the  transformation – getting a deep hole (should be around 700m deep) into the ground. They're using really big trucks for it – the tyres are probably as tall as I'm – but they just looked liked match-box trucks from our spot... 

Mt. Isa mine has some connections to a mine probably 60km away. In the other mine they just get the ore off and transport it to Mt. Isa. They're using really big trucks for it: 5 carriages with an additional engine and carrying around 500t per load. These road-trains are not allowed on public roads – I'm not sure if I'll see one up close. Then the tour went on to the copper smelter passing some big crushing wheels before hand. We were even in luck – they did some new pouring...  we could see a really hot fire (it glowed green) and a big bowl pouring something into the fire... Luckily we were just 10 people so we could take pictures without moving heads in front of the camera. The other day we used for cleaning and servicing the car, stock up on some groceries and then we started our round-trip as we had to come back to Mt. Isa to collect our mail.