After a day's cleaning and preening in Cairns on Sunday, we set off south on Monday aiming for Innisfail. It was a murky day, grey overhead with intermittent showers, a growing feature of our trip down the east coast of Queensland. We stopped on route to see the Boulders, a nice set of pools created by large boulders in the river flowing through. Very pretty, and normally a great place for a swim, but not in that weather.
We stopped again on route south to see Josephine Falls – lovely falls, and again, great swimming spot, were it not for the weather.
We drove around Innisfail looking for a campsite, and were directed out to the coast to a caravan park at Flying Fish Point. Nice enough for a night's stop.
The next morning we had a look around the shops in Innisfail (lots of Art Deco buildings, quite a pretty town), then set off south on the scenic loop through more cane fields.
These dominate the tropical Queensland coast, sugar and (when you pass the factories) the sickly sweet smell of molasses is everywhere. We stopped to take a look at Paronella Park, a Spanish castle built by a rather determined (and perhaps slightly mad) Catalan who came to Queensland and made his money in the sugar industry – its a bit like the Forbidden Corner folly in Yorkshire. Camping is included in the ticket fee provided there is room, and they seemed not to be busy, so we decided to keep touring for the day, and return there later in the afternoon.
So we continued on our drive through the countryside, finishing up at Mission Beach to have a little look round. This is regarded as one of the nicest beaches in Australia, but the weather wasn't really helping its cause. Still lovely, but not quite as inspiring in the rain.
We decided we would head back to Paronella Park and set off to explore the park in the late afternoon on one of their daily tours, returning at 6.30pm for the evening tour. The tour explains the structural nature of the buildings (built in the early 1930s, with lots of concrete and railway sleepers it seems) and some of Jose Paronella's background – a man with a dream to live in a castle. The castle is built over Mena Creek Falls, and Jose used it for both its beauty and for hydro-electric power.
All in all its an odd little affair, but a lot of fun to wander around. There are plenty of large fish to feed in the streams, together with a lot of turtles who practically come up to beg for food, and then of course the miniature Little Bentwing Bats which can be seen on the evening tour in the tunnel.
On Wednesday we headed to Mission Beach, stopping at Tully to see the famous gumboot on route.
The weather hadn't improved, still grey and damp. We had a drive around the Mission Beach area, and finally got a half decent picture of a Cassowary!
Only kidding, this is the one!
There are a lot of “slow down” signs in this area, much like in the Daintree – there aren't too many Cassowaries left, and their main threat is the good old motor car. Thankfully, we didn't see any on the roads.
We set up for the night at the council caravan park on the beach front. Nice site, shame about the weather.... Because it started to rain, and it didn't stop. On Thursday we woke up, packed up, and it continued raining. Beaches really don't look all that great in the rain. We decided to book into a hotel for a night so we could watch the rain from inside, and enjoy a bit of tv!
On Friday we continued down the coast, calling in at Murray Falls and driving through the Cardwell State Forest, before stopping the night in Cardwell.
We'd hoped to do a trip to Hitchinbrook Island where we thought we might track down the ever elusive dugong, but the operator wasn't running a trip for another 5 days, so this went onto the list of things for the next trip....
On Saturday we continued further down the coast towards Townsville, detouring up the steep and windy climb to Wallaman Falls (the highest single drop waterfall in Australia at 305 metres).
We headed back to the coast for the night, and stopped at a free camp in Toomula. The next morning turned back on ourselves to visit the Paluma National Park, stopping at Little Crystal Creek, Big Crystal Creek and McClellands Lookout - another steep climb with little rewards – nothing much to see thanks to the fact we were once again in a cloud, other than me throwing an orange
Then we made our way into Townsville, which we discovered is closed on a Sunday! We decided to head to Magnetic Island with Priscilla the next day for a few nights. More of which next week.
Love to all,
Claire, of Jen and Claire fame
