Return from Crocodile Country

Day 26, Cairns to Innisfail, 90 km

Today was only a short drive from Cairns to Innisfail, so we were mot in a rush to get packed up this morning. We had pre booked the van site at the Riverside van park so we had no issues backing the van into our van site as the park was nearly empty, at that time of the morning. I would advise any prospective travellers to book van sites well in advance as almost all the parks are booked solid at this time of year.

We set of first to see Paronella Park. The park was built in the early 1920’s by Jose Paronella. I could write a complete spiel on the history, but professor google could do a much better job. Come to Innisfail and have a look for yourselves, the place is slowly being restored enough to keep the park open, but its only just keeping in front of destiny. We enjoyed out time at the park, had some food as per normal then headed off to Etty Bay to try to see some Cassowaries.

The drive from Paronella Park to Etty Bay was about 40 km through a lot of sugar cane country. The amount of rail infrastructure is enormous and as they are now in cutting season, cane trains and wagons are being moved around constantly.

We didnt see any Cassowaries at Etty Bay, but the bloke in the cafe said he saw one a few days previously. Ah well, we have seen nearly every other type of critter on this trip, except for a wild buffalo, dingo and a Cassowary.

Tomorrow we head of on another short leg down to Cardwell. We are trying to stop at places we havnt been before.

Till then Max n Cath

Day 27, cairns to Caldwell, 105 km.

Only a very short trip today, mostly though cane fields so we had to be on lookout for cane trains. We are still in luck with the weather, mostly temps in the high 20’s.

We decided not to venture into Tully, sometimes its not easy to get the van turned around some of the tighter streets, apparently Tully gets over 300 inches of rain per year. Thats about 7.6 metres of rain. 

We arrived in Caldwell before lunch time. I had travelled through here twice before and it is a very nice place, being in the Hinchinbrook Island passage. The water is always a great color and I had thoughts of kayaking across. Fortunately the wind was in the wrong direction and the thought of croc’s put an end to that silly idea.

The local fish n chip shop does a superb job with fresh cooked takeaway, so in between a little sight seeing we just sampled a few items from the cafe’s menu.

Today was a rest type day, just chilled out mostly.

Tomorrow is 250 km down to Ayr. We will bypass Townsville, both myself and Cath have been here many times in the past.

Till tomorrow

Max n Cath

Day 29, 30,31,32, Caldwell to Mackay

Day 29’s trip was from Caldwell to Ayr. The short trip of 250 km made longer by the amount of road works to the Bruce highway, luckily we had stopped at Ingham for a very delicious prawn sambo, so we didnt starve to death on the trip. Arriving at Ayr to another good van park, the Cascades, a quick set up then off to see the Nature Display.

The Nature Display is a huge collection of butterflies, shells, insects collected over a very long time, by Jess &Allan Ey. The display was opened to the public in 1966, and is now run by family. This is a huge collection and well worth the effort to see.

After talking to the curator, we decided to try and get some pics of cane burning. Apparently up here they still burn the cane to get rid of the undergrowth as this growth chokes the fields and new cane growing is difficult.

So we drove around the side roads of the cane fields, looking for signs of a burn about to occur, but we only sighted burn offs from a distance and never really got close enough. A downside to the burn offs is the ash lingers in the air and settles on everything, it is referred to as “Burdekin Snow” and the ladies must curse every washing day as the whites must be covered in black ash marks, and as there is no pre warning of burn offs, washing in some cases would need to be redone.

Day 30 and off to Lake Proserpine. I had spotted the dog friendly van park on Wikicamps and as we couldn’t get into another park in the area decided to see if this spot was okay. Kanga camps is only a few kms from the lake and while amenities are basic, they were clean and well maintained. We spent the rest of the day relaxing and exploring the local area and the dam.

Day 31. Day 31 we just spent the day relaxing and vegging out as we’ve been going pretty hard for the other 30 days.

Day 32 we got up early and went to Lake Proserpine to go kayaking and fishing. The fog was very heavy over the dam so we put the lights on the kayaks, launched into the chilly water and proceeded on a 5 1/2 km paddle. The water was like glass and the paddling was very easy in the early hours of the morning. We got some really good pictures as you will see and although we didn’t catch any fish Cathy had two big barramundi pass under her boat. She was very excited to see the fish. We were going to paddle to the far side of the dam but at about halfway across we decided that we would be too hard to paddle back against the wind, that was just starting to intensify, so we paddled back to our launch spot. We both got a little sunburnt and it’s hard to believe we are in hot conditions and Lithgow is down to 0° overnight temperatures.

Day 33. Today will be driving from Lake Proserpine to Dean and Sarah‘s house at Ball Bay, we will be spending three nights there with Dean to see my first grandchild, Mason. He was born on 2 August and this is the first time I’ve seen him. I will not post for the next three days and will post again when we leave Ball Bay.

Day 37. Today we drove from Ball Bay to Baralaba in Queensland. Baralaba is 45 km north of Banana in Queensland. We were intending to drive to Banana but decided to stop at Baralaba at the Showground caravan park as it appears there were more options in this town. The fees are very reasonable at $25 per night and the ground is most comfortable for what an overnight stay.

Day 38. Today we drove from Baralaba to Miles in Queensland. Apart from a few wide loads there was not much to talk about for the drive. We drove around Baralaba this morning before leaving and came across a campground very close to the river. When we get our new caravan we will visit this town again and we will camp at barrel at the river and do a kayak. The weir and river at Baralaba appears to be very good for kayaking and fishing. We will try our luck in the future. On arriving at Miles we visited the Pioneer Village which is very similar to the village at Herberton. The exhibits are very similar to Herberton and the village is very well set out. We had a good look around as we had not had a chance to see this village on our past visit. The village is well worth seeing.

Tomorrow we will drive to Moree were we will stay for one night and we will be back in New South Wales. Another few days and we will be home, we heard it snowed two nights ago so it sounds like it will be cold when we get home. No place like home. It feels like we have had a holiday and am starting to feel refreshed. We are nearly home and now its time to plan the next trip. Not sure where or when yet, but I will keep you informed.

Till tomorrow.