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Published: February 14th 2011
Post dive trip we headed North through Daintree to Cape Tribulation. The drive included a so called ‘ferry’ crossing which basically involved driving the van onto a metal platform which slowly travelled on a cable from one shore to another. You could practically jump the distance, I reckoned with a decent ramp we'd have made it and saved a lot of time but Xan wasn't so keen.
Our campsite was brilliantly basic with nothing but a narrow section of rain forest separating it from the beach. At night after an amazing sunset we saw some absolutely huge bats flying above us and a creature in a tree beside us that looked like a cross between a possum and a rat.
We awoke in the morning to discover our ’thongs’ left outside overnight had been sabotaged (that‘s thongs as in flip flops, not Xan's undies). On both pairs it was the left flip only, and on both they had been severed in exactly the same place, the top and bottom of the actual thong, unfixable! I was convinced this was the act of some drunken reveller with a serious grudge against Havaianas. Xan doubted the likelihood of this in such
a remote campsite and suggested it could possibly be the local wildlife to blame. As if - I was having none of it so I went all Miss Marple and studied the dissected thong sections to see what kind of implement might have been used and explored the campsite for other victims and to gather evidence! This all quickly came to an end however when the campsite owner said ‘oh yeah, that’ll have been a phalanger’ none other than the possum/rat thing we’d seen the night before. Apparently it had happened to about 3 pairs of her thongs (again - flip flops not nickers!) Xan was gentlemanly enough not to take the piss out of me too much and just strolled back to the van with a slightly smug look on his face.
That day we did a pretty strenuous climb up a rain forest covered mountain from the top of which there were stunning views over the coast out to sea. This gorgeous landmark is one of many in Australia that was named by Captain James Cook (well of course originally named thousand of years prior to this by the Aborigines but Australia’s horrendous treatment of their indigenous
Quite a Campsite
Rainforrest lined beachpopulation isn’t really one we're planning on covering in our Blog) and basically he was in a pretty crap mood when he saw it, his boat had just having been smashed against some rocks, so he called it Mount Sorrow.
On the way up we saw huge birds of pray, some little black worms - one of which I had to pluck off my walking boot as it was stuck fast - gorgeous rain forest and a young German lad who fell and skited down the a rather steep and muddy section of the track on his arse almost wiping out Xan in the process. We checked he was ok, he was, only his pride that was hurt. When we eventually got there the view at the top was damn special but enjoyed from a very bizarre cage-like platform with no seats.
We chatted to the other people that had also made the climb - a couple that had done it without bringing any water with them, a couple that had brought everything you would need on a seven day hike including a gas stove and an older couple who lived nearby. It was them who started the
discussion about leaches, leading me to the realisation that the little worm thing I had been playing with was just that! Oops.
We both managed to clock up a few falls on our way back down, none as spectacular as the German dude, but picked up some scratches and bruises all the same. We got back to our camper filthy from the mud and dust and pretty shattered. My arm was also bleeding from one stumble that had sent me into some thorned branches.
We cleaned up a bit, did a final check for leaches and headed back down south.
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