Advertisement
Butcher Shop - Croydon
This was the towns butcher shop until 1989. NEWS FLASH - WE HAVE BEEN MAROONED!! Due to a laptop screen failure last Thursday night before our departure to the Cape on Friday morning, we ended up in Port Douglas because being without communications or photo download functionality for 3 weeks was unthinkable - it has been bad enough for just a week. But do we ever pick the right spot to get stranded????!!!
To cut a long story short, after dealing with Dell’s Malaysian call centres and Indian call centres until I could scream, trying to give the address and describe the proximity of the remote paradise that we found ourselves in, we finally had an onsite technician turn up (yes he sat at the caravan table) to replace the LCD late yesterday.
Ok, now that we are back on the air - to the business of travel news.
After we left Karumba, travelling along the Savannah Way we passed through Normanton and Croydon enroute to Georgetown (389kms) where we planned to store the caravan while we went bush to Cobbold Gorge and our first night in the rooftop camper. (We forgot to take photo so you’ll have to wait until we take photos of it
on the Cape York stint). Not much to report regarding Georgetown - it’s a standard very small town. But we did have a great meal of fresh gulf prawns that we bought in Karumba before we left, so that certainly made it memorable. Most of the towns along this section of the Savannah Way were originally gold mining towns or towns which serviced the gold fields going back the last 19th century, but these days they are mere skeletons of their former selves.
Our side trip to Cobbold Gorge (82kms) was great and well worth it. The Gorge is located within the boundaries of Robin Hood Station. The station is 1284 square kilometres in size and runs 10,000 head of Brahman cattle. We went for a silent eco cruise through the very narrow, rugged sandstone gorge. It is only 2 metres wide in some places. Saw some freshwater crocs. It was awesome and very peaceful. We camped in the bush camping area and lit our very own campfire that night. I should confess here that we almost smoked out the rest of the camp for the first hour due to green wood and having no accelerant to help it
Pioneer John Corbett
This grave is on Robin Hood Station. He was a storekeeper from the Cloncurry goldfields, and was murdered by local Aboriginals while on his way from Western Creek to Normanton in 1871. He was carrying a large sum of gold which was still loaded on his horse. along. The rooftop tent was a success…. well at least so far. I’m yet to find out about climbing down the ladder in the middle of night after having a few drinks (we abstained this time because of the ladder).
Oh and Wes took to three very large cane toads with the tomahawk - they fizzed, hissed and popped beautifully in the fire.
We returned to Georgetown, hooked up the van and drove onto Undara (231kms) through Mt Surprise. Undara is where the spectacular volcanic lava tubes are. We had never heard about lava tubes before but we were quite impressed.
The Undara site also had all manner of accommodation from campsites to tram carriage rooms, and a large bar and restaurant. We attended a campfire singalong (luckily Wes was drowned out by the others), had a campfire breakfast and went on some bushwalks.
From Undara we headed to Atherton (206km), through Ravenshoe and Innot Springs and for reasons that I am still to understand, the sight of our first McDonalds for a few weeks took hold and we chowed down on a Big Mac meal deal - thickshake and all. (We rarely eat McDonalds when readily available,
Cobbold Gorge
Geoffrey - We made it and it was great. but deprivation obviously takes its toll)
The scenery change from Undara to Atherton was spectacular for the extremes - Undara being still considered dry, arid and outback. Atherton being green, lush and tropical.
Unfortunately our run of great weather came to a temporary end in Atherton, which is on the tablelands west of Cairns. We stayed here for 6 nights and had intermittent showers cool days and cold nights for the first 5.
There was so much to see here: We visited local waterfalls, had lunch at a bio-dynamic dairy, went for drives through the rainforest and visited the crater at Mt Hypipamee. Had the best donuts ever at the Ravenshoe market. Did washing. Went bird-watching in a bird hide at Hasties Swamp. Went to Cairns for a day to pick up some camping bits in readiness for the Cape. Went shopping in Kuranda and visited a coffee plantation in Mareeba (sounds like a Beach Boys song…Kuranda, Mareeba, ooh I wanna see ya). Drove to Lake Tinaroo - very pretty. Went to choc and cheese factory in Yungaburra and had Devonshire tea at Lake Barrine.
Then, last Thursday night……after packing everything needed for the Cape trek
into the 4WD, baking a slice and yummy anzac bikkies…. the computer screen died and so instead of leaving for the Cape the next morning, we made some calls to Dell and relocated to Port Douglas (150km) to await the repair.
We are leaving here tomorrow, dropping the caravan off to go into storage and off we go. Take 2.
(We are coming back to Port Douglas in 2-3 weeks so will cover it in blog after Cape)
Advertisement
Tot: 0.128s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 15; qc: 75; dbt: 0.0727s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb