Wind, air and we're back at Ayr.

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We've always loved the Esplanade pool and the surrounding grounds at Cairns and found yet more of this area when we had time there with our son and his family. They were staying further along the Esplanade near a wonderful children's park that we hadn't previously seen. There were a couple of play areas of climbing frames, slippery dips etc. as well as a couple of great water parks, so much fun things for children. There are big shade trees and wonderful tropical plantings, a cafe, a graffiti-free skatepark, a volleyball courts and tennis courts. Cairns does it all so well, we were sorry when it came time to leave.

We had a few nights at the Big 4 caravan park at Rollingstone, north of Townsville. we always like it there, it's on the waterfront, it has a beautiful pool and good amenities. It's quiet and restful. Because of the wide-spread drought in Queensland, unfortunately the grass on the sites is struggling, and just to make it that much drier, the winds came and blew for our last two days there. Thankfully, the pineapple farm at the turnoff to the park is still producing it's wonderful pineapples which it supplies to the caravan park. We always buy one or two each stay.

Our trip today was back down to Townsville - first we turned off the highway and visited some of the beaches - the town of Rollingstone and their Rollingstone beach, Balgal Beach, and a new beach to us, Toolakea, all are very nice. It was a plus that it was higher tide as we walked along the sand, low tide shows some stones.

We've been having trouble with the air conditioning in the cabin of our motor home. We rarely turn on the air conditioning in the living area but the cabin is another matter, it gets hot as we drive along with the sun shining onto us. We found an automotive air conditioning place and they regassed it as we waited. There is evidently a slow leak but hopefully it will stay cool for us until we're home. We once again spent some time along the Strand, lots of young volleyball players playing on the beach and also quite a few new sculptures on the sand and the parkway along the Strand .. the Sculpture Festival begins tomorrow so we were glad we had an early viewing.

After the dryness of the Townsville area, we were glad to once again get to the lush sugar and mango growing area around Ayr. We saw a sign to Giru - their sugar mill is the second largest in the southern hemisphere, the first being the mill in Ingham. We drove to have a look .. yes, that's big, take a photo, (delete later). We'll stay here overnight.

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