Blogs from Innisfail, Queensland, Australia, Oceania

Innisfail is heavily dependent on the surrounding sugar cane and banana farms. The town was originally named Geraldton in 1882, to honour a local Irish Entrepreneur, Thomas Henry Fitzgerald. When a Russian ship sailed into the harbour in the early 1900’s, when it should have been sailing into Geraldton, Western Australia, the town realised it had to change its name to Innisfail. (The Captain should have checked Google Maps). Inis Fail is a romantic name for Ireland. Innisfail lies in the heart of the Cassowary Coast, and our first port of call was to drive to Etty Bay, which is known as a hotspot for cassowary sightings. Etty Bay has a beautiful beach, however, no cassowaries to be seen there. We did however see a large goanna striding along the foreshore, no doubt looking for turtle ... read more

Innisfail / Flying Fish Point 25th Oct 2012 Since arriving on the East Coast we had ridden a wave of highs and lows and leaving Cairns continued the theme for us. Our original plan was to head back up North and continue to the tip of The Cape, (which would have taken 3 weeks!), but as we had been in Cairns for so long, the wet season was now fast approaching, (it would not be good to be stuck up on the Cape for 6 months!), and we had to head south as we were to meet up with Matt and Penny, his lovely fiancé, in Mission Beach for the first week of November. So there was no question really; we headed south to Innisfail and a little beachside spot we knew of called Flying Fish ... read more

On Sunday 21st we left Cardwell on what was a very comfortable journey of about 100 kilometers further north. The weather was good, the road was reasonably flat and there was very little traffic about. We were heading for Innisfail but on the way we called in again at the Tully Information Centre. Yesterday we had noticed a very good “used” book exchange system in the centre and as we had recently completed a few books between us it was an excellent opportunity to change some. That done, we travelled on to Innisfail and arrived well before midday. We chose to stay at The Mango Tree Caravan Park which belongs to the Big 4 group and so, as members, we would get a discount. It is on the outskirts of Innisfail but we tend to prefer ... read more

We stayed a little longer at Lucinda than anticipated as we received a phone call early on the morning of 10th June from Trevor’s brother to say his Mum had passed away so we booked the train and went down to Brisbane for the funeral and then back up to Lucinda for a couple more days. Trevor went crabbing with our neighbour and they got another 5 crabs as well as seeing a very large crocodile come towards them who was a little longer than their tinnie so they drove the boat away very quickly to live another day. This is a photo of our neighbours Big Al and Liz. We played a couple of games of golf at a small town called Mackdale and most of its trees were blown over by Cyclone Yasi. It ... read more

Since being in Queensland we had seen a lot of leaflets recommending a place called Paronella Park. The leaflets all marked it as Number 1 thing to do in Queensland. None of the leaflets really give you much of an idea what its all about so it was all a bit of a mystery. The pictures looked beautiful so that was enough of a reason to give it a go. Entry to the park also includes use of the caravan park so for once we had our day planned and also somewhere to spend the night. There was a daytime tour and an evening tour to go on so after setting up we rushed back to the office for the daytime tour. We were in such a rush that we had forgotten to put on out ... read more