WEST TO EAST AND CAIRNS

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We arrived in Cairns about 10 days after leaving WA.

As we had seen most places on the way over we decided to high tail it to Cloncurry from where we headed North to Normanton and Karumba in the Gulf.

Normanton is a lovely old town with some lovely old buildings that have all been restored beautifully. This is also home of the famous Gulflander train which runs from Corydon and then returns to Normanton. The lovely old railway station has
been beautifully restored. After looking around we moved on to Karumba which is in the Gulf of Carpentaria and a real fishermen’s’ haven.

We were told by one of the old guys who has been going to the caravan park there for 35 years that you were undressed unless you had a boat and a satellite dish. Looks like we were undressed!!

Spent a nice day eating a $12 kilo bag of prawns and drinking wine and beer on the beach under a nice shady tree.

We then left Karumba and drove through Corydon another lovely little outback town then onto Ravenshoe for lunch and then Atherton.

The Atherton Tablelands are truly lovely although it was a bit cold the two days we were there. We went to the Lakes, Eacham and Barrine and Tinaroo Dam as well as visiting the cheese and chocolate factory and the Nerada tea plantation.

We drove through some beautiful countryside and then onto Mareeba to the coffee plantation then down the range to Cairns and to my niece Trish, her husband Mat and son Patrick. They have a lovely home in Cairns and it is really nice to be in a house for a while.

We are all heading up to Cooktown in a couple of days time so really looking forward to going with “the locals”. More to come soon.

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Photos

Very well preserved Normanton Railway Station
This is the home of the famous Gulflander