Our North Queensland Adventure......

We loaded up the ute and camper trailer and left on Monday morning headed for Cairns.  First stop was Lake Awoonga which is south of Rockhampton.  We had hoped to get to Rocky or beyond on the first day, but we didn't leave until about 10:30am and encountered lots of roadworks along the way which probably added an hour or so to the trip.

Second day, we travelled to Ingham and stayed the night at Palm Tree Caravan Park on the Bruce Highway.  We had the choice of quite a few camp spots but elected to go down the back to the unpowered sites (we don't need power as we are self-sufficient with our battery system).  We got set up when Dennis noticed that we were about 20 metres away from the railway line!!  Three trains went through that night - one before we went to bed and the other two during the night - once the engine got through it wasn't too bad, but both of the trains woke me, but only one woke Dennis!!  Got back to sleep pretty easily though.

Today, we travelled to Innisfail, and went inland from there.  Our first stop was Paranella Park.  What an amazing place - Jose Paranella certainly made the most of any opportunity that came his way. It is such a pity that the structures have decayed so much through the use of sea-water in his concrete; floods, fires and cyclones.  I think rebuilding it to its original condition would be a huge job - it would be magnificent if that were to happen but it would take a huge amount of funds.

We left Paranella Park and drove back to Innisfail, stopping at a local bakery and butcher along the way for some fresh bread rolls to have for lunch and I picked up 200gms of mince for the spag bol I plan to cook for dinner one night - I'm sure the butcher thought I was the last of the big spenders shelling out $2.20 for my purchase!! :-)

We drove out to Flying Fish Point to a park where we had our lunch - unfortunately the weather was a bit drizzly today and it the wind was a tad cool, but we managed to stay dry.  The beach was still littered with a lot of rubbish from Cyclone Yasi - I didn't get photos for some strange reason.

We then drove out to Millaa Millaa, Atherton and ended up at Kuranda after stopping off at several Falls along the way.  We went to visit the Nerada Tea Factory at Malanda but it closed at 4pm - we got there at 4:15pm.  I was hoping to pick up some Royal DEvonshire tea....never mind will have to see if I can buy it online.

 Ellinjaa Falls

 Millaa Millaa Falls

Malanda Falls

 

So we have stopped for the night at Kuranda; had pizza for dinner that I cooked up in the Chef's Toolbox pan -yummy.  We plan on heading off to Barron Falls & Mossman Gorge tomorrow before going to Cairns - where we will set up for 2-3 days and do day trips to the sights we want to see.

 

Check in tomorrow for the new post. 

Ann & Dennis. xx