A Wet Christmas

After I collected Louis from the kennels I decided that I would keep busy and catch up with the jobs around the home.  I started well on Wednesday by mowing the grass which is euphemistically know as the front and rear lawns but is actually a mixture of green weeds and wild grasses.   I use an old push mower to cut about 200 square metres so it takes some time especially after rain in our early summer.  It took about two hours of continuous pushing but I enjoyed it.  As I explained to my neighbout, S, I just put my mind in neutral and push!  Louis generally supervises by lying alternately in sunny and shady spots.  The day was warm, 30C,  and I was satisfied that I had done enough and took it easy for the rest of the day.

The next day was Thursday and I put in place my next resolution to use my little folding bike for shopping.  This was a great success.  I rode about 25km.  First to Noosa Junction for my general shopping at Aldi then to Noosa Civic where I picked up some odds and ends not stocked by Aldi.  The day was warm so I only bought items not requiring refrigeration.  The ride to the Junction is along the main road but is quite safe but the ride to Civic was along a superb bike track.  It runs about 5 metres from the road and actually passes under the road at a couple of round-abouts / traffic circles.  I never knew this track existed as you can't see it from the road.      The ride home from Civic to Tewantin was not so nice but quite safe.

Later in the day B and I walked our dogs in the park and as we neared home a big thunderstorm was about to break and the high winds were making the big gums sway.  As we crossed the bridge out of the park branches were beginning to fly.  We made it to our respective homes in time just as the heavens opened.  Soon after there was a terrific lightening strike near by with a simultaneous clap of thunder Louis jumped but luckilly he is very calm in thunderstorms.

Next morning the park was a mess.    First the tree which we observed swaying the evenining before now looked like:

     We were walking next to this.

But even more scary was the tree hit by lightning.    

 The main trunk lies to the right of the picnic table.

   The rest of the tree lies in the bush behind the table.

This tree fell parallel to the houses behind it.  Is was about 30 metres long so could have done real damage if it had fallen on the houses.  A few hunded metres away a similar tree took out the corner of a two story house.   It took a large crane to remove it.

In all we lost about 7 or 8 large trees in the park.

Since then it has done nothing but rain so I'll bore you with some statisitcs.

In December the average rain fall is 132mm over 13 days.

The maximum ever to date was 214mm

Up to 8.00am on the 29 Dec we have had 471mm over 23 Days

In a normal year Tewantin has 1571mm.

To date we have had 2270mm mainly since October .

Needless to say I haven't done any more cycling to the shops.

Over Christmas I went to my old friends J an B on Christmas Day and stayed until Boxing day.  They live in a good sized retirement villa with their old cattle dog, Pancho, and a young scruffy dog called Scamp.  As dogs have to have permission to live in the Retirement Village they were pushing the boundaries by letting me bring Louis with me.

Christmas Day was relatively dry and after lunch B and i went swimming in the villages superb pool.  We also walked the dogs but got caught in a heavy shower.

The amusing thing was that Scamp fell in love with Louis and spent much of his time trying to consummate his love in spite of both of them being neutered males.  Luckily Louis didn't take offence.

I stayed for lunch on Boxing Day but by now the rain had returned with a vengeance.  We filled in time watching the Test Cricket on the TV but as the Poms were thrashing Australia it did nothing to brighten the occasion.  Even Scamp and Louis settled down .

Scamp and Louis

I drove home after lunch in heavy rain.  Later I walked around to my friends J to have dinner with her 91 year old Mum plus Mum's boy friend and a Japanese student who spent Christmas with J.  It was a quiet evening and J dropped off at home on the way to taking the oldies back to their retirement home.

It had been a nice quiet Christmas but since then it has rained heavily every day.  Fortunately my house is at the top of a rise and providing I keep the side gates clear of debris the water just runs down each side of the house.  The back lawn is under about three inches of water at present.

Escape to Cairns - Part 5

On Sunday morning I checked out of the hotel at 8.30am and walked to the Cairns Central Railway Station to catch the tilt train back to Cooroy.  It left on time at 9.15am.  I was seated in car F seat 9 which is a very nice seat.  Car F is set up to accommodate several wheelchairs and is arranged in a 1 plus 1 seat layout rather than 2 plus 1.  I therefore had no immediate neighbour.  In fact there were only about 6 people in the car.

As we travelled south I took some photos of the car layout.

I soon settled back to listen to my MP3 player.  I was now listening to a LibriVox recording of Arnold Bennett's The Card.

The weather in Cairns had been pretty good considering that  rest of Queensland was being deluged but as we travelled south storm clouds began to appear.

I had morning tea and cake from the trolley but decided against ordering a hot lunch but got myself a sandwich and a small bottle of Chardonnay from the galley.  The little bottles of wine are good quality and are rather neat in that the bottle incorporates a glass with its screw off top.

 

 

 

As we travelled south the weather started to deteriorate and about 100 km from Townsville it began to rain heavily.  I videoed the view on my little TV screen from the driver,s cabin which shows how heavily it was raining.

 

 

  We were scheduled to reach Townsville at about 3.25pm but the train started to crawl.  We were told at 3.30pm that the galley had closed because there would be a crew change at Townsville.  At 4.00pm we were told that the train would terminate at Townsville due to water across the track further south.

The first thing I did was to phone B who was going to meet me at 7.15am next morning at Cooroy telling her not bother.  I also phoned the kennels and booked Louis in for another night.

At Townsville station I met another couple who had travelled up with me earlier in the week.  They were picking the train up at Townsville to go back to Cooroy.  Apparently they were told of the trains cancellation at 2.30pm.  We hung around the station for an hour and a half until we were put on buses to Rockhampton.  Those passengers getting off before Brisbane were put on a small bus which had really cramped seating.  I am only 165cm (about 5'5") and could not get comfortable.  After two hours we stopped at a roadhouse for dinner which was paid for by Queensland Rail.  There were over 160 passengers on three buses but we were all served in an hour and on our way again.

We drove on through the night through heavy rain .  There were occasional comfort stops at roadhouses and finally at about 5.00am we reached Rockhampton.  We hoped to catch the tilt train service from Rockhampton  to Brisbane which left about 7.00am but it was fully booked.  We were also told that the road bridge over the River Isis near Bundaberg was under water and it had possibly been damaged which could mean a 48 hour delay!

After a light breakfast and a three hour delay we were put on other buses and continued our journey south.  The new bus was bliss.  There was space to spread out.  Apparently the first bus was normally used as a school bus and has smaller seats with minimal leg room.

About mid morning we stopped at another roadhouse for an early lunch.  Here we were told that thee Isis River Bridge had just opened to traffic so we would be getting home today.  After a couple more stops we finally reach Cooroy Railway Station just after 3.00pm.  Here I checked the bus time table back to my home in Tewantin and there was one at 3.30pm so I was home just after 4.00pm.

I made myself a light meal and went to bed just after 6.00pm and slept through to next morning.  It had been quite an adventure.

On Tuesday I picked up Louis from the kennels where he had had a great time.

Now it's time to get back to a normal life.

Escape to Cairns - Part 4

I really didn't know too much about the trip planned for Saturday.  It was called The Rainforest, Waterfalls and Paronella Park Trip and would be a 360km drive through the Tablelands just South of Cairns.  Margaret and I had driven through some of the Tablelands around Atherton in our 1992 trip but that was North of today's drive.

The coach pulled in at about 7.45am and, after picking up some more passengers, we drove South to Gordonvale.  Our driver and guide was a lady called Jane and she introduced all the passengers to each other.  There was an English couple, a young German lady and four Taiwanese couples.  Jane decided that I was a real and therefore the token Aussie on the trip and throughout the day called on me to educate the others on Australian ways and customs.  I protested that I was really a Pommie but she said that I had been in Australia long before she was born.  Jane always got her way.  Actually she was great fun and a very good guide.  I think she must have been a primary school teacher in a previous life as she kept reminding us all to make sure that we had been to the loo as the drive had long periods without facilities. Any way back to the trip.

We turned right at Gordonvale and took the Gillies Highway west up onto the Tablelands.  This was a real winding road which meant that the little coach we were in was the largest vehicle that could made the turns without sliding down the hill.  Some of our Taiwanese friends were a little scared and some came close to being travel sick but the efficient Jane had distributed airline sick bags in case of such an emergency.  The road has 263 tight corners in only 19km.  Fortunately we reached our first destination without any dramas. This was The Giant Curtain Fig.

The Giant Curtain Fig is reputedly over 600 years old.  This is a strangler fig which had a seed dropped high in the trunk of a huge rainforest tree.  The fig sent down aerial roots for nourishment and finally ended killing it host and leaving a spectacular curtain of roots.  There is a board-walk giving access to the fig and Jane also pointed out other interesting attractions such as spiders as big as your hand.

 

 

 Jane at Work

Jane rounded us all up and we were off to our next stop. This was Lake Barrine see:


http://www.lakebarrine.com.au/

This lake is the crater of a volcano and is kept full by the high average rainfall for the area.  It is run by a family who have been organising trips on the lake for many years.  The English couple, the German lady and I went on the cruise around the lake which takes about 45 minutes while the Taiwanese went on a wildlife walk conducted by Jane.  The cruise was very interesting and we saw several pythons in the rainforest,  lots of wild ducks, turtles and eels in the water and lots of massive Kauri trees in the rainforest.

 Looking for Eels and Turtles

 A massive Kauri Pine

Looking back to the Tea Rooms

We had morning tea with scones, real cream and strawberry jam before we continued our drive.  I spoke to the German lady, Katrina, who is doing her Phd in Educational Psychology in Melbourne and had flown up for a three day sightseeing trip.  The English couple were on the third stage of a round the world trip.

Our next stop was south to the Millaa Millaa Falls in the Waterfalls National Park.  These are spectacular and have a popular swimming hole at their base.  Jane advised us not to swim here as the fall are fed by creeks flowing through cow paddocks up on the Tablelands and the water has a high concentration of contaminants in it.  This didn't put off a large number of tourists swimming there when we arrived.

We now had a long drive to our next stop at Paronella Park where we would have lunch followed by a conducted tour of the park.  Before setting off "school marm" Jane checked that we had all used the loo.  We drove east back down the Palmerston Highway towards the town of Innisfail but turned south to Paronella Park before we reached there.

Before our conducted tour of the park we had a hot lunch.  It was Quiche or Lasagne with a Vegetarian option followed by a selection of little sweet cakes.  It was surprisingly tasty and filling.  The tour was great as we were told the history of the park as we went along.

In brief, a Spanish migrant, Jose Paronella,  had made money out of buying and selling sugar farms around Innisfail.  In 1930 he indulged himself in building his own, what the English call a, folly.  Over five years he built by hand two fake castles out of concrete reinforced by railway lines.  A lake stocked with fish.  Numerous other concrete structures and a ballroom with the first Disco Ball Light seen in Australia.   He also built the first hydroelectric power station in the area and the whole complex was self powered from the waterfall.  In short he built the first Theme Park in Australia,

From 1935 until the late 1970s the family operated the park when it was sold.  The new owner had to cope with fire destroying the ballroom followed by a cyclone and the park was left to be swallowed up by the rainforest.

Jose was a baker back in Spain and a successful farm broker in Queensland but he was no civil engineer.  His choice of concrete mix was not waterproof and gradually the concrete structures have decayed,  the reinforcing railway lines have rusted away and the main structures have a severe case of concrete cancer.
In 1993 the present owners rediscovered the park and have re-opened it to the public.  At their own expense they are restoring the park.  I still has the many thousand of trees and shrubs planted by Jose and his family.  Jose's house is still liveable and is now a museum.  I have taken some photos shown below but the Parks Website gives s fuller history and more photos.

http://www.paronellapark.com.au/index.html





After the tour we had an hour to explore the gardens.  I found that Jose had even constructed changing room for visitors swimming in the falls pool out of reinforced concrete which are in surprisingly good condition.

Some of the Concrete Structures

The Hydro

This was probably the highlight of my entire Escape to Cairns.




Next it was back through Innisfail to our next stop.  Jane explained on the way that Innifail was originally called Geraldton after the original settler Mr Fitzgerald.  Unfortunately it was a major port in its day but sailors in the 1870's kept getting muddled up between Geraldton in West Australia and Geraldton in Queensland in spite of them being a whole continent apart.  Geraldton Queensland lost out and was renamed Innisfail after Mr Fitzgerald's hometown in Scotland.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innisfail,_Queensland

Our next stop was at Babinda Boulders near the little sugar town of Babinda.  There is an Aboriginal Legend about the Boulders at:

http://www.cairnsattractions.com.au/a_babinda-boulders.php

We were dropped of along the gorge and walked past the boulders to the swimming hole.  This one is spring fed and along the gorge the water is drinkable.  Here some of our group had a swim and we had after noon tea and cakes before driving back to Cairns wheer we arrive at 6.30pm.

The day had just flown by and I certainly didn't feel that we had driven 360km

At the end Jane gave me a hug and told me that the hotel receptionist had told her to look out for me as Margaret had died just three weeks before.  Jane told me that I was doing well.

I had a steak burger in the Good Food Cafe before going to bed after a long and interesting day.

End of Part 4

Escape to Cairns - Part 3

Friday morning I had to be outside the hotel on the street to be picked up by the four wheel drive which was to take me to Cape Tribulation in the Daintree Rainforest.  It arrived at 7.05am as I had been told.

My transport arriving.

 There were already other people on board who were a young couple from California.  Before leaving Cairns we picked up another elderly couple form Minnesota and a few kilometres north of Cairns we picked up a couple of young women at a beach called Yorkeys Knob .  They were travelling to Melbourne in a Camper Van/RV and just left it parked on the esplanade for the day.  This was the lot for our little vehicle but later we would meet up with another group on a bigger four wheeled drive vehicle with about fifteen people on it.

Our first stop was at Rex Lookout.  This has magnificent views of the coastline which we followed for an hour or so.

 

 

Views from Rex Lookout and our FWD waiting for us.

Our next stop was at Mossman theoretically to get a cup of tea or coffee but really the last chance to use the loo for a little while.

 

Our tea stop

We didn't explore area but nineteen years ago Margaret and I visited Mossman Gorge and it swimming hole.


We continued on until we reached the Daintree River  where we stopped for more tea the went on a hour long river cruise.


I had done one of these cruises with Margaret and much to her disappointment we never saw a Saltwater Crocodile.  Today I saw three admittedly two were only 24 and 50 centimetres long but the third was 2.5 metres and sunning itself on the river bank.

 

 

The big crock on the bank.

 

Mangroves

 

A cruise boat

 

The Daintree River

We also saw other wild life such as frogs and fish.  The river bank is nearly all mangroves.

The cruise ended on the north bank of the Daintree where our FWDs had crossed over on the cable ferry.

The cable car ferry

We travelled in convoy further north to climb the Alexandra Range and stopped at its lookout.  There are some good photos on the link.

We continued north to our lunch stop near Cape Tribulation where we had a barbecue and i bought a glass of quite nice red wine to go with it.  I sat with the couple from Minnesota during lunch and found out that, like me, he was an electrical engineer who has ended up working in computing.  They received several text messages from home telling that their house was OK in spite of there being 30 inched of snow all around it.  We were sitting in 32degrees centigrade hat with a humidity of about 90% and it all seemed a bit unreal.

After lunch we drove up the Bloomfield Track ( which is a rough unmade road until we came to the Emmagen Creek  where we stopped.  Several people from both FWDs went swimming in the water hole and we all had Billy Tea, a glass of wine and sampled some of the tropical fruit grown in this area.

Next we drove back to Cape Tribulation and took a short  walk to the beach.

 

 

Cape Tribulation

Then it was back down the track where we stopped at the Daintree Ice Cream Company to sample one of their specials.   These are a selection of four ice creams made from locally grown tropical fruit and were very tasty.

Next we headed back to the Daintree River and crossed it on the cable ferry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daintree_River_Ferry  and drove back along the coast to our hotels where I was dropped off at 6.30pm.

It was a long day and we had seen some tremendous rain forests and beaches.

I ate dinner at the Night Markets and had grilled barramundi, grilled potato and salad accompanied by a nice Chardonnay.  I was in bed by 9.00pm

End of Part 3

Escape To Cairns - Part 2

I woke up early Thursday morning after quite a good night's sleep.  After a shower and a shave I had my normal orange juice, two slices of toasted fruit loaf and a cup of tea for breakfast.  I also checked out the view from my apartment's balcony.

The view from my balcony. The Lagoon is across the Esplanade to the right.  The big building is the Pier complex where cruises to the Barrier Reef depart.

A broader view of Cairns Sea Front

Cairns doesn't really have a beach as it is on a tidal estuary. It has mud flats and mangroves.  They have constructed an artificial lagoon where the tourists can swim but most hotels and apartment blocks have their own swimming pools.

Looking down on the Hotel's swimming pool

Actually swimming in the sea in the summer is not a good idea because of stinging jelly fish.  The big ones can inflict a seriously painful sting by just brushing their metre long tentacles against you but the little Irukanji jelly fish can kill.  The lagoon has stinger nets and is swept daily.  Cairns is also home to the Estuarine Crocodile  which also is a very dangerous animal.

After breakfast I went down to reception to officially check in and arrange for some tours for the next three days.  The idea was to keep busy.

Ruth, the receptionist was a young woman from Adelaide, South Australia, and we had a good chat while she sorted out three tours.  The first would start at 9.00am and was a trip on the Scenic Railway to Kuranda in the tableland behind Cairns.

I was picked up from the reception area by a bus which took us back to Cairns Railway Station to catch the narrow gauge train.

This is an interesting trip up the range to Kuranda and is accompanied by a commentary.  The link details the lines construction and history and I also took a few photos on the way up.

 

My train crossing the trestle bridge

A stop at the Barron Falls 

The isn't much water in spite of the recent heavy rain.

However this little fall is going well

I had a three hour stop over in Kuranda Village.  We had visited here back in 1992 when we found in a hippy type community with lots of local craft stalls and the Aboriginal Dance Theatre.  Now it is a mixture of stores and markets selling touristy trash or very expensive shops selling local an aboriginal art.  There is an interesting aboriginal cultural centre which is worth a visit.

I had lunch in the Irish Hotel and the building is a very old timber structure.  Afterward I walked beside the Barron River before catching the Skyrail back to Cairns.

The link gives the full description of this trip which is very interesting and quite an experience.  Here are some of my photos.

Leaving the Skyrail Station at Kuranda

Approaching the first tower

Crossing the Barron River

Over the top of the rain forrest

Coming into the half way stop where you change Gondolas

Here you can take a walk to some look outs over the Barron Falls and a board walk through the forrest

Over the top of the last ridge

and down towards Cairns

They met me at the Skyrail Terminal and took me back to the hotel at about 6.00pm.. Here I found that Ruth had booked me on a trip to Cape Tribulation in the Daintree Rainforest next day and a Tableland Tour on Saturday.  I was going to be busy.

I found that the hotel had been built over the Cairns Night Markets which also had a good small, licensed restaurant (Shop 13) serving reasonably priced meals.  I had a big T-bone Steak with chips and salad accompanied by a glass of Shiraz.

I was in bed by 9.00pm after a busy and tiring day.

End of Part 2