Far North Queensland

28th August 2010
Ok….well…… We are pretty behind.
Monday night earlier this month, back up in Cairns, we found ourselves back in Gordonvale with old mate, his little brown dog and the travelling cockatoo!

The next day was overcast and wet so we headed to the movies to catch Toy Story 3. We also attempted to sneak into Karate Kid however the cunning movie centre staffs were on to us pretty quickly so we had to make a fast getaway from their little flashlights!

Right on dusk we stumbled into some great entertainment on the foreshore, the local Zuumba Class. Unfortunately we had plans for later in the night so we quickly cooked up tea on the BBQ and sat back and enjoyed our dinner with a free show. That Nights entertainment was a Magic show at the Casino performed by Sam Powers. It was a good show very entertaining and Meegan even managed to get up on stage and please the crowd as Sam’s sexy assistant! After the show we cruised up to our vacant block at Redlynch to catch some sleep!

On Wednesday we actually managed to find our beloved Lemon Meringue Pie Fruit, or Rollinia Deliciosa. For those who haven’t been fortunate enough to try it, it’s worth the effort of hunting it down for a week. If you ever come across it make the purchase your taste bus will defiantly thankyou for it. Later in the morning we made our way up to Mossman gorge, a beautiful spot which follows along the length of the river, again it was raining as we made our thru the gorge (I guess that’s why its called the rainforest).

Craving some sunshine we cruised over to check out Port Douglas another famous Queensland getaway, with beautiful white sand, calm azure blue water and lovely coconuts palms along the beach. We must have missed this part of the beach as all we saw was mangroves with brown silty water with mushy knee high chop, and gunky sand. I may be biased but I think WA beaches $%^& all over Queensland beaches. Anyway we didn’t spend long at Port Douglas, it has the feel of one of those towns that used to be really nice before it became what it is now, much like Dunsborough.
That night was spent at our illegal little spot down the road on our own private beach paying a total of $0 for the night, take that over priced caravan parks.

Thursday morning we awoke to a nice sunrise over the ocean, where we devoured our sour sop, rollinia, passionfruit, chocolate pudding fruit and many other delicious tropical goodies. We then headed back to Mossman, a town we were becoming all to familiar with. Luckily we were finally able to pick up a set of shiny new number plates. 1DLA819

Heading back toward Cairns we decided to head up to the quaint little town of Kuranda. Which is basically just a large tourist attraction with 2 “original markets“ a series of small shops, bird parks, koala parks, butterfly gardens; pretty much any animal that can be breed and displayed there was a dedicated park for it.

We opted for the butterfly hut as the birds in the rainforest are prolific and all the other animals we have already seen. The butterfly house is home to over 2000 butterfly’s, from over 12 local species, with the largest moth in the world; the Hercules moth which has a wingspan up to 27cm. The only problem is it cannot eat so it only lives for 48 hrs of its body fat.

One of the best things we saw in Kuranda was an old fashioned lolly shop where everything was hand made, the lollies are made with natural flavours with no added preservatives. All the lollies were wrapped and created with machinery from the 1930’s. The lollies where so tasty and natural we decided to buy some for Brett’s nieces and nephews. Unfortunately they weren’t posted in time and we ended up eating them, sorry kids but they were delicious.

After Kuranda we decided to donate another $350 to the local tyre company as we are sick and tired of being so cashed up! We than headed down to Innisfail for a night out on the town. You see we had been together for 4 years on this day and being the hopeless romantic Brett is he decided to take Meegan out for a big night on the town spoiling her with his love. (There is no money for spoiling, so love is all Meegan gets)
Anyway Innisfail was the biggest town on the map in the area so we where sure to find somewhere to wine and dine. First we needed to give ourselves a scrub so we went to a caravan park to pay our $2 for a shower.

Except no one told us that showers actually cost $3 in Innisfail, which is no big a deal, however we only had a $5 note left in the car. So Meegan decided to head into the shower with a stern warning from the lady at the front; Brett wasn’t to try sneak in as well. After pleading with the “lady” for a $2 shower (seeing that we only had $2 left) Brett was firmly told “$2 is NOT $3” Brett was sent to back to the car where the lady morphed into a bitch and positioned herself with a prime viewing of the shower area. Not satisfied with her bitch status she decided to up the ante, and have a go at Brett for offending her with his offer of $2 for a shower.

After Meegan was cleansed we headed into town to find some grub. After 30 min’s of driving around town we discovered Innisfail was a dud. Luckily it was late night shopping so we went to Coles and purchased some divine treats instead. Then it was off to the movie store to rent a movie, we then ended up back at the free camp by the highway (having bucket baths) where we belonged. In short do not go to Innisfail for a holiday. (It actually is a very beautiful area unfortuanlly that night we ran into a few problems).

Since Thursday was a shambles we concurred to move our 4 year togetherness date to Friday instead. So we arose early and made the short drive up to Josephine falls. We then cut up what was left of the rollinia, sour sop and custard apple fruit, ventured up by the river where we sat on some rocks enjoying our fruity feast. After a short walk to check out the falls, we returned to the swimming hole to slide on the rocks and a jump in for a very brief, cold dip.

After breakfast we had a look at the nicer side of Innisfail down at flying fish point, where the river meets the sea.

That afternoon we headed to one of the most incredible places in Queensland Paronella Park. Paronella Park is a park which was designed and constructed by one man Jose Paronella. It is an amazing place which has its own waterfalls, lakes, castle, hydro electric power station, ball room and 5 acres of tropical gardens with over 7000 trees and plants.

It can’t be explained in one page, it has to be seen to be believed. The only problem is it was made over five years in the 1930’s by Jose. Everything was done by hand and most of the materials for the building were sourced from the property, and most of it was lime from a quarry up the back. As this area of Queensland is prone to cyclones it has been through at least 4 major cyclones, every 5 years the bottom half of the property floods and a major fire destroyed much of the castle 20 years ago.
These days it doesn’t quite possess it’s former glory, however you can’t help but feel the passion that went into this place, the vegetation may slowly be taking over as moss covers the stairways and roots are devour the buildings, but it is a truly incredible property with a very interesting history.

After spending the morning photographing Paronella park we were both keen on a bit of beach action so on the advice of the locals we headed to Kurramine beach, a quick dip and we were on the way to Mission beach.














Watch this space for updates!

Believe it or not even in the life of holidaying we still are runing out of time to type about it! Updates coming soon.

Bob, the Legend!

Trying to catch up withouselves here are some updates from last week, or the week before! We are on holidays and we have lost track of time so just enjoy getting through another one of our essays!

Monday morning we headed into cairns to Drop Bob at the mechanic. The morning was spent walking around town, we went for a swim and discovered there were free hot showers down on the foreshore. Bob was ready to be picked up at lunchtime, the overheating problem was fixed, the oil had been changed but somehow Bob had managed to loose his back number plate!

Losing your number plates in a foreign land is not a good idea, even if it is in your own country! After waiting in long lines at government offices and spending the majority of the afternoon on government phone lines, we were given one option; we were not allowed to drive our car.

No more bob, well until our new numberplates arrived, which could take up to two weeks. We possibly could get away with driving with only one number plate but driving with no plates seemed a little riskier! You see even if you are interstate you still need to somehow get your remaining numberplate back to W.A for the transport department to issue you with new plates. So in the end we decided to risk driving up to Mossman (just inland from Port Douglas) as we had a family friend up there and we hoped we might be able to crash out the front for a few days while we waited for the plates to arrive. So we departed cairns and cruised along the Captain Cook highway, a windy little road that follows the rainforest and the coastline. That night we found an amazing camping spot right on the beach complete with coconut palms, turtles and an amazing sunrise to wake up to the following morning.


Tuesday morning after another amazing fruit filled breakfast we headed into Mossman to post off our one remaining numberplate. Once arriving in Mossman and chatting to the locals about our options with the car, we decided the Daintree was a much better place to kill a few days waiting for the plates. So on Scott’s nifty advice, after a quick stop at the printers and $7.00 later we were fitting Bob’s new paper, laminated number plates to the car complete with the photocopiers detailed images of fresh mud and squished bugs. They really looked the part so we then spent the next two weeks touring the country side of far northern Queensland with our rogue plates.

First stop before the Daintree, we found ourselves in the quaint little caravan park come retirement village of Wonga beach. We were possibly the youngest people to ever grace the grounds of Wonga and the locals loved the fresh young blood. We were not invited to craft, like we were up at Karumba, but the care taker insisted that 5o’clock happy hour was the place to be seen. So the clock struck five and we slowly made our way over with our one remaining glass of wine to share between us. We were the last two people in the park to turn up so we seated our selves at the end of the table and started making small talk with a few of “the locals”. A good half hour after our arrival, a young lad in his late 50’s stood up to address the table. In front of the forty or so he stood, chinking his glass to catch everyone’s attention. Oh no we thought, someone’s died or its time to sing happy birthday.

Instead he points straight down the table at brett and bellows “Stand Up”.
“Who me” exclaims a bewildered Brett Ian Woodroffe
“Yes you, we have all seen it that set up of yours, everyone’s been spying on it since you came in, what is it? Who makes it? Details?”
He sits down, leaving Brett standing in a crowd of grey nomads lusting after more knowledge of the mysterious Bob. After informing the crowd of all the details and answering questions like a school project, everyone in the entire campground then managed to get over to have a closer look of bob at some time during the rest of evening. As we left the park the next morning a whole bunch of “old mates” were gathered at the front gates, cameras at the ready, snapping away paparazzi style as we drove out and left the strange land of Wonga Beach.

A short drive up the road and a quick ride on the ferry took us into the Daintree. Apparently once you cross the river its meant feel like crossing into Jurassic Park, which is true except for all the for sale signs, every where, as far as the eye can see. Everything is for sale, as beautiful as it is, there are not many who actually want to live here as its rains for over 300 days a year. The population is only about 100, you can’t imagine how hot and steaming and wet it would be throughout summer.

Our home for the three days was at Noah Beach, another amazing spot especially for only $10 a night! Right on the beach surrounded by rainforest! Whilst in the Daintree we saw cassowaries and bats, turtles, spiders, bush turkeys and beautiful beaches. We sampled amazing tropical fruits at an Exotic fruit farm, including the Lemon meringue Fruit, Sour Sop and Chocolate Pudding fruit. We met a Bat at the Bat Rescue centre. We sampled ice-cream at both ice cream factories, once on the way in and once on the way out. We climbed the highest point, Mt Sonder but unfortunally the clouds had come in so the views from the top really were not worth the 5 hour journey! The hike was still pretty good, lots of up hill but luckily no leaches!

Bob managed to make it up all the hills, without breaking a sweat, and these hills are very, very steep and very, very long! Feeling pretty confident now that Bob was fixed and the success of our numberplate scam, we boarded the ferry on Saturday and Left the Daintree Behind. Ten minutes down the road we heard the all too familiar sound of Psssssssssssssssssssssssspssssssssss. Another bloody tyre!!!

Up another ridiculous hill, we made our way to a camp spot at Mt Molloy for some Saturday night fever. Mt Molloy was yet another beautiful campsite, complete with local Bogans drinking until three or four in the morning. We later found out that this lot had been camping at this free overnight camp spot on and of for 12 months only leaving when the police made them. They would return a week later and set up camp, squatting for a few more months.

Our next stop was the Atherton Table land. This area is the equivalent of the wine region down south, tropical fruit wineries, cheese and chocolate factories, the peanut palace, tea houses, coffee plantations, dairy companies, arts and craft. It was all pretty tasty especially the strawberry farm we found we found on our way back to cairns. We checked out more waterfalls and saw some of the most incredible fig trees we have ever seen.

Waterfalls and swimming holes.

It’s been a big week; we’ve swum in croc infested waters, hiked treacherous jungle paths, devoured some tasty exotic fruits, had a visit to the police station and dived into some beautiful pristine glass bottomed pools.

The beginning of the week was spent enjoying tasty bakery goods in Ravenshoe, an old school bakery, like the good old days when everything tasted good, and you couldn’t help but wanting to go back again and again, like we did 3 times! (In one hour). Here we also found our first passion fruits and bought up big! They were delicious and we have since found many more exotic fruits for Brett to fill up on!

After our bakery session we decided to head to the first of many waterfall excursions! Still on the outskirts of the rainforest, Mill stream falls was also an area where the army trained and rehabilitated troops during world war two. A short walk around the area uncovered old, tent sights, training areas and even toilet blocks from 1943.

From Millstream we entered the rainforest of the Misty Mountains, an absolutely beautiful area with tiny winding roads and intimidating, giant drop offs into the jungle below. Along the drive we checked out some more falls which meant the start of many jungle treks trying to avoid the stinging nettle tree, the “stop you dead” barbed tentacle vine, leaches mosquitoes and other crazy looking insects.

The firsts few falls were deffinlaty our favourites because as you entered the waterfall loop of Milla Milla, the hoards of tourists are worse than the mosquitoes! Mungalli Creek Biodynamic Dairy Farm was our next stop, unfortunately we arrived late in the afternoon so all we got was a few tastings, the plan was to head back to devour more of its goodness the next day, but Bob decided to change our plans.

As we slowly climbed the tiny windy roads, up some not so tiny hills, Bob failed to keep his cool for the second time of the trip. (Even though the poor bugger is carrying a few 1000kgs on his back). Pulling over on these roads in most circumstances is not possible, there is no road to pull off on, unless you feel like a thousand meter vertical tumble. So up the hill we were climbing, slowly watching the temperature gauge heating up, trying to find somewhere to pull over without ending our lives. Luckily we found a half decent spot on the top of a hill where Bob could cool down for half an hour. Camp was only 20km away down hill so after a quick stop we cruised down to a very beautiful camping area, Nandroya, right in the middle of the rain forest.


After our recent mechanical problem and many hours behind the wheel we were over being in the car. So we decided to stretch the legs and put some K’s under our feet instead of behind the wheel. Early Friday morning saw us walking the Nandroya loop down to a number of beautiful waterfalls. Hearing that the track was quite muddy we decided to tackle the trail in our thongs, which seemed like a logical idea at the time although we had no idea of the conditions on the walk.

Once we were well into our trek though the forest we realised that it probably would have been a wiser move to wear shoes, especially since the walk ended up being over 4.5km long. One of the main reasons the thongs were such a hindrance, aside from getting stuck in the mud all the time, was when Meegan started noticing all the weird looking little worms that were being flicked up onto her legs. When we looked a little closer we realised that these worms had began sucking the blood out of Meegan's legs. We soon figured out that our beloved thongs were actually helping the nasty little blood suckers onto some prime, juicy flesh. So sure enough every ten minutes we would have to stop and do a leach check. At one stage with Meegan screaming bloody murder, we found the little buggers had managed to find prime real-estate between our toes.

Needless to say the walk and waterfalls were beautiful and since we didn’t meet anyone else on the track it was nice just to have the entire area to ourselves.


Figuring we needed to get to a major town or at least somewhere to receive mobile phone coverage we scooted on to Innisfail. Along the way we stopped at many of the roadside fruit stalls to stock up on cheap, yummy, plentiful fruity goodness. A quick stop in Innisfail (the wettest city in Australia, receiving over 8 meters of rain a year) to stock up on food, we then headed to a camp spot for the night.

Anyone that owns a GPS will know how unpredictable these handy little devises are. Sometimes they are unable to tell their heads from their asses. Not knowing where we were or where we were going we put our trust into our Navman. For some reason the cheeky little bugger decided to take us right into Deliverance country. We could hear the banjo’s strumming away in the background as we drove thru a few km’s of sugar cane fields, along some apparent road. But luckily the little man and his redneck mates we unable to capture the almighty BOB, and we were delivered safely to camp just outside of Babinda.

Saturday we slowly made our way though the thousands of crazy pink cyclists doing a charity ride from Townsville to Cairns. We had a laugh at the colourful language coming from the Truck drivers on the two-way, who were not too impressed with the holdups the cyclists were creating. Brett got a free didge lesson in town and we spent the rest of the day at Babinda Boulders. This place was pretty amazing, the swimming hole was yet another small piece of heaven we have found. The water was so crystal clear and the back drop so peaceful and relaxing you felt like you never wanted to leave!


That night we stayed 20k out of cairns at Gordonvale, we arrived pretty late, and as per usual after we set up and start cooking dinner the “Bob Show” was on. The “Bob Show” refers to the amount of people we have being basically bedazzled by the resourcefulness and uniqueness of Bob. The feedback we have been getting has absolutely blown us away, as you will hear in a few stories coming up later in the piece.

Through this we have been meeting some pretty vibrant characters. This particular night at Gordonvale there was a strange man who was travelling around with his pet cockatoo who came over and introduced himself, and a Belgian couple who were on there first night ever camping. Mr Belgian was quite concerned that he wouldn’t be able to get out of one of the seven or eight ten meter gaps between caravans the next morning, he kept coming out at all hours of the night with his little torch to check no one else had come in to block his exit.

Later in the night when most of the campers were tucked in is when it started to get a little interesting. To start with the strange cockatoo man had a little brown dog; it refused to shut up the entire night. Instead of getting out and calming the dog down or bringing it inside, he insisted on yelling from his bed in a very loud drunken stupor “Shut the %$#^ up, you’ll wake the lovely people up”. Therefore further disturbing the 50 campers within very close proximity to old mates caravan. At about 12o’clock he suddenly decided to jump out of bed, (quiet heavily boozed up) and into his car, and he took off down the road. Luckily the dog was still alive the next morning as we both thought he maybe had decided to go and chuck it in to the river to give the crocs a feed.

The rest of the night was filled with lots of yelling from the locals camping down on the river, casually taking dips in the croc infested waters. As well as shouting and beeping from the cars crossing over the bridge above the campsite and of course Mr Belgian’s little torch tours every hour checking his escape route.

Sunday morning we headed into cairns to the Rusty markets, the fruit and veg over here is pretty amazing, Brett is in heaven. In the arvo we tried to get out to Crystal Cascades but the road was blocked. Spent the after noon listening to a live band on the Cairns foreshore then headed out to a new land release to find a block to park up on for the night. Found an awesome block, high on a hill with amazing views only 2 minutes from the Crystal Cascades. Woke early Monday morning to walk down to the cascades then headed into cairns to drop Bob at the mechanic.