21 June 2017

Hello Family and Friends

Greetings from QLD.

Our ‘Great QLD sojourn’ is well under way, and in our typical travelling

style we are making it up as we go along. In fact, less than 200km into

our trip we entirely changed our initial ‘generalised plan’. Our pre-

planning was virtually zero, and it - had through a series of ill-thought

through evolutions - become “up through central NSW, out to Byron Bay

and Brisbane before heading inland again and up through the middle of

QLD and Longreach to then pop out at Port Douglas Daintree and down

the coast”. On the road finally, we breathed, stopped, and started

thinking, only to realise it was a ridiculous plan adding almost 1400km

to the trip. So a few quick phone calls, deferred visit plans to on the way

back, and we were re-orientated to skip Byron and Brisbane and sensibly stick to the inland route all the way up (and

the coast back down). A lot more sensible. Gone are the days of great and detailed pre planning by me - Kel (when I

went to Africa many years ago, I worked out how long it took me to use a tube of toothpaste and bottle of shampoo

so I could calculate exactly how many I would need for my 6 month trip ....no such precision planning now – let’s

just wing it!)

Rather than boring you all to death with a ‘blow by blow’ description of the trip, I will have a go at putting you to

sleep with a collection of impressions and experiences we have been having along the way.

We stopped in Lightning Ridge and found it a surprisingly

vegetated area. Both of us had been expecting a version of Cobber

Pedy – all vast barren plains and mullock heaps from the mining.

Instead we were greeted with, admittedly desert variety, trees and

scrubby vegetation all around and quite a sizable town of all types

of houses from tin shanties right through to “Amigo’s Castle”, a

small castle built (25 years in the making and continuing to be

built) by an eccentric ex-miner who collected local rocks and

started creating.

Lightning Ridge draws many interesting, and

surprisingly creative, characters. Or does the

Lightning Ridge life tap into and reveal their creative

talents? “Chambers of the Black Hand” is another

outstanding example of this. A working mine, Ron,

the owner of the mine is an ex navy diver of many,

many years ago. When he spent time in the

decompression chamber after a dive he would take

in a piece of wood and pocket knife and whittle.

After turning his hand (not particularly successfully)

to mining for Opal in the early days, he started small

tours of the mine which is 40 feet underground and accessed by a steep flight of stairs. Waiting, one day at the

bottom of the stairs, for some people to arrive he pulled out his pocket knife and started carving some simple chains

and a welcome banner into the soft sandstone wall......and he never stopped. He continued to carve, become more

and more elaborate and skilled in his sculpting. From whimsical to political, to Egyptian, super heroes, animals, The

Last Supper, it is a tumbled together mix of creativity and skill winding through the rabbit warren of passages that

make up Ron’s mine. 25 years on, and at age 75 he is still going strong, and it was a well spent 2hrs of our time

roaming the tunnels and marvelling at his self taught skills and talent.

Apart from it being a different route, Glenn had been very keen to visit

Longreach, and most particularly “The Qantas Museum”. I am not a

‘flying fanatic’ but even I found it an interesting and engaging place to

look around and learn. The added tour of the 747 and 707 was

fascinating, and standing on the ground at the front wheel of the

gigantic 747 looking skyward at the 6 stories high plane above us makes

it even more incredible that these beasts ever get airborne.

Longreach is also home to the Stockman’s Hall of Fame and Bush

Heritage. When I first heard about it many years ago, I had a vision of a

substantial rotunda type building, probably with a bronze cast sculpture of

a stockman standing tall and proud at its entrance, around the walls were

lists of names – and probably photos – of all those stockmen (and women)

who had been inducted into the hall of fame for various great deeds, and

space left for new additions each year. Something modelled on a war

memorial I guess. But no no no, that could not have been anything further

from the truth – other than the bronze cast of the proud stockman gracing

the entrance. It was a grand and attractive building, housing a whole

history of Bush heritage and the life of stockmen and women. Covering

aboriginal pre colonial life, early pioneers, life on the land, the stock horse

right through to the flying doctors and everything in between. A good half a day was spent wandering through the

displays and watching an entertaining (and surprisingly educational) show put on by an ex stockman, his 2 working

dogs, his pet Brahman, his flock of sheep, his horse and a guitar.

Poking our way north, we finally popped out at the Daintree and the tropics.

Wow, the rainforests just blew us away, so completely and utterly different

from anything encountered before. So much green, so much vegetation, so

much size. Trees reaching 50 and 60 metres up to the sky, smaller trees

stretching to get there too, vines of so many different varieties looping and

climbing and clinging to anything that would hold their weight, and ferns of

all sorts sticking themselves to trunks of all sizes and cascading their fronds

down. Everything requiring the presence of something else to live, all of it

one big green and complex jigsaw with each piece vital to the next. We

spent two days walking various rainforest paths and board walks. On day

three I woke up with quite sore shoulders and neck, and wondered if I had

slept badly or was I carrying some unconscious tension? Suddenly, as I

looked up to seek a bird calling in the trees above, I realised that my

soreness was from having spent 2 days craning my head up to goggle at the

forest canopy, and my muscles were beginning to protest!

At first glance the rainforests seem quite bereft of life, but if you take the time, look carefully and are lucky, it does

begin to reveal itself to you. At various times on our rambles and drives through the forests – and on the edges of

them - we saw a couple of tree snakes, a python, the quickly vanishing rear end of a tree kangaroo, a big fat content

looking crocodile, and all sorts of bird life - including the largest of all the birds up here, the cassowary. The crocodile

was seen on a nature cruise we did in a boat on the Daintree river. The cruise was taken by Jim Woster a 73 years

young avid bird watcher and naturalist with just 8 people on board for a personalised feel. He was a delightful man, a

wealth of knowledge, full of enthusiasm, character and stories. He told of one trip where they were nosed up near a

croc lazily sunning himself on the muddy banks of the river.

Suddenly Jim sneezed an almighty sneeze and his top false teeth

when flying gracefully through the air to land ‘plop’ in the mud in

front of the croc. The boat erupted in unbridled laughter and a

scramble for cameras, and Jim finished the trip giving a gummy

sounding commentary of the sights along the way.

The bird life has been amazing, and we are having a lot of fun and

enjoyment trying to work out all the new birds we are seeing. The

excellent binoculars Glenn bought for my last birthday, a pretty

good bird book, and some haphazard photos to help us remember

details have got us a long way. Having a large family of superb blue fairy wrens at home, we were thrilled to see their

cousins the red backed fairy wren at the extensive Tyto wetlands in Ingham. What a fantastic surprise that place was.

Full of bird life and 4 kms of meandering paths to follow. Any bird lovers out there should definitely put that on your

list to stop and see if you are in the area. Just remember the

mozzie repellent – they are diabolical.

Probably though the most mesmerising and beautiful

creature we have seen in the tropical north has been the

Ulysses Butterfly. The wingspan is about 10cm, and its wings

are the most incredible electric blue, made all the more vivid

by the lush green backdrop of its environment. The first one

we saw was dancing around a car park we were in, and it just

stayed and stayed and stayed. Its colour was so unnatural

looking and its jerky flying motion made it almost look like it

was a pretend butterfly on the end of a fishing line string

being danced across a stage by some puppeteer or child with

a play thing. But it was real and beautiful. Hot on its tail in

the beautiful and captivating stakes is the Cairns Bird Wing

Butterfly, the largest of all the butterflies in Australia with a

wingspan of up to 15cm in females (only 12.5 in males). It is

a vivid iridescent emerald green. The females are larger,

because when they mate they join together and their

reproductive organs intertwine around each other, for the

full mating to take place they must stay this way for 14-

15hrs. To ensure they are not both startled by a bird and try to fly off in different directions tearing themselves

irreparably asunder, the female anesthetises the male for the whole time

and she then takes charge of holding onto him and flying them out of

danger should the need arise. So she becomes the knight in shining

armour whilst he slumbers the copulation process away!

Naturally we have taken the time to snorkel the Great Barrier Reef, going

on a full day outer reef snorkel from Port Douglas (with Poseidon – good

company). Sadly there was quite a swell and the day was overcast and

windy, so although we thoroughly enjoyed it and saw a fantastic variety of

beautiful and colourful fish, it was certainly not ‘like the brochures’.

Fingers crossed we have another opportunity elsewhere in more favourable conditions to enjoy the wonders and

beauties of the reef. But we are glad to have seen the reef before it all disappears. Surprisingly most of the tour

operators seem to be playing down the back to back bleaching events, calling it a natural occurrence (although there

has never before been mass bleaching on the scale seen, and in consecutive years), they gloss over it saying the reef

has recovered from both events and

there is nothing to be unduly worried

about. Bizarrely is like they don’t want

to acknowledge the foundation of their

operations is in danger, and fail to see

they have a prime and receptive

audience to say “the reef is still here

and intact, but we do need to take the

threat of its possible demise seriously

and all of us do what we can to protect

it”, or even as a powerful lobby group

band together as a single voice of tour

operators to put pressure on the

Government to take the threat

seriously. Such a sad and wasted

opportunity, and by the time they

realise they need to stand up and speak

up, it will be way way way too late. One fascinating little fact we did learn during the talk on the reef if that clown

fish (Nemo fish) have an very interesting way of organising their assigned gender. In an area, all the fish are male,

except for the largest fish who is a female, she harasses and makes life unbearable for all the males which actually

keeps them male. If she vanishes (gets eaten, goes on holiday) the next biggest clown fish morphs into a female and

takes over the position keeping everyone else male. If the bigger female returns from holidays to discover this new

female interloper she harasses this smaller female, who duly turns back into a male. So to stay male as a clown fish,

you need to be under the thumb of a bossy and agro woman. As such, it has now been revealed, that in the movie

“Finding Nemo” when mum got eaten and dad was left as solo clown fish to raise – and then look for – Nemo, and

Nemo was solo clown fish on his adventure, the real truth is that it was not a “Father-Son” story but actually a

“Mother-Daughter” story!

What else about the Tropical north (Daintree/Port Douglas – Townsville). Endless sugar cane fields as far as the eye

can see, on every piece of flat land. And if it is not sugar cane it is bananas. The vistas are stunning; great mountain

ranges looming high, their rugged and steep slopes draped in green, their tops hidden in swirls of cloud, reaching

almost to the beaches and blue water.

Speaking of beaches and blue water....what is the point of beaches in north QLD? The constant threat of saltwater

crocodiles looms, and even if you are foolish enough to dip your toe anywhere near the water the box jelly fish and

other stingers are bound to get you (although we are out of season for them now)!

We have moved south, and are now located in Bowen, the landfall town of Cyclone Debbie. It is an unassuming

working town, but the small beaches in little bays are beautiful, and the walking tracks through the large granite

boulders are lovely to follow. We have left the crocs behind, and here there is some snorkelling off the beach.

Unfortunately the weather is not favouring us for this, with a strong easterly causing quite a bit of chop and stirring

up the water. Still, we are putting our feet up here for a day or two, and I have finally found time to tap out this

hello.

Our camping set up is working beautifully well, simplicity at its best, and we

really are living the outdoor life. We have bush camped pretty much all the

way, with just a brief stop in caravan parks here and there, and calling in on

one or two friends. We are loving the bush camping, finding little side roads

to turn down and see what

interesting or beautiful quite spot

we can discover. One was on top of a mountain, another by a gurgling

stream. One was tucked into the rainforest and we could not believe the

amount of night life – cicadas, crickets, frogs, who knows what else – and

the dawn chorus put on by the birds – the forest was alive. Some nights

have been cold, especially travelling up through the centre – it is always a

bit interesting, but invigorating, doing my daily morning yoga session out

in the open in a beanie, gloves, socks and big woolly jumper!

There are so many other stories and details, but where to stop. Canarvon

Gorge walk, aboriginal stencil art, Glenn and his coconut hunting and

gathering, The noisy Mossman Caravan park

with its 24/7 sugar processing mill and early

departing Harley rider, sea kayaking, the

awesome little wholefoods coffee shop, the lost

dog, the waterfalls of the Atherton Tablelands,

Glenn’s microlight fly, the curtain fig, sunsets,

the butterfly house, the delightful town of

Yungalla, Tully Gorge, lunch looking out over

Hinchinbrook island. So many stories, so little

time. The rest of them will just need to wait for

another day.

We hope this newsletter finds each of you happy and well and enjoying life.

Love

Kell and Glenn.