Ryan’s Journal: Day 50 - 54

Day 50!

Distance travelled: 332km

Today we packed up at Normanton and were heading for Georgetown. It was a great car trip, for the three of us in the car. At 8:00am Dad dropped Mum and Jackson off at the station and they caught the Gulflander to Croydon, so, Nick, Dad and I had the car to ourselves! We did have to pack up, but because the Gulflander was slow, we could relax and not do much. We drove and quickly caught up with the train. A crossing was coming up so we decided to stop and find Jackson and Mum on the train. We did, and got alot of waves from the other passengers.

With me in the front, Nick lying in the back and Dad driving, we met up with the train where we had morning tea. The train came about twenty minutes after we got there and we stayed with Mum and Jackson for a while, before heading out to Croydon. Croydon is an old gold mining town, and it had historical houses set up. It was good, but most of the shops were closed! We went to the general store which is the oldest continuously running shop in Queensland. It was a great shop, had complementary tea, coffee and cake! We met up with Mum and Jackson at the station and left for Georgetown. The drive was cramped after our relaxed drive previously. There wasn’t much in Georgetown but we stayed there.

Day 51

Distance travelled: 179km (10,070 altogether!!)

We packed up very quickly in Georgetown, our quickest start yet, we were out by about eight o’clock! We were two days ahead of schedule so we had to call our booked site at Undara to see if it could be moved forward. It was moved forward, so we headed for Undara resort. Undara is famous for its Lava Tubes that were formed about 190,000 years ago.

We set up camp and went for a swim when we got there, at about 11, then had lunch, fried Queenfish.

Later, in the heat of the day, Dad, again, somehow got us to go for a walk, so we drove up to Kalkani Crater and did the rim walk. The crater is an old Volcano, like just about every hill in the area.

We had dinner, not fish this time (!) and went to a talk about space.

Day 52

Distance travelled: 1km

We had a tour of the Lava tubes booked today, so we got up and boiled some eggs for brekky, then went to the buses and went out to the tubes.

The Lava Tubes were huge! We walked through two, the first was huge, but short. It had many different bones in it, where kangaroos or other animals had fallen in and not been able to get back out. The next one we went into was long, and still very high. We found lots of Cane Toads and heaps of bats.

The rest of the day we didn’t do much, just relaxed, swum and read.

Day 53

Distance travelled: 289 km

Once again, we packed up. The next part of our trip was relatively unplanned so we decided to drive to Atherton, stopping on the way, and find a place we liked and camp there. So we set out and our first stop was at Ravenshoe which is the highest town in Queensland, and then at Midstream falls, the widest falls in Australia. They were... wide! We stopped at some more falls, called Millaa Millaa Falls. We could swim here, although, I was the only one to go in and swim under the falls. Staying around Millaa Millaa, we went to the lookout, which was amazing!! We could see for ages over the Tablelands and the highest point in QLD, Mt Bartle Frere.

Our next stop was the Cathedral Fig Tree. It is huge. And the best climbing tree in the world! It was about five stories high!! We climbed up a little way, and loved it!

We made it to Atherton, which had everything! But we weren’t going to stay there, it wasn’t remote enough. So we drove out to Lake Tinaroo, stopping on the way to get some local strawberries and cream. Lake Tinaroo was massive, and it had a few boats/jet skies whizzing around on it. Most of them with someone either water skiing or donuting on the back. We set up camp there.

Day 54

Distance travelled: 86 km

Ryan & Nicholas being towed on "donuts"

We woke this morning, after a sleep in! We had breakfast and then the people camping next to us, who had a jet ski and donuts, asked us if we wanted to go out onto the lake on donuts, and then biscuits. We couldn’t refuse, so, we soon were out being bashed around on donuts and then the biscuit.

After all that had happened, we packed up and, for some reason Nick and I swam across the lake (about a k) and met Mum, Dad and Jackson on the other side.

Our next stop was at Mareeba, where we went to a place called Coffee Works. I had been looking forward to this place for a while, for one reason; all you can eat chocolate!!!!!!!!!!!! And for Mum and Dad, all you can drink gourmet coffee and tea. It also had a museum on the history of coffee, which was huge. We spent about two hours there, before we all felt a bit sick from so much chocolate and coffee.

We set up camp in a Caravan Park because we needed to do some washing and showering.