8 - 2023 - May - Cooktown to Atherton Tablelands, Queensland.

Entry 8 – 2023 – May – Cooktown to Atherton Tablelands, Queensland.

After leaving Elim Beach, we set camp for a couple of nights at the Cooktown race course, a free camp location. It was a nice quiet location where we enjoyed some chill out time. Ironically, we had good phone/internet reception at the race course. It had been rather frustrating during the previous week when this good reception was missing whilst staying in the caravan park about a kilometre up the road, closer to town. It was good, catching up with all our required internet transactions.

We spent time wondering around Cooktown’s botanical gardens enjoying its setting and viewed the nearby Finch Bay.

We left Cooktown early stopping near it’s outskirts for a walk through Keatings Lagoon Conservation Park.

We ambled along, heading south enjoying the scenery. One of the constant sights during our last three weeks had been mountain peaks shrouded by clouds. 

 Our camp for the night at around 200 kilometres down the road was at “Mary’s Farm Creek Campground”. It was a lovely setting.

We found a track with a displayed 4-wheel drive sign. It led to a quiet spot away from other campers. The track started with a bit of a steep drop and the bush was encroaching along the track’s edges. We thought, we have a 4-wheel drive and we had a “Bushtracker Caravan.” It was time to go bush.

The nearby creek was flowing with enticing clear waters and a soft pebbly base. It felt good cooling off in the fresh water.

Late afternoon some other campers arrived, many seemed lacking in good camp etiquette. Grrr. There was a lady, sorry that should be a female with a kid who parked about 6 metres from us. The kid was running about shouting non-stop. Then this female set up their swag at the water’s edge making it difficult for other people to gain access to the water. It wasn’t long before a caravan half the size of ours came reversing down the track we had driven in. There was lots of loud engine revving with constant stopping, driving forward before reversing again. The camp ground manager showed up directing them to drive back out, turn around and to drive straight in. Then the manager had to assist them with parking up just to our rear.

Gone was the feeling of a divine setting. It suddenly felt safer to be in the confines of our caravan. We went to sleep hoping it was just one of those rare days with a feeling of being invaded by bogans. We decided to verify what day of the week it was and discovered it was a Friday with the start of the weekend activities. We thought the “special,” people might be with us for a couple more days and decided to move on the following day.

The people parked behind us were blocking access to the inbound track. We selected another track, for our out bound route, thankfully not quite as steep as our inbound route.

We were heading down a dirt track through the farm towards the main road when we were in need to stop for a Bustard Bird crossing the road. Our second experience of a Bustard Bird in about 5 weeks. We couldn’t remember any incidents of this type with a Bustard Bird during our 10 years of travel. It was a pleasurable experience, providing a bit of excitement.

Down the road a bit there had been some progress on the bridge works that had held us up when heading towards Cooktown.

We returned to Lake Tinaroo setting camp just around the bend from Michael & Sue’s home whom we had stayed with a couple of weeks prior.

We had been offered the use of Meg & Norton’s holiday home. We had last stayed here in 2019. It had another one of those grand settings where you were surrounded by rain forest. We had a majestic view of the lake from the confines of our caravan.

We spent plenty of time tucked away on the house veranda soaking in a most magnificent setting. We had a constant flow of visitors, all were giving us a good look over, checking us out. 

 We remembered enjoying this special location previously. Within an hour of our arrival all of our feel-good senses were bubbling away. It was a very delightful, most acceptable setting.

 

7 - 2023 - May - Cooktown, Queensland

Entry 7 – 2023 – May – Cooktown Queensland.

For something different, Cooktown was our target destination for 2023 where a mini muster of some fellow Bushtracker Caravan owners were to gather for a week of activities. 2019 since we had last participated in a function of this type.

Fifteen caravans had registered for the mini muster with an area allocated for this mob at one of the caravan parks in Cooktown.

We arrived at the caravan park around 11.15 am thinking we were a bit early for the normal book in timeline. We were provided with a guide to our allocated site taking us through a lovely tropical setting. We travelled around a corner to see most of the other Bushtracker Caravans had already arrived. Additionally, to our delight we saw one of the caravans beaming out to us with almost an identical outside appearance to our planned new caravan. It was the first one we had seen in real life in this current format.

To add to our pleasurable luck, we were placed next to another caravan the exact size, with many features for what we thought most suited our needs. Wow. Then to add to what we thought had been some unbelievable luck our neighbours were delightful people, hosting us for many visits into their caravan and provided answers for probably way too many questions. Thank you, Albert and Rhonda. 

Happy hour each evening didn’t wind up till well after the sun had set as people slowly wandered off for their evening meal time.

There was plenty of free time where we explored some of Cooktown’s highlights. One morning we participated in a walk from Grassy Hill to the Botanic Gardens. We left one vehicle at the Botanic Gardens carpark and another at Grassy Hill for ferrying purposes. It was wonderful mornings walk with Meg & Norton and Ann & Phil, with a trail moving about through a beautiful tropical rainforest setting. We all finished off our early morning walking exploits with breakfast at the Botanic Gardens café.

There was an organised sunset cruise, commencing from Cooktown harbour with nibbles provided whilst moored up in a creek setting, surrounded by mangroves. There were a couple of provided spot lights for people to search for the reflection of “crocodile,” eyes. We did get to see one a way off. As the boat started to move towards the crocodile it quickly disappeared below the water surface.

It was a busy week. There were three organised early morning starts. One with a drive to Trevathan Falls. This involved driving along a bumpy dirt road/track crossing around nearly two dozen creek crossings with pot holed surfaces, camouflaged by flowing waters. The grand flowing waterfall making the trek all worthwhile.

From the waterfall we travelled to the iconic “Lions Den,” pub for a lunch time meal.

It had been about a 100-kilometre drive for the day.

The following morning, we departed even earlier with a target destination for the town of Lakeland. This day’s activities had been arranged by one of our (influential) group members.  There was an organised tour of a very high-tech mushroom farm. No others existed, in the southern hemisphere. It was a brand-new facility, still in the process of setting up to commence production. No photographs were permitted of its internal operation. Everyone was in awe of the high-tech operation. The whole factory could be monitored/controlled from the phone of the owner from anywhere in the world.

We were then ferried by bus to various properties where we got to view some different crops and were provided with descriptions of how they operated. We were moved by enthused presentations from various people, proud to be a part of the farming community, supporting one another’s needs. We were mesmerised, allowed to move about a large-scale banana plantation with a wonderful presentation describing its operation, from the growing to packaging for transportation, Australia wide.

The plantation owners expressed the importance of looking after their work force. Many of the banana processing workers were from Tonga and we were shown a church in the process of being built for these people and the accommodation facilities provided for them. We were shown where a Swiss craftsman had been flown in to build the furniture for this church in the authentic ways. This craftsman played some Swiss musical instruments for our pleasure.

It had been a long day. No one had any indication for how wonderful we were to be treated. It was a most gracious feeling. All we could say to our hosts was thank you. We were returned with a smile and “enjoy your retirement.”

We all drove back to Cooktown, close to the speed limit, arriving with about 15 minutes for a quick tidy up, before we were required to present for a prearranged bus to ferry us to the local RSL Club for our evening meal.

The following morning was to be a provided breakfast for serving at 8 am. There was a bang on the side of our caravan and we suspect most other caravans at 7.35 am advising breakfast was ready. Our group were very quiet the rest of the day with not many sighted moving about. Something to do with exhaustion.

Our last evenings happy hour, wind up was a low-keyed event indicating we were all in need of some R & R time.

It had been a most enjoyable week with plenty of brains trust type people providing ideas for consideration with the construction of our new caravan. We departed with more ideas than existed prior to our arrival. We were in need to reassess which way we should go with a new caravan design. They were all a bit similar and all a bit different. It was up to us to select the internal and external colours and layout features. Each caravan was a “custom,” design where you selected how it was to be.

Departing Cooktown at the official completion of the mini muster, we joined in with a group whom headed north to a bush camp at Elim Beach.

Enroute, we deviated off the main road for a look and drive through the flowing waters of Isabella Falls. It was just another beautiful northern Australian location.

From Isabella Falls to Elim Beach, it was another interesting, different drive.

We set camp at Elim Beach in an open area where we were able to obtain our required sun powered solar supply. It was quite a nice setting. There were some great camp site options close to the beach. The premium sites provided a grand setting with distant views of the rainbow sands. The rainbow-coloured sands were one of the main attractions promoted for this location.

It was about a 5-kilometre return walk from the campsite to the rainbow-coloured sands. Access was dependant with having a low tide. During our stay, low tide was during the middle of the day where we were in need to also consider the heat, carrying extra drinking water whilst walking. There was an access gorge walking track providing glorious views of the different sand colours. The publised beach walk component was about 300-metres but it was more like 600-metres to almost a kilometre.

We sat around in groups chattering for a couple of days. It seemed everyone was in need of some rest time after a hectic week of activities. After a couple of days we all said our good-byes with everyone heading off in different directions.