Evil Oddie

Gawd dang it.  I got the flu and I’m finally starting to feel better.  Glen got it first and his developed in to Bronchitis and he’s on antibiotics.  He’s started to feel better today too.

I’ve got to say that I’m finding it extremely difficult being back at home after the Cape Trip.  I just don’t want to be here and have to go to work.  I’m struggling to see the point of going to work and coming home when there is so much out there to see and do and experience.  I think I’d rather be on the road getting odd jobs and paying my way around Australia.   We could rent out our house and that could pay the mortgage or we could sell our house and get another that we wouldn’t have a mortgage on…  See all these ideas and Glen’s not so keen.

Yay! After almost 10 years together, Glen and I are engaged.

To be honest, since I was a little girl, I’ve dreamed of getting married.  Yet, my experience so far has not been dream worthy.

I think that my thoughts on the entire matter are different to what they were even 5 years ago.  I’m not interested in spending mega money on  stuff that guests or the people that matter (Glen and I) don’t even notice.

Glen has set a mega hardcore budget of $10 000.  I’m definately going to try to not spend any excess money, but I’m not sure on how I’m going to keep it under the $10k after getting my first couple of quotes from vendors.

Because of the mega budget, I made a list of what is most important to me.  My list is: Jewellery (the engagement ring & wedding rings); Photography and; having everyone there.  I am more interested to have everyone there and they eat BBQ or Fish & Chips than having a few people and serving them lobster.

So my first quote was from a photographer (my first ever quote).  For their most “basic package” it was going to cost $3400.  I started freaking out at that point!  If someone for 5 hours and an album is going to cost that, how much is the rest  of this day going to cost???

And so begins the wonderful  wedding day planning.  I think it’s better to help a friend with her day than to plan your own!

I slept pretty well apart from the guy across the way snoring and the locals that live across the street from the Caravan Park playing ACDC at 1am in the morning - BLARING!!

We got up early-ish as we had to get to Undara before 10:30 for our tour.  Innot Hot Springs is approx one and a quarter hours drive (without a car towing a trailer / caravan).  There was quite a heavy dew the night before and it was overcast, so we had to pack up a wetish camp.

In the car park at Undara, we set up the awning to dry out.  Glen chamiosed the tent a couple of times before it got packed away and it was mostly dry.

I raced in to get a cuppa.  I didn’t have time to have a cuppa at Innot.

I thought that it would be a long 2 hour tour at Undara, but it went really quickly.  One thing we both got over really quickly was a couple of kids.  I think they were a bit too young - maybe 2 or 3 (they still had dummies).  Every time our guide was saying something interesting, these kids just chucked tanties.  I think that they were twins.  I said to Glen that if we do any trips with kids, that we will wait until they are a little bit older so they understand that they need to be quiet and respect other people.  These twins were just little brats and if they were my kids, they would’ve copped a smacking!!!

Undara

Damien was our guide and he was awesome.  He talked in basic english so we could understand and he didn’t get bogged down with crap that we didn’t really need to know.

Undara Lava Tubes

I’ll be honest and say that I wasn’t very keen on going to Undara.  Mostly because it just looks like a cave and I’ve seen caves before.  I enjoyed the story of Undara, but it wasn’t anything new.   Not $45 worth in my opinion.   Well we’ve done it now so it’s another thing off the list.

After the tour, we decided to hot foot it to Townsville.   Glen was really tired, so I drove.  The back way to Townsville has only got maybe one lane of bitumen and the road trains do not budge off the bitumen.  It’s scary!  You’ve pretty much got to pull off the road and stop so they can pass.

The back road to Townsville

The photo above is where we stopped for lunch.  We were maybe on the side of the road for about 30 minutes and only one car passed us.  It was like the road went on forever.

Coming into Townsville

We booked  a room on Wotif as soon as we were coming into Townsville.  We’re at Hotel M on Palmer Street.  It’s awesome.  It’s fairly new  accommodation and we got upgraded and we’re on Level 9.  There’s kitchen facilities and the king size bed is really comfortable.  I slept like a log.

There’s a washing machine and dryer in our room too!  I had bags and bags of dirty clothes, so I’ve done a couple of loads while we’ve been here.  The view is fantastic and we had Benny’s Hotwok for dinner last night.   I had the Yellow Curry and it was great.  Glen even enjoyed his too!

Glen and I really like Townsville.   The  two times we’ve been now, we’ve both said to each other how much we like Townsville.  I can’t imagine how hot it it here in Summer though!

Glen spoke to his parents last night and they asked if we’d been to Atherton.  Erm, no we hadn’t.  Glen got a bee in his bonnet and wanted to go back north to do the Atherton tablelands.  So here we are back up north.

We left early-ish from Port Hinchinbrook and we made our way up through Millaa Millaa and Malanda.  It is a really beautiful landscape and it’s pretty dang cold!  We stopped at Nerada Tea and had Devonshire Tea.  We actually had jumpers on!!

Dog having Devonshire Tea

We were off again to check out the Cathedral Fig.

Dog at the Cathedral Fig

And then the Curtain Fig.

Dog at the Curtain Fig

We stopped in Atherton and got some info on where to stay and any other touristy stuff.  I wanted to go to the Cheese and Chocolate Factory but the info guy said that it takes a while to get to where we were planning on staying.  We took the highest road in QLD to Ravenshoe.  We stopped in Ravenshoe to get some fruit (yay - haven’t had any in a while).

Not too long after, we pulled up at Innot Hot Springs.  We set up camp and them we booked our tour for tomorrow.

A quick change into our togs, and we were off to the  pools to soak in the Mineral Water.  I lasted the longest in the hottest pool.  Then you’d swing over the pool separation into the cold pool.  The inbetween pool was the best.  I could’ve stayed in there for hours.  I think we were in the pools for over an hour.  Glen piked out first.

Dog enjoying the steam at Innot Hot Springs

A cook up dinner - bacon, eggs, sausages, left over chips, baked beans and tomatoes.

Didn’t sleep very well.  Our cabin backed onto the highway. Lesson learnt: do not stay near a main road!  We had cereal for breakfast and Glen said that the GU was lacking in power so he changed the fuel filter and air filter again.

We went into Cairns to get another Air Filter and some diesel additive just in case there was algae in any of the diesel we got on the trip.

Heading south, we saw a sign for Boulders and we decided to go have a look.  It was beautiful and it started to rain on us during the walk.

Dog at Boulders

Dog munching on some fungus

Lunch stop was at Babinda Bakery.  Everything we got was yummy.

On our trip up, Glen saw the signs for Paronella Park and remembered going there when he was young.  He said he really liked it when he was young, so we went.  I have to say that it is definately worth the detour off the highway to check it out.  Jos’e Paronella had a dream of a castle and he decided to build it.  He borrowed some stuff that he probably shouldn’t have along the way, but it really is quite an experience.  If you want to stay there (caravan, camping only) book in.  We thought that we could stay there, but there wasn’t room for us.  We would’ve loved to do the after dark tour if we had’ve camped there.

Dog at Paronella Park

Dog on the Stairs

Glen was getting pretty tired, so we started to look for somewhere to stop.  It looked like rain so we decided not to camp.  We stayed at Port Hinchinbrook.  The cabin was awesome.  We got the Lake Cabin (more like drain cabin) because it had kitchen facilities.  There were two Queen size beds, so Glen and I took a bed each.  I slept really well even though we were right next to the highway (again - I can’t win!).

We got Fish and Chips (and salad for me) for dinner from Cardwell.  When trying to find somewhere to get F&C, we detoured and found the  Cardwell lookout.  It doesn’t look like many people come up to experience the view, but it’s really nice and it’s not that far from the highway.

Dog at the Cardwell Lookout

Glen asked me today if I had blogged about the Bush Turkeys at Punsand Bay.  I can’t remember if I did, but here’s the story anyway.

When we went over to TI and Horn Island, we left out our kitchen camping stuff and chairs but locked up other stuff incase it went wandering - eg. our notebook.

One thing that didn’t packed away well enough was the Plain Flour.   I think it was just put into a plastic bag and put on the bench.

When we got back from the day trip, there was Plain Flour everywhere.   The Bush Turkeys had eaten all of the 2kgs of Plain Flour other than the white powder that had been spread all over our campsite.  Glen and I were one of the last travellers off the ferry, so the other guys had cleaned up most of the mess.  It was still pretty funny walking in to white powder everywhere!!

Here are a couple of dog photos.

Dog with the No Dogs Allowed sign

Dog with the mega stinger sign & vinegar

Are we twins??

I woke up early - due to the wind and also knowing that I had internet connection so I could do some upload some blog posts.  At dawn (yes I was already up blogging by then), we had another chorus of birds to start our day.

Garry got up and started breakfast.  We’re pretty much all separating today, so we split some food and I’ve done some meal prep for the they others so they’ve got dinners to get back to Brisbane.  We had bacon & sausages on bread for breakfast.

We packed  up camp and went into the Cultural Centre in Laura to get the details on how to get to the Rock Art.  We all gave our $5 donation and travelled the 12km to Split Rock.

Dog at the Cultural Centre

We climbed the stairs to get to the Art and it was pretty good.

Dog blown off his feet at the Rock Art

Dog and Alex coming down from the Rock Art

Our next planned stop was lunch at Cape Tribulation.  We did the Bloomfield Track to get there.  Bloomfield is pretty but nothing compared to what we’ve seen on our cape trip.  Cape Tribulation was packed.  We had a BBQ lunch and the BBQ was free to use.  We did the board walk and then went up to the lookout.

Dog doing the Rainforest Walk at Cape Trib

Dog and Glen at the Lookout

We got stuck at the Ferry for a while - there were heaps of cars waiting to get across.  Glen and I took off after the Ferry and kept driving til we got to Ellis Beach.  We booked in for camping, but when we went down to the Camp Ground, it was packed.  There was no way our tent would  fit in.  So we went back to the Office and we’ve upgraded to a Bungalow.  It’s pretty nice but nothing on the Sebel. Doh.

Scott has found some room for his swag at the campsite, but he’s up here visiting us in our bungalow.  Tomorrow we’re heading south.

We woke up with to the chorus of birds.  It was awesome.

The plan was to wake up early and the GU plus the Challenger would do the Frenchman’s Track.  We would meet up with the Hilux at Archer River.  We were going to have a full cooked breakfast, but ended up with having snags on bread - thanks for cooking Garry!  It was quite a cool night and morning and it was hard to get going this morning.

We finally got on the road at 8:15am.  We started the Frenchman’s Track at 9am.  The road is a bit rough, but this track and the Northern OTL have definately been the best tracks on our entire trip.  They were both pretty and no traffic.  For those of you planning your Cape Trip, both of these should be on your ‘To Do’ List.

We got to Archer River at 1:30pm and we decided to push on to Laura.  We were leading in the GU and when we got to Musgrave, we caught up with some people we’d met at Punsand and we did the trip with them to TI and Horn Island (we call them XTrail man - sexist I know but woteva).  They are also going to Laura today.  They invited us all to go and have dinner with them at the Pub. We had dinner at the pub, but there wasn’t a table big enough for us all.

We got a pretty good campsite, but the amenities weren’t fantastic.  They’d run out of toilet paper and there wasn’t any room to change in the showers either.  I had to dry and get changed in the middle of the ladies amenities.  Nice job.

Old Mate XTrail told us that there were 27 cars waiting on the dock at Seisia to be sent home.  Apparently they’d all been drowned - maybe at Nolan’s?

I stayed up late to finally get some blogs up now that we had internet connection and I went off to bed.  The wind picked up during the night and I thought that we might get blown to the Land of Oz.  The tent was actually getting picked up by the wind… Scary…  Glen pretty much slept through it all.  There was also a Bull that was walking around our campsite too.

I had a really good sleep last night.  It was our coolest (temperature) night for a long time.  We had French Toast for breakfast.  I went and took photos of all the green tree frogs that were in the shower with me last night.

The best advice that I would give people going up to the Cape would be to stay at Loyalty Beach rather than Punsand.  The drive maybe longer to get to the top, but there’s better amenities and there is actually grass campsites.  Plus it’s just that little bit cooler and there’s a breeze even at night.  There are ferries that go to TI and Horn from Seisia, so you won’t miss out on that either.

We went into Seisia to see how the Jeep was getting along.  The car has been there 3 days now, and they’ve done nothing.  NOT HAPPY JAN!  They don’t think that it will actually be ready until tomorrow!  There have been other cars that have come in after the Jeep and they are getting worked or will be finished before the Jeep.  There are other things that are broken on the Jeep, but all they’re doing is the welding.  They said that they will try to get it done by lunch time, so we went and had lunch and coffee at Bamaga Bakery and got some diesel for the GU. $1.90 per Litre. 65 litres ish… Ouch.

Scott and Dog squished into the Hilux with Garry & Ristan

After lunch we went back and the Jeep still hadn’t been done. Without using names, we have met someone that works at Top End Motors.  He’s a bit of a wild one (referred to now as WO).  While we were waiting for the Jeep to be seen to, WO told us about his escapades over the weekend.  Him and his friend, Feral (hint hint), had been drinking at Bamaga all day on Saturday and they were in the car park of the Pub when Feral asked if WO was up for a game.  The game is called “Ass Slap”.  So there were two blokes in the Bamaga Pub’s Car Park slapping each other’s bare bums.  The below photo is of WO’s bum.  I ever so nicely asked if I could take a photo of his butt after he’d shown us before.  BTW, WO is pretty aesthetically pleasing.

WO’s butt

While waiting at the Mechanics, we met an old guy with a Land Rover.  They were from Western Australia.  They were on Seisia time.  They were just sitting  in the shade just drinking coldies.  They didn’t care when they mechanics got to them.  They said that they couldn’t really do anything until the parts had come off the carrier anyway.  They had some awesome stories about the trips they’d done in the landy.

When WO looked at the Jeep, the news was not good.  More was needed than the welding.  Rear tail shaft including Cardan Joint with  unis, lower control arm bracket welded and braced, draglink, pitman arm, steering box and the rear shock absorber bracket all needs replacing and / or fixing.  WO was giving Scott a fair bit of a paddling.  WO asked Scott when the Uni Joints got grease.  Scott’s response “Erm, not exactly sure.”  WO said next time you need to do Trip Preparation on the car.

Seeing the car needs so many parts, Glen called Fester (All Four x Four Parts - Minden) to see if he had any parts for the Jeep.  Fes has the parts and is going to send them up.

Scott is now a passenger in the Challenger.  Scott’s stuff has been split between the cars.  All we could fit was the stuff out of his fridge / freezer.  Scott will have to fly back up to Bamaga when his car has been fixed.  It will actually be cheaper to do it like this than get the car shipped back down.

After the great news about the Jeep we wanted to get the hell out of the Top End.  So we bolted to the Jardine Ferry and down the Bypass Roads.  The Southern Bypass Road was pretty bad, but not as bad as Battle Camp Road.  We’ve spoken to a few locals and they reckon the rooads were fantastic up til when the Endeavour Rally went through.

We made camp at Bramwell Junction Roadhouse.  I made Spaghetti Bolognaise for dinner.  While we were eating dinner, a lady came over to ask if anyone could put in a dislocated finger.  I told her that no, you shouldn’t re-locate the finger without having medical attention (and an xray).  We asked what had happened.  A guy had had a pretty bad accident down the road.  His vehicle had gone off the road and he’d hit a tree front on.  He was okay, with some bruising on his ribs, but all he was complaining about was his finger.  His dog, Stormy, had actually gone through the windscreen.  They said that the dog was okay but a bit sore.  I’m wondering about internal injuries on both of them.  The owner of the Roadhouse was going to be taking them to Weipa for medical attention in the morning.  Our thoughts are with them.

GU next to a giant Ant Hill at Bramwell Junction Roadhouse

Injuries & Ouchies:

Jeep - Dead (for the time being anyway)

We had a late start and it had been raining on and off all night.  Trust me to leave the washing out for it to get rained on!

We had Corn Fritters again for breakfast - I think they’re a favourite.  We called Loyalty Beach to see if they had any vacancies because we were over Punsand’s packedness.  There was availabity so we had a new home.

We packed up and got on our way.  I drove today.  Glen said I did really well.  We got to Loyalty at about 11ish.  We got to the office and paid for our campsite and we got an icecream.

Dog at Loyalty Beach (Paradise)

Shed 2 where we were given to stay, someone had already set up there.  So we went back to the office to see what we could do.  We ended up where the other guys that had taken Shed 2 were supposed to be camped.

We set up camp and Garry and Ristan went into Seisia to drop in a line.  The other group set off to see the WWII plane wrecks.  Along the way, I said to Glen that something on the roof rack was flapping about, so we pulled over to check it.  Two of our floor mats had flown off, so we turned around to find them.  We didn’t have to go too far to find them and then we were off again.

Our map wasn’t the clearest; we were kinda feeling our way to get there as the info centre in Bamaga was closed.  We went to far and then we had to turn around and then we went bush and the track lead no where to see the two planes that are off the main road.

The DC3 was easier to find.  This DC3 actually took off from Archerfield Airport in the middle of the night and crashed here early in the morning.  Someone told us that what had happened was their commanding officer had told them just to follow the coast til PNG and they ran out of fuel.  Not sure if this is correct or not.  I think the plaque said that the pilot was in training - so not sure if human error came into play here.  I felt really sad for the lives that were lost in the accident.

Dog at the DC3 Wreck

Dog got a ride home from the wreck with Alex in the Challenger.  They guys filled up again in Bamaga.

We had Mexican Chicken and Rice for dinner.  Alex cooked Sticky Date Pudding for Luke’s Birthday for dessert.

After dinner, I went and had a shower.  I shared my shower with some friendly green guys.

Green Frogs in the shower at Loyalty Beach