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North Coast – Townsville to Cairns
After leaving the Whitsunday’s we made our first stop in Townsville- why, I don’t know. It was okay to be fair just quite run down. We drove up to castle hill and saw a pretty cool 360˚ panoramic view all around and out to magnetic island. Leaving Townsville we stayed in a rest area on the beach which was really nice.
The next morning we set off early and drove to Paluma range national park. We went to Little Crystal creek, Big Crystal creek and paradise waterhole, they were all really nice, and natural. Roger was like a little kid, jumping in all the water. It was really nice and pretty cool to see. We went to the rock slides which were amazing; we were there for about an hour. Rog insisted on going down every single slide making sure I videoed him. It was good fun though. We stayed in another rest area that night, saving lots of money.
We drove to Wallaman falls in Girrugan National Park in the morning; this took about an hour up a very steep winding mountain, but well worth it. The waterfall has the biggest single drop on any waterfall in Australia at 305m. It was the most spectacular waterfall we’d ever seen. Flowing into a massive gorge, the waterfall is extremely fast flowing and so noisy. After a 45 minute walk down the Jinda track through the rainforest we arrived at the bottom. This was even more magnificent than what it was like at the top. It was incredible, with a rainbow starting right at the bottom and following the river. After 20 minutes or so of us getting every picture we possibly could we started our very step ascent back up the mountain. We were both shattered when we reached the top, but it was definitely worth it. After a rest and a cold shower we drove to Innisfail, where we stayed in another rest area for the night.
In the morning we drove to Atherton tablelands, west on the Palmerston highway. We drove around the waterfall circuit, which consisted on Millaa Millaa waterfall, Ulanjaa waterfall and Zillie falls. All three were really nice, although not very rustic. Ulanjaa was our favourite.
We carried on with our journey and stopped at Malanda falls, although this seemed more like a big lake really. Afterwards we drove to Gallo chocolate and cheese factory. The cheese was delicious, Rog and I tried every piece of cheese we possibly could- fatties. The blue cheese was so nice, can’t wait to have some when we go back home now. After buying some cheddar cheese (Rog said the blue cheese was to strong), we went to the farm where we saw a baby calf had just been born. It was actually quite gross but cool to see.
We drove to the Curtain Fig tree which was spooky, and down to Lake Barrine for some lunch and a rest, it was really nice here, with very well kept gardens.
On our way to Cairns we drove down a very steep hill which had over 190 bends, it made us feel a bit queasy. We arrived in cairns at about 4ish and checked into our campsite. We did all our washing, and it was so nice have our first shower in 3 days. Anouk and Sjoerd were there so we spent the evening in the campsite having dinner and a bit of wine.
We moved campsites the next day to one which was a bit cheaper. We spent the day at the lagoon which was really relaxing and we had a wander around the shops. In the evening, Anouk cooked us all a really nice dinner, Rog and Sjoerd got a bit drunk, it was a good evening.
We hit the shops in the morning, looking for warm clothes for New Zealand; this was very successful and very cheap. I cut Roger’s hair in the afternoon, not very successful at all lol! It wasn’t too bad, it was just obvious I’d cut it. After a quick call to Sophie, we dropped in at her hotel and she very kindly cut his hair properly, although she said I did a good job!!! We all went out for a really nice dinner in the evening, I had Kangaroo and Rog had crocodile, Emu sausage, barracuda and Kangaroo all BBQ and skewered, his was delicious. The crocodile tasted a bit like chicken, it was all really nice.
The next day we packed up our campervan said our goodbyes to everyone and drove to the lagoon for a couple of hours. We dropped off our spaceship in the afternoon, and luckily there was someone there to drop us off back in town. We caught a taxi to the airport after abusing McDonald’s free wifi, and had a 7 hour wait at the airport before catching our first of three planes to New Zealand Wahoo!!!!
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