2020 Far North Queensland
 

Cairns - Mon 20/07/2020

2020 Far North Queensland
It's Monday morning and time to start our return journey to Mount Colah - only 2,600 Kms to go. As we are about to leave, Neil pulls up beside us. He's just dropped Jordan off at school. We exchange pleasantries and head for the Barron Gorge National Park. As drives go, it's not that far from Atherton: 70 Kms. The Barron Gorge NP has Cassowaries living within it but sightings are rare. The park is part of the traditional lands of the Djabugandji Bama who maintain a close spiritual connection with this country. Before Europeans arrived, Bama traversed this country, developing trails linking the coast to the uplands. These historic trails now form sections of a walking track network. On 17 December 2004 the Federal Court of Australia handed down the Djabugay people's native title determination over Barron Gorge National Park. This is the first park in Queensland to have a native title determination. The determination recognises the interests and rights under customary law and tradition that already exist. A formal Indigenous Land Use Agreement (ILUA) has been registered to ensure that park management and native title interests are properly integrated. Note: It was only after a series of court battles that the High Court of Australia, on 3 June 1992, decided that Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islanders actually did have a reasonable claim to the land on which they had lived for 50,000 years. Eddie Mabo, a Torres Straight Islander challenged a Queensland Govt legal manoeuvre that essentially meant that the Government could do whatever it wanted with their land - i.e. sell it to developers. A plain English description of the case is at the Mabo Case web site.
It is a 650 metre walk to the lookout overlooking the falls. "This area is renowned for its tropical rainforests along with the seasonal rain and mist upon which it depends. Other plant communities in the park include open woodlands, with groves of she-oaks, found on the foothills and upland slopes. Grassland patches grow on the coastal foothills and adjacent to the railway line. Patches of upland heath are restricted to the plateau and peaks." There they are, our first glimpse of the Barron River Falls. As we get to the lower levels, the eucalypts start to appear. The noise of the falls becomes louder
I'm always fascinated by the geological forces that created these scenic wonders. Briefly: 420 -360 Mya Australia is part of Gondwana - Devonian Period - Age of fishes: Hodgkinson basin in NE Qld fills with sediments including coral reefs 360 Mya Beginning of Carboniferous Period - Coal swamps - Hodgkinson basin crumples because of tectonic pressures (Hodgkinson Basin also called Atherton Tableland Hodgkinson Basin) Note Hodgkinson Basin still exists today west of the coastline. 100 mya Australia still linked to Antarctica (Dinosaurs)- 80Mya Australia breaking away from Antarctica - 65Mya Late Cretaceous Period - (end of dinosaurs) : Volcanoes cause upwelling with the eastern side dropping into Coral Sea 65 Mya to present (Cenozoic era) Coastline wears away but at end of ice age 6000 years ago, sea levels rise to form current coastline. How North Queensland was born - the Granite boulders at Barron Gorge National Park at Kuranda. Information from the Wet Tropics Management Authority. "Birds and butterflies are abundant, flying between and within the different vegetation communities. Vibrant rainbow and scaly-breasted lorikeets screech in the treetops. Quieter emerald doves can be seen on the forest floor. The distinctive 'wallock-a-woo' call of the elusive wompoo fruit-dove echoes down from the rainforest canopy. Australian brush-turkeys and orange-footed scrubfowl scratch around on the forest floor. Both birds use leaf litter to build huge nesting mounds. The imposing flightless southern cassowary also inhabits the park, and plays a vital role in distributing the seeds of rainforest trees, by feeding on a variety of rainforest fruits. The brilliant blue Ulysses butterfly and the vivid green of the Cairns birdwing butterfly provide flashes of colour among the trees."
"Mammals found here include striped possums, long-tailed pygmy-possums, Lumholtz’s tree-kangaroos, musky rat-kangaroos and spotted-tailed quolls. Insectivorous bats occur in the park along with flying-foxes, notably the distinctive spectacled flying-fox. Egg-laying mammals, the platypus and its prickly relative, the short-beaked echidna, also live in the park." To think we were at Mount Hypipamee only yesterday. Note: The Barron River does not flow unhindered to the Coral Sea; it is intercepted by the Tinaroo Dam along the way. This part of the track is a wet tropical forest full of vines, palms and trees that eat each other. Beautiful
As we get nearer to the viewing platform, we pass a couple of magnificent trees. I take a movie of them and it turns out that they are a couple of kauri trees. Queensland kauri occurs in two localities: A southern population on Fraser Island and around Maryborough; and on the Atherton Tableland where there is a northern population.  "Queensland kauri is a large, coniferous tree with a straight trunk, growing to a height of 25-40 metres with a trunk diameter of between 100 - 200cm. The trunk is clear of branches for over half its length. The characteristically straight and symmetrical trees are covered with smooth to flaky grey-brown bark. Woody scales from collapsing cones gather at the base of these trees." We get a glimpse of the Cairns - Kuranda railway line. When Australia was a number of competing colonies, the nation obviously needed railways to cover the enormous distances involved. So Victoria and South Australia decided to build a wide gauge system (5ft 3"), NSW decided to build a "standard" gauge system (4 ft 8½") and Queensland built a narrow gauge system (3ft 6"). Here we see our first narrow gauge rail track.
Isn't it amazing that people need to be warned that standing on a fence overlooking a 250 ft drop is dangerous; but what a stunning view. "The Barron Gorge Hydroelectric Power Station is an electricity power station commissioned in 1963 with a maximum capacity of 66 megawatts. It replaces an earlier station which was the first underground power station in the country and the first hydroelectric station in Queensland. The power station was refurbished in 2006." The falls are turned down to a trickle right now. The falls operate at full flow only during the wet season when the Tinaroo Dam is opened. As luck would have it, a train arrives from Cairns.
It would be much more exciting to see the train pulled by an original steam engine. The Puffing BIlly in a historical journey through the Dandenong Ranges East of Melbourne is hugely popular, in part because of the steam engine. The Durango - Silverton train in Colorado is also very popular for similar reasons. "Bring back the steam!" says I. It isn't particularly crowded probably because of Covid-19. The story of the scenic railway: Construction began n 1886 and employed 1500 men Officially opened in 1891 Many people died through disease, accident, fever and conflict 2.3 M³ rock and soil removed by hand and cart. We return to the car park and retrieve our "Tow Truck". It's going extremely well so far and even the fuel consumption isn't so bad at 10.8 L/100Km.
We take a quick drive through the village and park here. We park opposite the railway station and the entrance to the Skyrail cableway. If there's a prettier train station than this, it ain't in this country. The foliage is impressive and there's even a lift for disabled passengers - typical Queensland.
IMG 0788 The train that we saw previously at the Falls is parked at the platform. We take a quick look inside one of the carriages and it looks a bit Spartan. The first class carriage is more upmarket.
Skyrail Rainforest Cableway is a 7.5 km scenic cableway running above the Barron Gorge National Park, in the Wet Tropics of Queensland’s World Heritage Area. It has won more than 25 awards. Unfortunately, it is closed because of Covid. My Movie 9 We continue our journey into Cairns, losing altitude as we descend from the Barron River Gorge to sea level.
Across the north, tribute is often paid to Australia's traditional owners. Maybe in future years, tributes like this will have helped our first nations peoples towards some kind of equality. A short distance from Cairns, we finally see the ocean. We check into our motel, a Ramada, and learn that we have been upgraded to a better room. We did not use the internet to book our room. Jenni searched with Google and phoned the hotel direct. The room is quite large and is the first decent room we've had that came at a reasonable price - around $100. In the wet tropics, tiling is far more practical than carpeting.
I hate bicycle lanes. There is an element of Australian society that firmly, stridently, believes that building more freeways only encourages more cars. I feel the same logic applies to bicycle lanes; more bicycle lanes encourages more bicycles. This is obviously a very bad thing. Time to do the tourists' walk of Cairns. We go downstairs and walk one block towards the ocean. This is the Esplanade, the main road that runs along the waterfront. What a miserable, sordid, wasteland; and it's all man made. Cairns was named for Sir William Wellington Cairns, a Governor of Qld, and officially founded in 1876 following the discovery of gold in the surrounding area. However, Captain James Cook had 'discovered' the area more than a century earlier, on his first voyage of discovery in 1770 aboard HM Bark Endeavour.
The tiny 30m Endeavour ran aground on the coral reefs and, limping to land, put in at a river that became the site of present-day Cooktown. The dispirited crew named other features according to their dark mood: Cape Tribulation, Hope Island and Weary Bay. The Esplanade was the first to be surveyed in Cairns in October 1876. It was named Troughton Esplanade after the Travelling Superintendent of the Australian Steam Navigation Company, Captain Fred Troughton. Early photos reveal that the Esplanade was once a sandy beach, similar to other Cairns beaches to the north. Dredging of the Grafton Channel for shipping resulted in mud completely covering the sandy beach because the sediment gathered during the dredging process was dumped offshore and promptly swept back in to silt the inlet and cover the Esplanade beach with mud. "This infusion of mud has been great for the mangrove ecosystem, but not great for tourists who would rather see a sandy beach than a muddy tidal swamp. The arguments purported by developers are that the mudflats are an artificial ecosystem that is not integral to the mangrove forests. But environmentalists assert that the area has been in it's current form long enough to be home to thousands of species of mud-dwelling creatures, and to dump sand on top of them is environmental vandalism." I'm a greenie at heart but sometimes "environmentalists" do just as much harm as developers.
Here's the sad, sad story about Cairns' Esplanade beaches. Apparently, there was a period where sand was imported and laid along the muddy mess close to the boardwalk. It didn't last long as the tidal flows washed it all back out to sea again. Now, who'd have thought it? Humans prefer sand but migratory birds prefer the food supply provided by the mud flats. "Cairns Esplanade, part of Trinity Bay, is an important link in one of the world's greatest bird migrations. Each year millions of shorebirds leave Alaska, Siberia, N China, Mongolia and Japan after breeding in the northern tundras and fly south to Australia for our summer." Everything is lush and green on the streets of Cairns. Epiphytic ferns cling to the tree in front of us.
I think these trees are a species of fig called ficus virens. It is the same species as the Curtain Fig we saw on Saturday at Yungaburra and they are strangler figs. They are often called Banyan trees Ficus microcarpa, which is an introduced species. Moving south along the lush, green Esplanade. If this were in any other country but Australia, these foreshores would be littered with highrise apartments but these beautifully maintained spaces are for the enjoyment of everyone, even (gasp!) manual workers and other indigents. This Sculpture, unveiled on 31 August 2017, is called the Citizens Gateway to the Great Barrier Reef . It was created by Torres Strait Islander artist Brian Robinson who was commissioned to create an iconic artwork that would reflect the biodiversity of the Great Barrier Reef. His 6m high and 11m helix depicts a wave of marine creatures and birds led by a life-size stingray. Beautiful.
An aboriginal family enjoys a picnic on the right and two aboriginal girls exit left. I put this picture in because seeing our first nations people is a rare experience for me living in Sydney. Towards the end of the Esplanade, we come across the Lagoon. The Lagoon is a safe 4800 m² salt water swimming facility, open year-round, without stingers, sharks or crocodiles. The Lagoon is filled with filtered salt water from the Trinity Inlet. It is free and Covid-Safe rules apply during our visit that limit gatherings to no more than 30 people. A shameless hussy, with beautiful, perfectly-shaped breasts sits topless under a palm tree. I am deeply offended by this brazen display and slowly move on.
Cairns has a few sister cities. The only ones we've been to are in North America. Helicopter joy flights: $185 per person for an hour. Not cheap. Shame about the mud. A giant Ficus virens fig near the southern end of the Esplanade.
This is the Salt House restaurant. Covid spacing rules in play. We enter the boardwalk that runs beside Chinaman Creek. A huge tropical rain storm gathers to the South of us. Jenni sees this "Dine On" vessel and thinks it would be a good idea for dinner tonight.
She goes down onto the wharf and talks with one of the staff. It seems like it's a good idea, not expensive and should be fun. Definitely on the list for tonight - I actually feel like fish 'n chips not having had any seafood on our travels as yet. It looks like we have only minutes to get inside before the rain hits - but it stays where it is and we remain dry. The building on the left is imaginatively named The Pier Shopping Mall. IMG 0834
Ferries to Green Island and Fitzroy Island leave from here as do dozens of tourist boats. We start our return journey back to our hotel, travelling inland. The lush gardens of Cairns continue to impress. The palms are Foxtail Palms, what a good name. The size of this fig tree needs a human, in this case Jenni, to stand in front to get some idea of its girth. We go into The Pier Shopping Mall and it is deserted.
Businesses like this are suffering because of Covid. We exit the shopping centre, cross the road and enter another beautiful walkway under a canopy of young fig trees. This walkway is illuminated at night with lights of many different colours. How tropical is this? Palm trees and mud flats. Jenni looks these birds up on her iPhone; they are Bush Stone Curlews and are native to Australia.
They are capable of flight, but rely on the camouflage of their plumage to evade detection during the day. Both sexes care for two eggs laid on the bare ground, usually sited near bush in a shaded position or next to a fallen branch. Jenni takes a picture of the Lagoon with a sign of the times behind her. I thought this was sorta sad. The young aboriginal guy drank too much and collapsed into the arms of his mother. His father stares regally into the distance. More aboriginal girls. This is odd for me, I know in Sydney it is polite to refer to native Australians as Koori but I have no idea if the same term applies in FNQ.
I remember these 1956 games in Victoria. At age 15, I had travelled by train to join my father in country Victoria (Bridgewater NW of Bendigo). Many of the international athletes had gathered in this area to use the local facilities to acclimatise and train. We went to a stadium at Bendigo to watch them run, jump and do athletic things. The sad story is always the same wherever Europeans clash with "primitive" peoples. This is the Cairns Cenotaph, a memorial to those brave souls who lost their lives defending this great land. "The memorial is surmounted by a statue of a digger and records the names of 142 men and women from the region who served in World War I. Designed to incorporate a much-needed public clock, the clock faces are now painted replicas showing 4.28am - the time the ANZAC forces landed at Gallipoli on the ill-fated 25 April 1915." We're right opposite the Cairns Aquarium so I take a few pictures of the posters outside.
The facility is closed because of Covid restrictions. As night falls, we decide it's time to eat. The idea of going back the wharf area to dine on board is dismissed as my left ankle continues to act up - miserably. We must be a little early because restaurants on the Esplanade are empty. The Cenotaph is lit up at night and the clock still shows 04:28.
The tide has come back in and a pod of pelicans (I looked up what the collective noun is) is peacefully floating on the water, a little way off shore, perhaps sleeping after a hard day's fishing. Cairns is beautiful by night. We cross over Applin Street and wander down Abbott Street looking for somewhere suitable to eat. The are many places open but everyone seems to have forgotten Covid spacing for now and it's too crowded for us. We cross Sheldos Street to other corner and wonder if Frydays does a good fish 'n chips.
It does, so we order one plate of fish 'n chips and another plate of calamari rings. We have plenty of space around us so we have a nice quiet meal all to ourselves (just about). This is the cheapest night-time meal we've had on our journey so far. The building on the opposite diagonal corner is the Cairns Art Gallery. Video update 2029-07-13FNQld-11
Only 112 Kms today but that was one of the positives. The car is still going well.    
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