Just Keep on travelling: Our trip to Cape York begins

Friday, August 5, 2011

Our trip to Cape York begins

Leaving the caravan in storage in Port Douglas

This morning we finished packing up the caravan and took it to storage in Port Douglas. We are now travelling with the Patrol which has the tent and hopefully everything else we will need for our 2-3 week trip to the northern most tip of Australia. We intend to take the Old Telegraph track which is 4wd only and follow as many of the 4wd tracks as possible. This is a trip of some 2000 kms return to Port Douglas.

Queue for Daintree ferry

We took the road to Cape Tribulation stopping off at Newell Beach and Wonga Beach on the way. We also went into the village of Daintree just so we could have a look. Once back on the highway we met the queue for the barge across the Daintree River. This costs $12.50 one way and only takes a few minutes and about 15-20 vehicles can be transported in one trip. We wondered why there was a queue and soon found out - the barge was being assisted by two speed boats. Obviously there was a cable problem as the workmen were working on this on the side of the river.

Daintree ferry with aid of power boats

The trip through the Daintree National Park was really beautiful. We stopped off at the camping area at Noah's Beach for a picnic lunch and then walked into the beach at Cape Tribulation. This is a most beautiful part of the world. We then started along the Bloomfield Track (the road Peter and Roanne and Roger had taken on Friday). It was an interesting drive, requiring the normal letting down of the tyre pressures, and there were a number of creek crossings. We stopped at Wujal Wujal and walked into see the falls which are pretty impressive. The crocodile was again sunning himself on the same rock which Peter had seen him on last Friday. The town of Wujal Wujal is very depressed and it is quite sad to think that people are living like this in Australia.

Crocodile warnings everywhere

We had initially thought we would stop off at one of the camping facilities but decided to travel on into Cooktown. We stopped off at the Lions Den Hotel so that I could see this - our friends in Melbourne Heather and Tim had told us about this icon and it had to be seen to be believed. The camping facility looked good but wr de died to travel on. We passed the Black Mountains and these were most impressive. The mountains are covered in black granite boulders and are apparently the only mountains like these in the world.
We arrived into Cooktown just before 6 pm. This was a real mistake as we had to put up the tent and organize ourselves for the first time in the dark. Another lesson learned - arrive in the daylight! Still the tent went up easily and we were soon organized and dinner was cooked. We will stay in Cooktown a couple of nights before heading north.