Up early we were on the first cave tour at 9am.
The caves were different to normal as they were dry and above ground - interesting and some more travellers to talk to. One aussie family were doing a 6 month tour with their children right round the coast.
After the caves time to start the first of the long drives - 350km to Mackay and then 85 to Eungella National Park. Not a great start - 25km after starting hit a queue of traffic - stopped for an hour while emergency services dealt with a head one collision between 4WD and car & caravan.
Once we were clear of traffic progress was good.
Stopped for lunch at Sarina Beach - 40km south of Mackay.
Deserted beach with trees to beach. Lots of ships lined up to take the coal from Oz to China (port near Mackay).
Startled to see dolphins swimming, diving and jumping very close to beach - fantastic to see them - possibly 10-20 - chasing fish. Some flying fish made interesting sight - flying as much as 100m across surface by flipping their tails on the waves.
From Sarina we continued to Eungella NP - along drive and once again we arrived after dark (having earlier booked accommodation).
Accommodation slightly more than normal but had a log burner - strange but we actually needed it! After a lovely meal where we had seen a possum eating outside the restaurant, it was out for some late night wild life watching.
ENP is famed for sightings of the unique duck billed platypus. We caught occasional glimpses of things in the muddy river but could not make out for sure.
Never mind - we were up at 6am to revisit the river. We were not disappointed - we saw the platypus, turtles and a kingfisher. Great to see but not particularly photograph.
After breakfast the owner took us to the start of an 8km walk. Advised Bruce Highway was again closed due to RTA - vehicle had left road and burst into flames - for a single carriageway road there are certainly lots of accidents - mostly due to tiredness.
The walk was through rain forest along the Broken River. Not much wildlife but lots of trees, occasional lizards and lots of roots to trip you up. Unfortunately Mandy tripped up a route and went flat on her face - bruised leg and elbow - of course boys were all sympathetic and reminder her it was more like grandad than Margot. After a brief recovery stop it was on with the walk. Mark stumbled across a snake on the path - snake moved quickly away - a reminder that you are never sure when danger may lurk!
A tornado apparently hit the area in March and uprooted lots of trees - on the way out of the park we noticed a tree had actually crushed a house (wooden one).
The caves were different to normal as they were dry and above ground - interesting and some more travellers to talk to. One aussie family were doing a 6 month tour with their children right round the coast.
After the caves time to start the first of the long drives - 350km to Mackay and then 85 to Eungella National Park. Not a great start - 25km after starting hit a queue of traffic - stopped for an hour while emergency services dealt with a head one collision between 4WD and car & caravan.
Once we were clear of traffic progress was good.
Stopped for lunch at Sarina Beach - 40km south of Mackay.
Deserted beach with trees to beach. Lots of ships lined up to take the coal from Oz to China (port near Mackay).
Startled to see dolphins swimming, diving and jumping very close to beach - fantastic to see them - possibly 10-20 - chasing fish. Some flying fish made interesting sight - flying as much as 100m across surface by flipping their tails on the waves.
From Sarina we continued to Eungella NP - along drive and once again we arrived after dark (having earlier booked accommodation).
Accommodation slightly more than normal but had a log burner - strange but we actually needed it! After a lovely meal where we had seen a possum eating outside the restaurant, it was out for some late night wild life watching.
ENP is famed for sightings of the unique duck billed platypus. We caught occasional glimpses of things in the muddy river but could not make out for sure.
Never mind - we were up at 6am to revisit the river. We were not disappointed - we saw the platypus, turtles and a kingfisher. Great to see but not particularly photograph.
After breakfast the owner took us to the start of an 8km walk. Advised Bruce Highway was again closed due to RTA - vehicle had left road and burst into flames - for a single carriageway road there are certainly lots of accidents - mostly due to tiredness.
The walk was through rain forest along the Broken River. Not much wildlife but lots of trees, occasional lizards and lots of roots to trip you up. Unfortunately Mandy tripped up a route and went flat on her face - bruised leg and elbow - of course boys were all sympathetic and reminder her it was more like grandad than Margot. After a brief recovery stop it was on with the walk. Mark stumbled across a snake on the path - snake moved quickly away - a reminder that you are never sure when danger may lurk!
A tornado apparently hit the area in March and uprooted lots of trees - on the way out of the park we noticed a tree had actually crushed a house (wooden one).
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