Tropical Queensland

The pacific pull was strong. The ocean was calling once again. So after a quick shower, scrubbing off the 35km’s worth of hiker’s cheese, we jumped in Maria to make some ground before sunset. We made it to Virgin Rocks – a camp spot just outside Emerald. It was here we learnt that cooking on all 3 gas burners takes an amazingly long time when it is about 5 degrees.

Passing through the towns Springsure and Gindie we cruised on through Emerald and a whole heap of nothing much, predominantly BIG mining country. Tom Tom was keen to visit one particular mine site but we had other ideas. As we turned east we passed through Capella, Cleremont and Nebo. Just outside of Mackay the lush tropics welcome you with horizon to horizon sugar cane.  

We had a couple of tropical QLD boxes to tick – reef and rainforest. So after a 1 night stop over at Ball Bay (just north of Mackay) we arrive at Airlie Beach. Famous for backpacker orgies and box jellyfish this is also a popular launching pad to check out ‘The Reef’. Aw yeah and the Whitsundays. We decided to move on though as the water looked pretty murky, the sky cloudy, and there were more crusty sunburnt backpackers than in a Bundaberg tomato farm slave camp.

Since the reef was priority number one on the bucket list we moved on and checked out Reef HQ in Townsville for a little education on all things Great Barrier Reef. Reef HQ was very informative and within an hour or so you can upload with more information than can be retained about the reef, ogle at the impressive tank set ups and be glad to get the hell out of there if you visit in school holidays like we did.

Hooking up the coast we pull in to Bramston Beach for some shut eye next to a croc infested swamp, yup officially in croc country. Being assured that the crocs are pretty placid in winter we take a pleasant early morning hike through the nearby wetland hoping to spot the fabled 18 footer that resides there. Jumping and joking around with calls of ‘watch out’ and ‘there he is’ we snapped a few photos of the wetland but the croc king was most elusive.

At Cairns we were pointed in the right direction for our reef experience we were seeking so we headed to the most northern place on the coast a 2 wheel drive could go - Cape Tribulation. Hugging the scenic coast road Maria leaned into the cliff side bends of the World Heritage Captain Cook Hwy. I don’t have a habit of rating roads but this one gets 5 stars with its scenic vistas of the aqua Coral Sea.

There’s a vehicular ferry you need to cross and then you are officially in the Daintree Rainforest. The scenery reminded us of our Central American journeys but this was tropical Australian! The road winds around the edge of jungle clad cliffs giving you cheeky vegetation framed glimpses of white sand beaches and brilliant aqua waters.

Cape Trib’s various places to camp include the beach front National Park campground (which at $5pp is the cheapest) but if you’re not organised chances are it will be booked out (with screaming kids during holidays). Another option is PK’s Jungle Village – and we just managed to sneak into the last spot. PK’s has all types of accommodation from camping, dorms and bungalows. From our campsite we could hear the onsite bar facilitating a QLD troweling of NSW in the State of Origin - Wow, the QLD Bogans just loved it. Also from our campsite is a short 2 minute walk through a mangrove board walk to the white sand, palm jungle fringed Cape Trib Beach. Doing yoga on the low tide flats of the east coasts beaches has been no doubt one of the highlights of the trip thus far. Cape Trib beach was no exception with peaceful sunrise and sunset sessions.    

Another plus was that the only Cape Trib reef tour operator “Ocean Safari” is just across the road. After checking out the options of tours from Cairns we went for “Ocean Safari” as it’s a smallish boat (max 25 people) and the reef is only 30km from the mainland at Cape Trib as opposed to 100km from Cairns.

Ocean Safari’s took 20min to get out to the first spot, a coral fringe around a sand cay called Mackay Reef. And wow, pristine coral of every shape, size and style you could imagine illuminated in every colour of the rainbow. Fish stocks seemed a little sparse (compared to previous snorkles in the Red Sea, Bay Islands Hondurus, Samoa, Indo…) but it was definitely the most impressive coral either of us had ever seen. To top the Daintree experience we did an unguided scramble/hike up Mount Sorrow to get a lookout over the reef and experience the rainforest. The locals will tell you that it takes 6-7hrs and don’t begin the walk after 10am. That’s rubbish. It took us a leisurely 3.5hrs (6-9:30am) and hikers a good 20yrs older were also doing it under 4hrs.

With the tropo QLD bucket list completed it was time say goodbye to the east and split towards the west. Actually, we were just glad to get out of there alive. I mean keeping an eye out for crocs was one thing, but then the other eye for electric ants!!!  

Carnarvon Gorge

After a week of work Jim offered for us to stay on and pick the glory run of his murcotts, i.e. picking only the largest and leaving the smaller fruit on the trees. We really liked Jim and I think the feeling was mutual. Jim still had mandarin tests to do and this wasn’t going to happen for a few days so we made the call to hit the road again. Cheers mate it was an awesome experience. Good luck and good farming!

Carvarvon National Park is a 6 hr drive NW from Gayndah. We took the route through the towns of Mundubbera, Eidsvold, Cracow, Theodore, Moura, Bauhinia and Rolleston. The scenery consisted of barren vegetation stripped grazing property, bored and depressed cows, the QLD bottle tree, cotton plantations and dry eucalypt forest. 

Carnarvon Gorge is about 45min from Rolleston (last fuel stop so fill up). The access road is unsealed and would be inaccessible after rain. The gorge itself is an oasis, a fertile valley in the semi-arid heart of QLD. Towering white sandstone cliffs form a spectacular steep sided gorge with narrow vibrantly-coloured and lush side gorges.

The Carvarvon NP information centre was really helpful, sorted us out with a map and a plan for the next day. The Great Walk (86km) was temporarily closed so our next most exciting option was the 35km round trip to Battleship Spur – up, out and on top of the gorge. Why get up at sunrise when you can get up a couple of hours before it!? So up at 4.00am it was and wow, it was a good surprise to see that someone was just as nuts and keen to attempt the same hike in a day. With Mick as company we set off into the bush in the dark guided by our not to scale map and head torches. The first 10kms sees you criss-cross up through the bottom of the gorge. The trail had 16 creek crossings which were at one stage apparently well marked. We had a couple of moments losing the trail and ourselves in the dark. One critical moment of the journey was saved by the sunrise and we got back on the trail eventually and not too much time was lost. The recent March 2011 QLD floods had caused some damage to the trail. Some of the markers had been washed away and parts of the trail had detours. Not so easy to find in the dark with fading, flickering budget head torches…

There are many sites to check out along the way, the highlight for us being the Aboriginal rock art which adorns the sandstone overhangs at Cathedral Cave and the Art Gallery. The display of rock engravings, ochre stencils and free hand painting is talked up as some of the finest recent (pre colonisation/invasion) Aboriginal rock imagery in Australia.

Don’t miss this place if you’re ever nearby. Not just a beautiful walk or jaw dropping scenery, but a spiritual place to the local Indigenous people who first lived on this land.

Gayndah Queensland

“Tha More Ya Pick Tha More Ya Get”

Jim McNaught, Citrus Farmer

It was a peculiar series of events which led us to our first fruit picking job. We were in Hervey Bay awaiting a call from some fellow traveling buddies to get the all clear to head to Bundaberg for a pre-arranged gig picking juicy tomatoes. The call came and it wasn’t the outcome expected, the gig had fallen through. What to do now? We set the office up (laptop and mobile) and called every employment agency/farm that we could find a number for. The news was not encouraging. A cold snap had lowered yield of tomatoes and the majority of labour was sourced from dehydrated, delirious, nude backpackers. In a moment of despair we looked to the cloudless sky “c’mon give us break”. Someone was listening...

On her way to the loo Jess bumped into a friendly local, Ivan, who was playing with his giant Alaskan Malamute whilst waiting for his wife Kate. After exchanging friendly chit chat Ivan divulged that his Bro in Law, Jim, had an orchard in Gayndah and then proceeded to call and see if he could hook us up. Outcome - no work for a couple of weeks – ok... Ivan and Kate then offered us their beach front holiday home for a hot shower and a place to stay that night neighbouring Guy Sebastion! Well it was a lovely offer and the idea of some singing lessons from the man himself was a huge temptation for Steve, but we needed work pronto. That’s it, let’s just head to Bundy to door knock farms and just as we were 10 minutes out of Hervey Bay Jim calls us back – he had a couple of days work! Tom Tom was re programmed to sunny Gayndah, 4 hours west.

Welcome to sunny Gayndah

So now we are officially fruit picking gypsies. Jim sorted us out with a farm stay and a week’s work of thorn thrashing mandarins and limes. It would have to be the most physical work either of us had done. Averaging 600kg of fruit each per day! Besides the thousand scratches, early starts, long days and RSI’s we had fun and now had some money in the bank to put us through the next adventure.

Sunrise at Jim's

The fleet

Stevie going crazy, again...

Full bins in the afternoon

Mandies on chin

Living room and kitchen

Mandarin sunset

FACT: mandarins and limes have brutal thorns. FACT mandies straight off the tree are amazing and you can eat 30 in one day. FACT there is no better smell in the world then 600kg of freshly picked limes!

I got a winner!

Lovely limes, where's the Mojitos?

Special

Cool lime buggy

And for those who may consider Mandarin/Lime picking:

MANDARIN/LIME 101

·        Farmer usually provides a ‘joey’ bag and stem snips. It’s a good idea to also equip yourself with a pair of close fitting fabric gardening gloves and strapping tape.

·        Tape up areas of hands that hold the snips and also your gloves to your long sleeve work shirt in an attempt to protect yourself from thorn fury.

·        Music – gets you through the 10hr day and cuts out ranting and raving delusional fruit picking jibber.

·        Tactics – always start an empty joey bag up the ladder. Then once half full/or when your risking your life balancing come down slowly, preferably 1 step at a time, then fill the rest of the bag working the lower branches on your way back to the bin.

·        So you know what you’re in for – a bin is roughly a cubic meter = approx 400kg of fruit  = $90 (mandies) or $130 (limes) for your bank acc… minus tax.

·        Give yourself a chance – the first day you will work harder than you ever have and not even fill a bin. After the second day you think you need to go to hospital. By the 3rd day you will become enlightened and tap into your inner ninja skills. You will become one with your ladder, joey bag and snips singing songs of love and conversing with the trees... And eventually earn more than a 14yro kid working at McDonalds.

Gotta a love a big thing