While we planned to leave Paronella Park today and head north again we still hadn’t availed ourselves of the day tour of this park. So, after packing the van up and performing our morning chores we joined the 10am tour around this incredible attraction.
Once the tour had finished and we were left to our devices on the opposite side of the park, Deb took the kids back with her and let me spend a further 20 minutes or so enjoying, and photographing, some of the very distinctive flowers and plants that adorned the area.
Once satisfied that I hadn’t missed anything of startling beauty we pulled out of Mena Creek and aimed northwards. Travelling through Innisfail and eventually the outskirts of Cairns we pulled alongside their Centenary Lakes gardens to enjoy some lunch. The gardens were again amazing with some large lakes almost fully covered with lily pads and blooms that took your breath away.
From there we detoured west off our northern bearings to visit the small mountain top town of Kuranda. The attraction for us was a set of waterfalls called Barron Falls which was near the town but other tourists had also recommended its merit as a town to see. Even the steep incline and goat track roads were incredibly scenic.
After we had trekked around the top of the falls, well…as close as one can get to them, we set back to the little town. Alas, the town seems to close down at 4pm and all the shops were pulling their wares back in under cover as we arrived. Needless to say it was a short visit and once the r___ came bucketing down it made it even shorter.
Then it was back to traverse the mountain road again until we were back on the Captain Cook Hwy – we’ve finally finished with the Bruce. From there it was a series of large roundabouts with beach access roads coming off to the right at regular intervals until we found ourselves driving directly along the coast for the first time in a long while – possibly the Great Ocean Road in Victoria was our most recent coastline road.
The road began introducing us to some rainforest gullies before taking us back out onto the coast and finally steered us in to Mossman. Our lodging for the next two nights was Wonga Beach, another 20km north of Mossman, so we continued our journey before arriving a little after 5pm.
Then, as it always seems to do here the r___ kept us indoors for the evening as we enjoyed a very breezy sleep.
