Forest meets the sea

We visited Mossman Gorge today - around a 45 minute drive north of Palm Cove.  The Eastern Kuku Yalanji Aboriginal people took over the care and management of their traditional lands, which include Mossman Gorge back in 2007.  The last time we visited the Gorge (in 2012) their beautiful new visitor centre hadn't long been opened, and at that stage it had attracted few visitors and looked quite raw in its surroundings. Today there were people everywhere, with the Kuku Yalanji people having built the centre and its surrounding environment into into one of the best (and busiest) eco tourism experiences in FNQ!! A wonderful success story!

We walked the 2.4klm Rainforest Circuit Track today, through forests that form part of the World Heritage Listed Daintree National Park (the oldest continuous rainforest in the world). We got great views of the granite boulder strewn Mossman River coursing down the eastern slopes of the Main Coast Range, amazing rainforest trees, plants, ferns, palms and fungi, and the odd scrub turkey. 

We were struck by the quality and upkeep of all the park infrastructure too.

The entry to the Rainforest Circuit Track looked like it had been "blower vacced" in readiness for the day's visitors. 

The Mossman River .....

Manjal Dimbi (Mount Demi) keeps a close (protective) watch over the gorge, according to stories that are at least 50,000 years in the making ......

We met two lovely young women on the track, Jessica and Grace, from Alberta Canada. They are in Australia working as nurses. Grace took this picture of us and we chatted for quite a while. We're hoping to catch up again, in time, when they make it to Canberra.

Crossing the Rex Creek suspension bridge - another marvel of beautifully maintained infrastructure along the track.......

We drove back to Port Douglas after our morning at the Gorge. We enjoyed lunch at the Court House Hotel on Wharf Street with Rob adding to his rapidly expanding album of portraits of me drinking a beer while on holidays .......

I convinced Rob, under sufferance, to do the Flagstaff Hill Walking Trail after lunch. The trail started over the road from the hotel in Rex Smeal Park and wound its way around the Port Douglas peninsula to the start of Four Mile Beach. There were great views along the walk, out to the Coral Sea, the Low Isles and Snapper Island to the north. Many a great site for an Instagrammable wedding too! 

The most spectacular views were from the Flagstaff Hill Lookout. Rob could finally see the point of all this hilly exertion so soon after lunch!

Port Douglas's famous Four Mile Beach........

We walked back to the car via the length of busy Macrossen Street, stopping for a well deserved gelato from Shakes Gelati Bar - just for old times sake. Once we got back to the old port area where Packers Creek  joins the Coral Sea at the narrow Dickson's Inlet we found some familiar sights ......

We watched one of the catamarans coming back to port around 4pm after the day's cruise to the Low Isles and wondered if it was one of the same ones we sailed on a decade ago.

We only walked about 6-7 klms today, but a lot of it involved climbing and then steep descents over some rough ground. Parts of our walks were under a tropical sun too although its nowhere near as fierce as it would be in Summer. But it was a such a memorable way to experience the forest meeting the sea in the unique way it does in FNQ.

Back at Palm Cove tonight we met up with our friends David and Ro at O'Donnells on the Esplanade. We did a thorough job of dissecting the weekend's election result (which has brought us all so much joy!) as well as making a few plans for the coming week!

Palm Cove FNQ

It's been almost a decade since we've been in Far North Queensland - and here we are back again, but this time staying at Palm Cove (last time we stayed at Port Douglas) so we're not too far from where our friend David is staying at Smithfield, north of Cairns!

We left Canberra yesterday, first flight for us in a few years (thanks to COVID). It felt very unfamiliar, and not all that relaxing either, especially when our flight was cancelled at the eleventh hour and we were diverted through Melbourne. We were awake early for our (cancelled) flight in cold Canberra and didn't settle in to our much warmer Reef Resort at Palm Cove until around 3.00pm - a long day without food or much of a break between flights.

This is our garden view (complete with bird songs) from our balcony at the Reef Resort - which had an immediate relaxing effect ..........

And the pool area is very appealing to us. The Reef Resort is one of the older resorts in Palm Cove and we appreciate its space, beautiful expansive gardens and privacy. Its not at all "designer" or contemporary, but we're ok with that ...... 

First thing on the agenda was to find something to EAT. Luckily we are very close to Palm Cove's very pretty esplanade, looking out the Coral Sea .....

and only a few minutes walk to Vivo - a restaurant we'd visited a decade ago on the occasion of my (61st) birthday. We had fond memories of Vivo but were very disappointed to find they would not serve us ANY food (not even a bowl of olives!) until 5 o'clock - hard to deal with when we had virtually eaten NOTHING all day!

We tried to make do, until 5 o'clock, with the view and a glass of beer!

First thing on the agenda this morning was the 2 and a 1/2 klm walk south to Clifton Beach. It's a great track all the way to Clifton Beach, designed for cyclists and walkers, along the coastline and through native wet coastal paperbark forests ... quite beautiful really!

We imagined we'd be able to do a lovely coffee and breakfast at Clifton Beach, but alas there was nothing on offer (other than a sad offering outside a Coles supermarket!) so we made our way back to Palm Cove where the choices were much better.

We hoped to swim at Palm Cove, but the Box Jellyfish are still around at the moment. The main "surfing" beach got closed today while we were there and the nets were raised to clear them. We are not inclined to swim with Box Jellyfish so we caught some sunshine lying on the grass while watching the drama, then returned to our resort for some swim and spa time, free of stingers and crocodiles.

I love the palm trees at Palm Cove and enjoyed this view as we sunbaked on the grass ..... (also love a beach where you don't have to sunbake on the sand!).

The jetty at the northern end of Palm Cove.......

We are eating early in the evening these days (no lunch!) and gave O'Donnells Irish Bar and Grill a try tonight

Rob loved his smoky caramel pint of Guinness and I enjoyed my salad with local prawns! We also love being able to enjoy a meal this close to the ocean (even though there was quite a strong off shore wind tonight).

Walking back to our resort in the beautiful evening light - under the giant Palm Cove native Melaleucas.

Ella at fifteen

This beautiful girl was born 15 years ago - where has that time gone?!

Ella took a low key approach to her 15th birthday this year - a movie outing with her girlfriends and a family dinner with us last night (lucky us!).

I handed over the camera to Abi for the night, because everyone loves Abi taking their pictures far more than they do me! She has done an amazing job, capturing a lovely portrait of everyone in the family on the night, more than I have ever been able to achieve!

Ella was happy with her present from us: a new wallet (with cash inside!).

And all the extra ear adornment is looking good!

Ella wanted us to play a family game of Monopoly as her birthday treat - which we did - accompanied by lots of jokes and laughter, but without Ella winning on this occasion (Joshy did)!

Joshy did his usual amazing job with dinner, cooking a full sirloin for us, to celebrate Ella's birthday .....

... and his signature Yorkshire Puddings (which I have never attempted myself!)

Abi was responsible for birthday treat dessert: ice cream sandwiches - yum!

Abi's portrait series .....

As the night wore on Ella got more and more wound up as the discussions got more intense: the shortcomings of year 9 boys, the foibles of teachers, gender politics - you name it we covered it. Ella was in fine form, full of mature insights, hilarious wisecracks and and an amazing array of stories, complete with accents and relevant dramatizations. We laughed 'till we cried!

And this gorgeous one captured it all.