24 July 2011 - Palm Tree Caravan Park, Ingham, Queensland

Another day in paradise, as is so often used as a greeting from one camper to another here. The day started cooler, at about 9 degrees and I wished that I had put that extra blanket on the bed last night.

We had watched, or rather attempted to watch, the rugby last night between periods of psychedelic flickering on the television screen possibly caused by the amount of smoke in the surrounding atmosphere, or perhaps by a vindictive crew of truckies screwing the radio waves every time they passed the caravan park. No, the latter is very unfair; we have no idea why it happened, but it was very frustrating.

I sat up late to keep Chris company, taking the opportunity to cull photos from this blog, having reached my limit. I had not realised there was such a restriction, however Olly has put me straight, yet again, ironing out some irritating little problems I was encountering. How I appreciate that assistance, being such a techno-dinosaur! I did however give up the all night vigil at about 11.30 pm and thus missed the winning run of Cadel Evans at Grenoble.

So this morning when the sun rose promising another beautiful day, the locals were really on a high; a ridiculous hope of a national holiday to celebrate their kinsmen Tour de France win and celebrating the Wallabies thrashing of the Boks (despite the fact the game was “oh-so-ho-hum”)

Sadly it was also a day to mourn with the Norwegians, the horror of the lone crazy assassin of so many, and to hear of the loss of  modern music’s sad, but talented, Amy Winehouse.

But also this was happily a distraction from the other two main subjects that monopolise the news here: Julia’s falling popularity and her carbon tax that is promised to save the world from global warming.

On a personal level however, it was a perfect day to undertake the expedition we had specifically paused in Ingram to make. The Wallemen Falls are Australia’s highest sheer drop waterfall at 298 metres, situated just a little more than fifty kilometres west of the town. We knew we should not pull the caravan up to them, and while we had considered the possibility of unhitching and parking the caravan at say, the Information Centre, while doing the trip, we had decided that staying here in Ingham was the better option.

The Wallemen Falls

We packed up our lunch as is our habit, and headed toward the Girringun National Park. The road passed through acres and acres of sugar cane plantation, eventually changing to open wooded pasture well stocked with floppy eared cattle, and then through pine forest, much of which has been laid waste by Cyclone Yasi. Once in the park, the narrow road climbed steeply, winding eight kilometres through gums, turning into rain forest, all of which has suffered as the pine plantations below. Once the top of the range was reached, the road widened out and we sped along the remaining ten kilometres, on through the forest, back again to woodland, until we reached the Stoney Creek which appears to run north before plunging down the most spectacular sheer sides of a gorge that is as equally awesome as those seen in the Blue Mountains, if not more so. We stood for some time at the various viewing points before driving around to the picnic and camping spot on the creek where it runs innocently through bush and rocks, home to platypus and turtles, the former too timid to greet us.

We lunched under lovely gums, but remarked about the paucity of birdlife we have come to expect. This is of course because the trees have been stripped of so much foliage and are no longer attractive to the usual birds.

Ingram's cemetery

With the sun still high in the sky and the temperatures soaring, we descended from the Park, back to Ingham and east to yet another cemetery. When examining the maps for the day’s trip, I had noted that the cemetery that was considered to be a tourist attraction was not the old one we had called on yesterday, but the new one situated in the middle of the cane fields on the outskirts of the town. Even as we got out of the cruiser, we could see this was so much more than yesterday’s offering. The opulence and decadence of these structures, hundreds of them, was mind boggling. So many of the deceased had been born in Sicily and other parts of Italy, probably leaving their homelands after years in relative poverty. Their surviving relatives made sure that they left with an exhibit of richness, as obscene as it is.

We returned back to camp, early enough to catch up with Larissa, Kit and my parents on Skype. Tonight Chris will watch the victory ride in to Paris and then our lives will return to their normal routine, well, at least until the Rugby World Cup which starts next month.