On Sunday, Doug and I went up to the
Atherton Tableland as part of a big group to walk to the top of Mount
Emerald. We have actually walked up this little peak before when we
were staying at Lake Tinaroo. It's a pleasant easy walk of perhaps 3
hours return with a nice view of the Atherton Tableland at the end.
Given that driving up and back from the track head takes about three
hours, this trip doesn't really fit very well with my walk:drive
ratio rule where you should be walking at least 1.5 times the amount
of time you spent driving. But, it is always good to be sociable,
particularly when you are as generally anti-social as I am.
Atherton Tableland view from Mount Emerald
Wednesday was forecast to be hot and
calm, a perfect day for a paddle. After musing over the map/chart
for a while and looking for some where new to paddle, we ended up
launching at Palm Cove on the north side of Cairns, paddling out to
Double Island and Scouts Hat, and wandering up the coast as far as
Simpson Point before paddling back. I think we probably paddled
somewhere between 28 and 30 kilometres, which made me feel better
given I was getting a bit sore in the shoulders by the end – not
much paddling lately but a lot of pull-ups. Double Island is only
about a kilometre off-shore but has a lot of bird-life and a lot of
turtles. I think we saw about 20 green turtles paddling around the
two islands. I hope to convince my mother to come out in the kayak
with me when she is visiting next week as it really is quite amazing
to paddle with all these turtles. There's some nice coral off the
islands too.
Glacier Rock from Smith's track
Today I went off for a walk in the
woods, as I like to do, even though the temperature was again
forecast to hit 32 Celsius. I rode my borrowed bicycle up to Stoney
Creek track-head and then walked a kilometre back down the road to
Smith's track-head. The trail climbs steadily for the first 3 km up
a burnt spur ridge to about 500 metres ASL where you meet a trail
junction at Toby's Lookout. There are actually better views from the
track on the way up than at the lookout which is rapidly growing in.
I stayed on Smith's track as it descends to cross Stoney Creek then
climbs back up again.
Diamond python on the track
At the next track junction I took the
Gandal Wandun track north to the Douglas track. A big diamond python
was lying right across the track and did not move despite me lobbing
sticks at it. I eventually gave up getting the snake to move on and
bashed around it in the bush. Following the Douglas track back to
Stoney Creek I detoured to Glacier Rock, at a sausage (good paleo
snack), drank, admired the view, and then descended down to the track
head and my waiting bike. I was liberally drenched in sweat by this
time so I lay down in Stoney Creek to cool off before riding home and
collecting a supply of mangos. Just another few days around Cairns.
View from Glacier Rock
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