We disembarked in Cairns and headed towards the Atherton Tablelands. It was so much cooler than way up north or even out on the water. John said it seemed weird to be driving so fast after all the slow rough tracks we’ve been on lately.

This area is well-known for its mountain bike riding trails, so the boys found one in Davies Creek National Park on the way to a lovely bush camping site with no one in coo-ee of us.

Upper Davies Creek National Park

We stopped in Mareeba where they are growing coffee these days. We even found time for stopping to actually drink a coffee. I liked that. Mareeba also has an amazing Heritage Museum at the Visitor Information Centre. We couldn’t believe the sheer volume of things to see there. They had extensive displays on the pioneering days, mining of gold, the now defunct tobacco industry and its history, pastoralist history, beef industry and a huge number of historical displays of times gone by. It was exhausting. We only stopped in there to get a map, but left an hour later.

Then in Atherton, we found the trail head for another extensive network of mountain bike trails. There’s a Pump Track (that’s a small set of tracks with numerous mounds and raised tracks for zooming over). It was here that Harry fell off a raised track and ate dirt. How he didn’t lose his front teeth, or break his nose is a mystery. He ahs ended up with just a few grazes and a bit less chin than he used to own.

We also visited Herberton. It’s touted as a town where every building is heritage listed. What it actually is, is a private museum of an enormous collection of historical buildings and an endless collection of stuff from farming tools, children’s toys, clothing, blacksmith’s tools, printing presses, ancients cameras – the list goes on and on and on. The one place that did catch my eye was the old pharmacy.

The old days in Pharmacy

It was an amazing collection “stuff” that one couple had spent 50 years putting together. But we were completely over the whole history thing by now. Ferg and John went for a good hard MTB ride for a couple of hours and Harry (injured after the crash earlier today) pushed the trolley in the supermarket. It was odd, because my supermarket buddy is always Ferg, while Harry usually does fuel, gets ice and cleans the car windows with John. But I’ll take anyone who’ll help me when it’s shopping time.

What a fantastic time we had on our impromptu cruise. We loved coming past Cape Tribulation.

Cape Tribulation

But it was disappointing to see those wretched clouds hanging around. There was a mist in the air, which at least made for an unusual rainbow across the water.

Rainbow near Port Douglas

We travelled with some lovely people from various places – Port Fairy, Bendigo, Mackay, Rockhampton, Sydney and even Cairns. It was time for final photos on deck for everyone.

Cruising.

As we approached Cairns the crew donned the high visibility gear and took their places on deck. We dropped the speed as we got closer and I took the next photo from the stern of the ship showing the shipping channel we were travelling through in our approach to Cairns.

Cairns shipping channel

I never realised Cairns had such a big port, but there are at least five wharves for ships to dock. It’s a different view from the B deck as we arrive in town.

Arriving in Cairns

It does look cloudy, but the sun was out from time to time for a shot of my two biggest boys.

And here’s one of our ship and some local boats in tropical Cairns as we were ready to disembark. What a great few days!

Boats, big and small.

We have read about the ship that sails from Cairns to Seisia carrying freight to the isolated places up here. It also takes passengers and their cars. In a random moment of thinking through the second part of our trip, which requires us to backtrack down the road from whence we came, we decided to hitch a ride on the ship back to Cairns.

Due to a cancellation there was a four bunk room available, the ship was leaving Seisia on Friday which is the day we would start the drive back anyway, and we got standby fares. And that’s how we found ourselves heading south on MV Trinity Bay. This is going to be fun!

Seaswift operate a fleet of cargo vessels that around Cape York Peninsula and the Torres Strait. So we are on the Trinity Bay, 81m long and built in 1996. It travels between Cairns and Seisia carrying freight, stopping at Horn Island and Thursday Island. It is the only working cargo vessel in Australia that also carries passengers, with a total of 48 berths for crew and passengers. The total trip is about 1000km and we travel inside the Great Barrier Reef.

We boarded the ship about 10am on Friday while the Cruiser and the trailer stayed ashore – for now.

About to board MV Trinity Beach

Then we watched in fascination from the A Deck as they unloaded the ship of its containers, tanks of diesel fuel for the town’s power and cars. It can carry 120 containers! Then they loaded it up with mostly empty containers and three cars and our trailer. I never thought I would find this interesting, but we couldn’t tear ourselves away! The whole process took about 7 hours, and we were glued to it for about four of those. I think I’d like to be a crane operator in my next life. Here’s a gallery of the process.

It was pretty scary watching our car being lifted up and swinging in the breeze as they lowered it into place and locked it down on deck. We’re not allowed access to it while we are at sea.

The trip will take two nights and we should arrive in Cairns on Sunday afternoon. The crew gets to eat first and so far the food is great. I’m told they call this a three kilo trip. The chef is a sure fire candidate for Biggest Loser. And there’s a huge box of Arnott’s Family Assorted biscuits that’s never empty. I might need to increase my walking when I get home. It’s not the Queen Mary, but the rooms are clean and the views are great.

We left Seisia about 6.30pm once the tide came up, and rounded the Cape just on dark.

Last light of the day shines on Seisia Jetty as we leave.

Goodbye to Seisia. It’s been the end of the road for our northern bound days. We passed through some of the islands of Torres Strait in the fading light. Beautiful.

Torres Strait

Our cabin is known as the Bat Cave because we have no windows, but it doesn’t matter – we all slept like logs. In the morning, after a full hot breakfast (there’s another 10km to walk), we had a visit to the bridge with the Captain. Harry took centre stage by asking him a question he didn’t know the answer to.

Ferg at the wheel

We stopped at Lockhart River to drop off one container and one small box. It’s too shallow for the Trinity Bay to get in there so a barge comes out and pulls up alongside us while they transfer the stuff. There’s just 30cm of water between us and the sea bed.

Transferring cargo with the barge alongside at Lockhart River

It’s an odd arrangement, this sharing of space with the crew. I’m not sure if they feel like they’re invading our little adventure, because we could easily feel like we’re invading their workspace! They come from far and wide. There’s a female crew member from Melbourne. A guy from the Philippines. Some live in Cairns. They work four weeks on and then four off. The girl flies back to Melbourne each break. I guess it’s a FIFO kind of life. Odd Spot: the first Mate is 6 foot 4, but the ceilings are about 6 foot 2. The poor guys walks around with his head bent over.

We’ve spent our full day on board just hanging out. Reading books. Harry watched Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade today. I think that’s the 50^th time he’s seen it. I will always remember him dressed up as Indiana for Book and Movie Day in Grade One. I love the photo I have from that day. We’ve played cards, Trivial Pursuit and soaked up the warm breeze on deck. It seems so odd to have such a warm climate when you head out there. Quite unlike the Spirit of Tasmania climate!

Our B Deck sailing along the Great Barrier Reef

As we head south we stay inside the reef, but in some places we are quite close. The swell starts to rock us a little, and you can actually see the waves breaking at the edge of the reef. We’ve been past Cape Tribulation this morning and also Snapper Island – the one the boys weren’t able to paddle out to due to bad weather. We’re due to dock in Cairns about midday. More in the next post!

PS – I know you’re wondering what the question was that the Captain couldn’t answer. Harry wanted to know why the two rotating things on the top of the antennas of the ship rotate at different speeds.

Riding hazards, Cape style.

The red dirt gets into everything here. Above is a pic of John after a morning ride. Getting overtaken by a car on these dusty roads has a whole new meaning. He even had red spots on his hair where the dust came through the ventilation holes. I have great doubts that our clothes will ever by clean again.

And as for the cars! I’ve seen two clean ones in the last few days. They belonged to a couple of blokes who got bored with the fishing.

Things are pretty easy going way up here at The Tip. It’s a busy life, what with all those fish to catch. The ocean here is the most tantalising pretty blue colour. But of course, no swimming. Our camp site in Seisia is right on the beach next to the jetty. The internet connection is frustrating to say the least. Last night it took hours (literally) to upload about 8 photos. Then when you’re in some extreme location that took many kilometres of rough 4WD tracks to reach, your phone goes off with messages and even phone calls get through.

I like the way they just park their helicopters on the beach next to the camping ground.

Free parking

We saw this boat at Seisia, with their makeshift wind screen repair job – 1001 uses for Glad Wrap.

At Seisia jetty

We are constantly warned about the crocs. It might be the staff at camp ground reception, fellow travellers or the millions of signs they have installed near every body of water on the peninsular. But somehow the locals seem to know otherwise. Below is a group of kids who spent hours in the water with a dog (read: excellent croc bait), or otherwise with one of the many wild horses that roam around the region…..

Croc safety, local style.

And I’m so relaxed I don’t even care about the small bug that just crawled into my laptop while I’m typing this. Just next to the H key. He might pop back out somewhere near W later. But maybe not.