Kurrimine Beach to Cardwell

The plane from TI touched down in Cairns at around 4pm, we picked up our car from the long term car park (not at all like Sydney either price or size-wise) and made our way through the peak hour traffic south towards Kurrimine Beach.

Cairns has certainly changed over the years. When we first went there with our young family it was a very insular place and the locals really had no time for visitors. This, of course, was well before the airport received International status and the tourists, both national and international started flocking to the place.

The population has now grown to around 170.000, and most of them seem to be on the road at peak hour. The traffic remained fairly heavy until we reached Gordonvale, just south of the city, where most of the stragglers turned off. From there, for all the next 100k's to Kurrimine Beach where we had stored the van with Wayne and Joy Smith (our neighbours in Darwin in 2003 who have become good friends), we had clear air in front of us. It was a sheer delight with cruise control on 100k's driving through a magnificent NQ tropical evening.

When we arrived at their place Wayne & Joy had dinner ready for us. We had told them not to wait as we would pick up something along the way but they would not hear of it. As usual they were delightful hosts to us camped in their back yard. We did have to share our space, however, with, amongst other birds, a family of curlews.

Though she would probably not agree, Joy is an animal whisperer. When she and Wayne lived in Darwin, she had a job with the Council working with animals. On more than one occasion she was called out to pacify dogs that had become so violent their only future appeared to be a shot of lead in the head. Often she would save them from that fate.

Joy treats the curlews as an extension of her own family, She also has a drongo that visits her a couple of times a day looking for a free feed. She will feed him but he has to work for it. She makes up little mince balls that she throws in the air when he arrives. He has to catch them in mid flight. It hones his reflexes for catching insects on the fly. We watched this happening a few times. If he misses the little morsel, she doesn't go crook at him, she just encourages him to try better next time.

Now I know you are thinking I am having you on talking about a drongo and a bird in the same sentence but I am fair dinkum. Look it up in http://birdlife.org.au/bird-profile/spangled-drongo.

Wayne's story is just as interesting. He developed polio as a young boy. One day, he was with his father when his foot suddenly started to twist inward - the first sign of the disease. His father grabbed his young son's leg and violently twisted it back straight. Wayne's recollection of the event was that the pain inflicted on him by his father's action was excruciating. However, it saved him from a life as a cripple. He now has only a slight limp.

Wayne's parents owned a farm in the Tully region but, when he developed polio, they sold it to generate the funds for his treatment – iron lung, etc. What's that about “Greater love that this....”

I mentioned in a previous blog that Wayne and Joy arrived home from the Atherton Tableland just after we had arrived and set up our caravan. We had found the curlews a little touchy when we were setting up but found out why when Joy and Wayne arrived. The birds had two little chicks that they wanted to show off to them, as long as they didn't get too close.

Mum and Dad proudly showing off their new family - but from a safe distance.  Photo by Rob

I presume the new mum and dad were still haunted by an experience they had last year. They had produced a couple of chicks then also and, at one stage, took them for an adventure. They were all crossing the road when a car flashed by killing one of the chicks. Joy said the parents stood over it for hours crying uncontrollably. Who said animals (including birds) don't have a soul.

Wayne has, over the years, taught himself all about 12 volt electrics and he is considered a bit of an expert. We mentioned to him that we intended staying “off road” on our way home; i.e., staying in roadside rest areas where there is no water or power. We carry two tanks of fresh water and have a couple of solar panels to keep our 12 volt power topped up so we would be pretty comfortable.

Our refrigerator is three way; i.e., when we are connected to 240 volt power it works off that just like a home fridge. Then, when we are travelling, both the car and the solar panels charge the van's battery which keeps the fridge operating. Lastly, if we stay overnight somewhere without 240 volt power, we switch over to LPG gas which keeps the fridge cold, more so than 240 volts. We cannot use 12 volt overnight as we do not have sufficient battery power.

Anyway, when he went to test the fridge's 12v system he noticed three pipes on the floor of the enclosed fridge compartment that definitely should not have been there. On investigation he found that when we had the van re-skinned just before we left home, the repairer had not replaced the gas flue. Had we turned on the gas for an overnight stay, any one or more of three things could have resulted.

1. Everything could have been OK
2. The gas flame could have escaped the fire box and the van could have burned to the ground with us in it.
3. The fumes from the burning gas could have escaped into the van where we were sleeping thus asphyxiating us.

With two adverse possibilities out of three, we decided not to chance it. We were definitely not impressed particularly as we got caught out a few nights ago and had to turn the fridge off overnight and throw out a freezer full of meat in the morning. We will be having a serious discussion with the repairer when we get home.

One day, the four of us went on a shopping expedition to Innisfail. Wayne and Joy needed to re-provision after their trip to the tablelands. We were pretty right but I did want to go to Harvey Norman to get some descaler for our coffee machine that was beginning to display the need of attention.

I should have known better when I saw Joy having a number of private, earnest conversations with Rob. It seems she is not just an animal whisperer....

The girls had intended doing their own thing while while Wayne and I visited HN's but suddenly Rob decided they should come with us. Fine, except that instead of leaving the store with a $25 bottle of descaler, I had a stone something frying pan that is being advertised mercilessly on TV at the present time, a robot vacuum cleaner and the descaler liquid - some $700 in total. Both Joy and the woman who served us both had a robot and a frying pan so I never stood a chance.

Obviously, over time, the robot becomes a part of the family. The saleslady told Rob that she will need to be firm with it. Apparently, when it feels like a top up of battery charge, it will make its way back to its base station. She said that sometimes it becomes a little lazy and goes back prematurely. She has therefore taken to hiding it and only bringing it out when she feels the machine has done a reasonable amount of sucking and crawling.

I'll never learn and Rob is still picking up little nick knacks along the way that Joy has convinced her she cannot live without.

We did have a wonderful few days with them and after three days moved on to return to Cardwell as the first stop on our way home. Ray and Marg had offered to allow us to set up camp again in their yard.

I mentioned in an earlier note how they had stepped up to the mark when leadership was required to start returning their town to normality after cyclone Yasi. Although they are relative newcomers to Cardwell, Ray put his hand up to become president of the golf club when no-one else would take it on. It was generally considered to all but Ray and Marg that it was a lost cause, such was the devastation.

Step by careful step he led his team bringing the golf and attached bowling clubs back to their former glory. He applied for a number of government grants being offered for cyclone restoration purposes and was successful in obtaining them. He and Marg spent most of their Friday nights with a small band of supporters cooking meals at the little clubhouse called the Caldwell Country Club. The result was that as well as fixing the sporting clubs they were able to make a number of improvements to the Country Club.

For his efforts, Ray has been awarded Life Membership of the club.

The reason I have brought all this up is, when we arrived we received an invite to join with Ray and Marg for dinner and a show at the Country Club. Before we left for the club, the four of us shared a roadie bottle of wine. No problems as we were being picked up by the Courtesy Bus.

At the club, I bought another bottle of wine to have with dinner. Unfortunately it was consumed before we got to the dining room so, when we did adjourn for the meal, Ray excused himself and shortly reappeared with yet another bottle which we consumed as we ate.

After dinner, we adjourned to the bar come entertainment come club room which is really a credit to Ray and Marg. It would do credit to many clubs many times larger than it.

Sax and the Single Girl

 The entertainment was a lady playing the saxophone interspersed with a few songs. I'm sure that it wasn't the third bottle of wine, or even the fourth bottle that Ray magically produced, that made her sound great. She called her show, “Sax and the Single Girl”. The range of her repertoire was broad - golden oldies, country and the occasional bit of classic. I found it easy to sing along with her as well as Marg and Rob who both belong to choirs.

At one point, while I was busy talking with our group, someone grabbed me by the arm, pulled me up and asked me to dance with her. She really was a young beauty and as we glided around the dance floor my feet seemed barely to touch the floor. It was good to know that I still hadn't lost IT.

When we finally left to go home on the last courtesy bus run, Sax and the Single Girl was starting her third hour straight of playing and singing. Nothing like the big city types who play for twenty minutes before taking a twenty minute break.

The next morning Marg greeted me with, “And how's Mister Life of the Party?” Don't really know what she meant!

As the night was not totally clear in my mind, I asked Rob if the young girl who had chosen me to dance with her was as young and beautiful as I had remembered. Unkindly she told me that the blossom of youthful beauty of my partner had faded somewhat, she was a generously proportioned lady bowler who had just come in after a roll-up, and that the reason my feet hardly seemed to touch the floor was she had to hold me up to keep me from stepping on her toes.

I would have preferred my memories and, oh, by the way, I didn't have a hangover though I thought it wise not to leave on the continuation of our journey towards home until after midday by which time all remnants of alcohol would have gone from my breath.

It certainly was a night to remember, even if the memory is somewhat confused.

ps. I have taken to having this recurring dream about floating around gripped by a soft and warm, though unusually animated, feather down pillow. I wake up from my dream gasping for air.

pps. When I mentioned to Rob that I obviously still had IT she looked at me rather strangely and said, “Oh Darl”, she calls me that when she is trying to explain something basic to me me, “Oh Darl,” she said, “what you should say is you say you are in IT, you are the IT Software Officer in Marine Rescue, Port Stephens, not you've got IT.”  

My God she gets confused, there is a whole world of difference between having IT and being in IT.