Tablelands

Waterfall’s and No Tree Kanga’s

Again being woken up by noisy children (there are also a lot of noisy but more acceptable parrots around this camp site) we packed up the van and headed off again.

The weather had improved so we drove down the road and headed to the lake where we had a little walk around taking a few pics before getting in the van.

As we had not done anything the last couple of days we headed for a tourist attraction which was the town of Herberton which was about 20km away, the only trouble was poor old Muriel had to struggle up some hills again.

We arrived at Herberton and found that it was a re-built historic mining village (that had been highly recommended in our guide) that wanted an extortionate entrance fee.  However as we had not spent much money in the past couple of days we decided to do it anyway.

The village was very quaint with all manner of old fashioned stores, chemist, butchers, grocery stores, bank, etc all from the period.   It also had other things to see like a garage of vintage cars, farming/mining machinery and a lot of information about the history of the place.

Although it was OK it was a bit touristy for our liking and very overpriced in our opinion (But a lot of attractions in Oz seem to be), but is something that my parents would most probably enjoy, especially my dad as it had a large radio shack with hundreds of old radio’s.

After spending an hour or so there we headed back down the hill and found a little rest area where we stopped and fixed ourselves some breakfast whilst overlooking a duck pond.

Breakfast done our next plan was to head through the Tablelands taking in the waterfall circuit and after an hour or so of driving through great countryside, bar the hilly terrain that Muriel does not like, we arrived at our first stop which was Malanda falls.

Parking up we headed to the information centre where a helpful lady gave us a map of two small 1km walks we could do around the forest (unbelievably there was no entrance fee).  She also said there was a chance we may see Tree Kangaroo’s, turtules and Platypus if we were lucky.

Heading for the first trail we walked around with our heads in the air trying to spot Tree Kanga’s but not knowing how high or low to look.  As per usual on this trail we did not spot anything, the only thing of note was some bird that made a call like techno music. At the end of the trail we came to Malanda Fall’s which although nice were not spectacular.

As we were here we decided to do the second walk and once again all I got was a crick in my neck and no Tree kanga sightings, although along the way there was a river with loads of little turtles knocking around.

Jumping back in the van we then drove on for a bit before heading onto the waterfall circuit proper.  The first set of falls was The Millaa Millaa falls which apparently were the most photographed fall’s, most probably for the ease of access (a short walk down to them) but also because they were pretty stunning as you can see below.  There were people swimming in the water below it, but it was still a bit overcast for us to take the plunge.

From there we headed further down the road until we reached Zillie Fall’s where this time there was a bit of a steeper walk down to the falls, which again were very pretty.

A bit further down the road we came to the car park for Ellinjaa falls where there was a bit more of a walk to actually get to the falls but it was worth it as once again they were very pretty.

We had one more set of falls to go to but we could not find the turn off for them so we decided to give Muriel a rest from the hills and as it was a bit later in the afternoon we would head to Etty Bay where we had seen a camp site where we could stay for the night.

It was about a 50Km drive and just as we approached Etty bay Shell spotted what she thought were Cassowarry’s in a nearby field, but on closer inspection we deduced that they were Emu’s, which was cool none the less (apart from Shell being in the way!!).

When we actually got to Etty Bay it was a very pretty little beach and we were quite excited about staying on the campsite that was practically on the beach, but unfortunately on enquiring the site was very small and did not have any room for us.

Quickly checking our camp site app we found another site about 10km away so we headed there and checked in.  The site itself was OK but nothing to write home about and a bit muddy from the recent rain.

The one feature we did like was that the camp kitchen had an oven in it which allowed us to cook some baked potato’s to go with our evening meal.  We then had a few drinks outside our van and then read for a bit before turning in.