Driving to Mission Beach

Saturday July 2^nd

Today is election day and as I drove through the towns I saw several voting stations. In Australia it is against the law not to vote. I asked a gas station attendant what the fine was and he said he has no idea as he doesn't want to find out, so he always votes.

Today was a driving and poking about day. I am headed south to Airlie Beach for my Whitsundays cruise but I have three days to get there so I am taking my time. After driving through Edmonton I stopped in Gordonvale for a look around. I found a large flea market in their park and behind that was a huge old factory belching steam and found out it was a sugar cane processing plant.

Driving further I saw a sign for the Babinda Boulders, so I drove 7 km west to them. I took the Devil's Pool Walk. Here the Babinda River cuts through the forest and through the gorge exposing and eroding large granite boulders. It was a very pretty spot that is used by the locals as a swimming hole.

Next I stopped at Wooroonooran National Park at the base of Mount Bartle Frere to see Josephine's Falls. This too is a swimming hole, but there is a sign that warns that people have died here because of rapidly changing water levels as the area gets lots of rain which rushes down off the mountain.

There are heaps of sugar cane and banana plantations in this region. I have been seeing them for days. Today I stopped at a stand where you could buy 4 bananas for a dollar and papaya and pawpaw on the honour system. I drove down to the habour figuring I'd see a fishing community but stumbled on a processing and shipping port for the sugar cane.

I was tired by late afternoon when I arrived at mission beach so I found a small motel just off the beach. I wandered around the town and down to the beach. It is a huge, beautiful, wide beach with packed sand. There were signs warning about 'stingers' or jellyfish. I read the sign on the lifeguards stand about the 8 varieties that can be found here and the results of contact and treatment. Yikes! a couple are life threatening. It was windy and there were good sized waves crashing on the beach.

I wandered around looking at the local restaurants and found one that I thought would be good. It was crowded and I don't really like going to restaurants by myself but I felt like a beer and I saw a pasta marinara that appealed. So I waited for a table. I drank my beer and waited 30 minutes for it to be prepared but it was worth it. After that I went down to see the beach and found that the tide had come in and most of the beach was gone! So much for walking the beach. Back to the room where I watched North by Northwest.