Left Mareeba and headed north to Laura, stopping at a few lookouts along the way. We stayed at the Laura pub 16 years ago, and I couldn't really remember the town at all. The campground was pretty basic with lovely tree frogs living in the bathrooms. We met a lovely couple from south of Perth, who were having car issues, and had to have their car transported to Laura. Ended up listening to the grand finals on the radio, bad luck Swannies and good game Cronulla.
Had a look at the Split Rock art site just out of Laura, great images of echidna, turtles and dingoes.
Left Laura and headed onto the gravel or should I say dust corrugations. They seem to be doing road works in many sections, but I think it may be more for drainage than tarring. We spent a hot night under some Melaleucas down by a croc free river at Coen that Comet loved fishing in........ I never understand why one river is free of them and others not, however ,others had told us of their swims here, so we felt safe.
Next day it was all the way up, a huge drive to the ferry crossing of the Jardine river ( they don't miss you here with a return trip of $130)
On to Seisia our stop at the top, near the ferry to Thursday Island and in close proximity to the top.
Next day, all of us, Comet included, made our journey to the top, which means another of our missions ticked off. Great visuals up there as we scampered over the rocks to the sign to take our photos and have a look around. Beautiful waters, you just want to be able to plunge in. We drove around to Somerset beach, stunning spot again.
There is no escaping the heat, you just feel clammy all the time.
Next day it was an early start to get over to Thursday Island. The wharf at Seisia is always teeming with activity. The local kids swim here, even though we saw footage of the day before , them pulling in a 2 1/2 m shark on a hand line, it took about 5 of them to tie it up, so they could keep fishing.
We had a great time with another young family who had booked a privateer tour and asked if we wanted to join them. So glad we did, Dirk ,our guide was a local who imparted lots of information that was personalised, he was lovely. We did a lap of the island,then had a great lunch at the pub overlooking the pier before our trip home.
Back home to Comet and a bit of a cooler evening with a breeze.
Next it will be our journey south.