Had a crap night sleep last night with moderate to heavy rain starting at 2am and not ending till 9am! Boo also had a nightmare and needed to go to the toilet so Marty and my idea of an early night didn't quite happen.
Anyhow, packed everything up all wet and was on the road by 9am. Our destination was undecided and we were going to make camp wherever it happened. We headed over the Daintree river on the ferry and was on our way to check out Cape Tribulation. Our trip almost came to a holt when we were driving around a bend then suddenly saw reversing lights coming towards us from a Toyota camary. Marty braked hard and the tyres screeched on the dirt!!! After our heart beats returned to normal and the cursing stopped we headed over our first creek crossing which the girls found exciting, it wasn't deep but was cool at the same time. We hit dirt road and started some steep hill climbs when we decided we had been on the road way too long and had missed the cape trib turn off. So we turned around and made a 20min return trip, back over the creek crossing amd finally found the turn off, not really signed that well for a tourist destination. Anyhow, headed down and did the short walk to the beach, mangroves looked cool. Then we took the short forest walk to the lookout, had a quick pic then got back in the car to go do the Bloomfield track. It was pretty cool, but not hard, just a few steep hill climbs and windy dirt track. Arrived at Wugal Wugal, an aboriginal town and brought a frozen loaf of bread for lunch. Headed off to Bloomfield amd had lunch and the girls had a quick play on the playground. Got back in the car and drove thru Rossville amd them arrived at Helenvale to stop and look at the famous Lions Dem Hotel. Is totally awesome and had heaps of character with stubby holders up in shelves, animal skulls hanging from the ceiling, people's singlets and a few bra's signed hanging up. The coolest thing is the walls and Delong is graffitid with people's trips and signatures. We brought a beer and glass of wine and had just finished and was about to leave when we saw our old neighbours from Daintree village camp pull up. The girls screamed with excitement and we were all happy and surprised to run into each other this soon. Anyhow, we caught up and they were staying the night at the camping grounds behind the pub, so we decided that was a good idea and stayed for $20. It was pretty windy and it took a while for us to find sheltered sight that the tent wouldn't blow down. We headed up to the pub for tea after seeing that we had no meat in the fridge for tea. The pizza was just what we needed and was a cheap meal really at $20. The girls played out the front of the pub on the lion statue while we had a few drinks and a game of pool. Since we were staying the night we were allowed to sign the wall of the pub, and also had to make a gold coin donation to the RFDS. So if anyone comes here, go outside to the toilet area and you'll find on the left hand side eve of the roof just behind the gutter in front of door one our stamp on the Lions Den which says: "Three girls, a man and a caravan"- Martin, Belinda, Charlotte & Meg Beeson- 2011 Trip Around Oz 15/9/2011. Spoke with the pub owner Max who was really interesting telling us about the history of the place. The writing on yhe walls started by the miners writing how much money they had left and just progressedfrom there. After a bit of a chat we have decided to join our neighbors convoy to do the Cape, and everyone is very excited, especially the girls. Will be great to have some company and as they say 'safety in numbers'!
Bell Xx