Mission Beach

We left Kurramine campsite in a bit of a hurry due to a heavy downpour. Rach was still in her pyjamas and had to get changed in the back of the van at a nearby petrol station. Australia had experienced a seven year drought but the rain was certainly making an appearance since we had arrived in Oz.

Our first stop was to a town called Tully to hit the shops. Ironically enough, considering the current weather situation, Tully is famous for being the wettest place in Australia. To mark this 'achievement' Tully has one Australian iconic 'big things' - a 7.9m boot that signifies the amount of rainfall that fell in 1950!

We had a successful shopping trip that saw us leaving with mosquito nets for our van windows (that the man gave us for cheap as it was a cut-off) and a huge fan (reduced as well)!

On our way to Mission Beach we saw lots of signs for cassowaries - Australia's flightless and endangered bird. They look a bit like an ostrich but have bright blue and purple facial features. The Lonely Planet guide says that they look like something out of Jurassic Park but we quite like them.

The Mission Beach area is made up of Mission Beach, Wongaling Beach, Bingil Bay and South Mission Beach. Sat Nav had quite a few problems finding the campsite and kept trying to send us down roads that weren't roads anymore.
Eventually we found the campsite that backed onto Wongaling Beach and had views of Dunk Island which wasn't too far away.

Our first job was to sort the van that had become quite messy after us having to throw all our stuff from the driver's cabin to the back that morning. On removing our washing from the machine, we were surprised to see a tiny lizard on one of the shirts. How it survived a thirty minute spin in the washing machine we will never know!

As we hadn't eaten since breakfast we decided to head to the onsite café for some food. The burgers seemed really cheap but we found out that it got served on its own without chips etc so we decided to share a large bowl of chips too. When our food arrived, we realised the reason why it was served on its own. The burger was filled with cheese, pineapple, lettuce, bacon, egg, tomato and BEETROOT! It was so tasty but so filling. The waitress even commented that the manager and her had both said there's no way either of us would have been able to finish it.

The manager let us go on the internet quickly and gave us information on Dunk Island including how to get there. Every time we saw him he had a beer in his hand - what a life!

After this, Rich got to work on creating our fly screens with the mosquito nets we had got from Tully. We sat out at night thanks to our new lamp/torch and a candle that is meant to keep the mosquitos away that we had picked up from a dollar shop in Tully. It was really nice just being able to sit out and enjoy the night before we headed to bed. We really like this campsite so decided we would stay a few more days and get some form of boat to Dunk Island.