Cairns to Bowen

On October 19th we left Cairns for a 2 hour drive south, through loads of sugar cane and banana plantations, to Innisfail. Here we stayed at Flying Fish Point, but the weather was extremely windy and the recent high rainfall washing down the Johnstone River meant the sea along the coast was very brown and murky. Our next stop was beautiful Mission Beach where we stayed right on the beach at South Mission, looking across to Dunk Island. Mission Beach was named after the Aboriginal mission that was established here in 1914. When white man settled in Mission Beach they forced the Aboriginal people out of their traditional hunting grounds and soon had them working as farm labourers. The white men paid the Aborigines in rum and the Chinese banana plantation owners paid them in Opium. So before long the Queensland Government identified major social problems within the indigenous communities (not surprisingly) and forced them all into a mission (penal camp) where they were fed on sugar, tea and canned corned beef. Four years later a cyclone destroyed the mission and the Aboriginal people were relocated to Palm Island. It poured with rain for the next 2 days in South Mission but that didn't stop me going white water rafting on the Tully River. It was an unreal day with plenty of rapids and excitement........but not for Simon! He stayed in the van most of the day with the girls watching movies. Dunk Island disappeared behind a huge cloud.........it was so wet. Our next stop south was Townsville where we celebrated Simon's birthday and enjoyed walking along the foreshore and looking at the view to Magnetic Island. On Sunday 24th of October (Happy Birthday Pa) we left Townsville in the morning and just called into Bowen for a lunch stop.....and ended up staying 3 nights. We loved the beautiful turquiose waters, lovely long Queen Beach, the playgrounds along the main bay and the huge swimming pool at our caravan park. One day we walked out along the main jetty (used in the film "Australia") and saw dugongs feeding on the sea grass, a massive sea turtle, a baby black tip shark, a pod of dolphins and a guy on the end caught a Golden Trevally. What a great place!