Thank You!

First posted on May 15, 2013

Thank You is never enough but I say it all the same to …
– The Boston Bride and Groom and their Australian family who invited me to join their celebrations, looking after me so generously during their precious time together in Atherton.
– My darling friend Joseph for putting himself out to catch up with me during the brief window of opportunity of my in-transit stop in Brisbane.
– My dear friends for their concern and commiserations at my disappointment and changed plans that knocked Brisbane off the itinerary.

God bless you, one and all … with special blessings to the Boston babies and their little Australian cousins.

This’n’That

First posted on May 15, 2013

I love the old Queenslanders – but some are in better nick than others!

Gorgeous old Queenslander

Ripe for renovation

Compare that to the many gated communities…. like an homogeneous prison with day release, i.e. the checking in and out. There are quite a few of these about, both as holiday “resorts” and permanent residences. Definitely not for me!

Gated community

Old Australians – aka Grey Nomads. I haven’t actually come across them at close quarters before, apart from getting stuck behind them on the road. At the Atherton Information Centre I was shocked to hear one ask if there were any free sites with showers nearby. When he left I asked if this was a common request. “Oh yes.” And are there such facilities? “Oh yes. Maybe a gold coin donation for the shower.” Who provides them? “The local council.” Well, if I lived in a tourist area I’d be asking my local council to be charging realistic fees for maintenance of such sites. I didn’t know you could travel that cheaply – at the expense of local rate payers! Eye opening!!

Then there was the one who nearly ran me down – twice!!
I dare say you can’t judge all grey nomads by these two. She hopes!!

Tourist Information Centres – If you’re into planning a trip and you’ve got time enough … I found asking the local accredited Tourist Information Centre was the best way to get info about where I’d be visiting. I say “accredited” because there are so many “tourist information centres” in Cairns but all but one are booking agencies giving information limited to what they sell.

I had to look twice at this – an above ground possum crossing. It runs from the Flecker Garden to the Botanic Gardens in Cairns.

Possums cross here!

And I rather liked this water tank set-up at the Red Cross Blood Donor Centre in Cairns. Definitely practical and it looked rather good too, in keeping with the local architecture.

Eating and Sleeping in FNQ

First posted on May 15, 2013

Sleeping – In Atherton I stayed at the Atherton Hinterland Motel. This was a great spot to stay and I’m not just saying that because it is run by Piers’s sister and brother-in-law. It was clean, dry, comfortable, plenty of hot water and good water pressure. The location is perfect – at the edge of the centre of town so you can walk to all the central amenities (if you wanted to!). Atherton itself is central to a great district for seeing tropical Australia.
In Cairns I stayed at Hides Hotel, right in the centre of town. There’s the old hotel with newer (a relative term!) rooms as well. I stayed in one of the newer room so I could have my own bathroom. My particular room suffered from the constant hum of air-conditioning units a few feet from the window. The room also had a number of oddities – you really wonder about how things are designed … and who does the designing!! Rarely is a large bathroom a problem – except when the towel rail is placed as far from where you step from the shower as possible. You have to leave your towel on the floor by the shower or traipse, naked and dripping, across the bathroom to grab your towel from the rail. You could hang your towel on the shower taps I suppose – they were “outside” the shower! Novel!! The bed lights – you needed six foot long arms to turn them off. No fun being 98% asleep and having to lurch out of bed to turn off the reading light. And it was not refreshing to have the air-con blow straight on you from a metre away when you’re in bed. Other than that …. the balcony was great and the included breakfast had what I have at home – sultana bran!

Eating – I was most grateful to be invited to eat with Piers’s family each evening for the duration of my stay in Atherton. One of the things I long for when I’m away is a home-cooked meal. No shortage of them this time. I brunched at various cafes, depending where my travels took me each day.

In Cairns I ate twice at Perrotta’s at the Gallery. A bit more than I’d normally spend but it was well worth it for both the food and the service. The night in between I had a delicious salmon risotto at a place on the Esplanade but service was lacking. The waitress I started with was good but there was a shift change (or so it seemed) and I became invisible.

Fish'n'chips at Perrotta's

... followed by panna cotta. Yum!

At both of these places I ate outdoors. It was so pleasant. I thought, we should have outdoor eating like this in Melbourne. Then I remembered …. we do, but the smokers are there. In Cairns there was no smoking in food service areas. Three cheers for them!!! When will Melbourne become so civilised?!

The Great Queensland Train Ride

First posted on May 14, 2013

It was raining a bit, still!, for my last breakfast on the balcony. But it was dry for my 8 minute walk to the train station.

This is the 60th year of the Sunlander. Next year it goes out of service, so I was lucky to do this trip now. When you’re on a train, there are times when slower is better, and this journey is one of them.

The train left Cairns on time, 9.15 on Saturday morning.

Trusty iron horse - for the Cairns to Townsville leg

I’d decided that for 32 hours I could do without a sleeper, particularly as the price for one was astronomical. I had an empty seat beside me. Would it last? Sadly no. A young girl got on at Mackay at about 10pm and went through to the second last stop. She was an attractive young thing with a good figure – and stank to high heaven of cigarettes. Why do they do it?! I didn’t have much choice but to bear it as I tried to sleep. But once dawn broke I spent the rest of the trip in the Club Car. That’s the better place to travel anyway – better windows for scenery watching. I’d already spent quite a bit of time there on the Saturday.

Sunset

Sunrise

The scenery – lovely without being spectacular. Lots of sugar cane, bananas and, to a lesser extent, cattle. I made sure to book a seat to get the best sea views. There was one of those! Ha ha!! There were many hints of the sea but always just beyond view.

The one sea view of the journey - near Cardwell

Low clouds and sugar cane

Bags of bananas!

Cattle country

The food – lunch on both days was good, a roast beef and gravy roll on Saturday and a chicken burger on Sunday, both freshly made. Dinner on Saturday night was less exciting – the barramundi was definitely of inferior quality. There were plenty of options, that was what I chose. No dessert though!

The shower – for 32 hours amongst strangers …. I didn’t bother!! Most didn’t but a few did, much to my surprise.
The stops – there were quite a few, the longest at Townsville where the engine was changed for some reason. The other at Rockhampton in the middle of the night. I got off the train twice – at Townsville and one of the first five minute stops.

My train curves into Townsville

At Townsville there was enough time to move away from the smokers. At the shorts stops, as one experience was enough to teach me, the smokers simply ignored the “no smoking on the platform” rule (announced prior to every stop) and there was no escaping the foul air so I stayed on board.

I chatted occasionally with another woman travelling alone. She pointed out a power point for re-charging my phone, which was handy. You notice the lack of them in older trains! Other than that it was an extremely pleasant, uneventful trip. The train got into Roma Street, Brisbane’s country rail terminal, only 15 minutes late, not bad considering the need to go slow in some spots where cyclone damage is still in the throes of being repaired.

It was an easy connection to the airport train where I was joined by my friend Joseph for a catch-up over coffee before my flight on to Melbourne. I should catch up with Joseph more often …. for a bit of star spotting! Last time, it was Wayne Swan at the next table at a Chinese restaurant in The Valley in Brisbane. On this occasion it was Colin Friels at a café at Brisbane airport. There is a link between Joseph and Colin Friels: CF starred in a mini-series (The Farm) which was partly shot on Joseph’s family farm outside Yass. We let CF be though and didn’t remind him of the acquaintance :-)
The flight to Melbourne was very quick – two instead of two-and-a-half hours. I wasn’t complaining about getting home that little bit earlier on a late night!

Giving the legs a workout in Cairns

First posted on May 11, 2013

Oh boy! Am I looking forward to sitting down for 32 hours when I get on the train to Brisbaneat 9.15 in the morning!!! Over the last couple of days my legs did more work than they’ve been used to for quite a while.

Memories of Spain

Cairns Botanic Gardens

Sculpture on the Esplanade

Catalina Squadron Memorial

St Monica's Cathedral

Cairns Swimming Lagoon

Culture in Cairns

First posted on May 11, 2013

After a quick bite, not so much to nourish as to cool me down – ice cream of course! – I hit the culture trail. First there was the museum of modern art – nothing there to tempt me to linger! 

Next, to the Cairns Regional Gallery where I was especially interested to see that “After Afghanistan” had travelled north.

These are paintings commissioned by the Australian War Memorial which by definition gave the title “War Artist” to Ben Quilty. I’d seen an episode of Australian Story (ABC TV) about this series not all that long ago. With my son David having returned there (without even saying goodbye) it was all the more moving. It’s not a place you return from unscathed and you can see it in these paintings.

There were a couple of other exhibitions at the Cairns Regional Gallery too – one of weird sculptures, the other on a theme of feathers – one reminded me of a skateboard! They don’t have a collection of their own, everything is visiting. For a small city that strikes me as a good way to go.

Finally, Cairns Library. This appeared to be housed in re-badged former council chambers, a lovely looking older building.

There were lots of people there in a well laid out space, some big old rooms blending seamlessly with newer spaces created by (it looked like) knocking out some walls and glassing in some verandahs. A very pleasant place with a lovely piece of stained glass near the entrance, presenting aspects of Cairns and surrounds.

And … aaaaaah …. at last, crippled, I hobbled back to the hotel to rest, rest, rest my weary legs. The feet were holding up OK!!

A long walk in Cairns

First posted on May 11, 2013

My second day in Cairns was not on the Kuranda train, as originally planned. Instead, I got a bus to Edge Hill to go to a cafe recommended by Piers’s aunt. It was pretty good without being outstanding. Walking from there to the Gardens I spotted another that looked worth a try too.

The Gardens were, firstly, the Flecker Gardens. Relatively small. Very much in the laid out style that botanic gardens have. Different (for me) in that the plants were all tropical – and not in a hot house!! They didn’t seem to encourage picnicking on the lawns though.

Flecker Botanic Gardens

Next stop was The Tanks, a gallery/exhibition/performance space created out of three WWII fuel supply tanks – they were HUGE! I don’t know at what stage they were converted to this use but much more could be done with it. Really, really interesting to see.

The Tanks

After The Tanks I went to the Botanical Gardens proper via the Info Centre, an interesting building of glass, mirrors and artwork. I bought some blank greeting cards here for future user because they were cute and pretty.

Botanical Gardens Info Centre

The Botanical Gardens are unlike any other I’ve been to. This was almost entirely virgin rainforest with a boardwalk superimposed for people to walk amongst the trees, palms, over the creek and swampy areas. Nothing “pretty” here in the way of flowers, as at the Flecker. But no less interesting, beautiful, fascinating for that.

Walled creek

Boardwalk

Rainforest

Freshwater lake with turtles and ducks

Water bird

On leaving the gardens I continued walking back to the main road because the bus sign at the edge of the gardens indicated an hourly service. I stopped at the first stop, looked at the timetable, and thought I was in luck, several routes converging at this point so a pretty frequent service. A local joined me – and she wasn’t best pleased when the next bus sailed right by. She said it wasn’t supposed to – all buses on all routes were meant to stop there. Not wanting to wait forever and chance my luck, Shanks Pony trotted off, heading for the Esplanade and views of water (quite distant, the tide was out) on the way back into town.

At the edge of the city centre I stopped in at St Monica’s, the Catholic Cathedral. From the bus to the brunch cafe I’d spotted the sign (a bit tacky), something about stained glass.

St Monica's Cathedral

Yes – wonderful – a huge series of windows depicting creation, and a smaller number depicting war and peace. There were also some other artworks around the walls – more gallery-style than church style, although all of suitable religious content. Some were by a Dutch artist, died 1944. A victim of WWII?

Alpha

Omega

I don’t know what the artist calls the panels above, but they’re towards the beginning and towards the end of the series, both with a still small spot in the middle – that’s what reminds me of Alpha and Omega.

Back to the Esplanade, I walked as far as the swimming lagoon. This was fabulous. A man-made pool, huge, with artificial ‘beach’ along one of its many edges. No fencing around it so quite free to use. I asked a patrolling lifeguard as she passed, did people go there at night. She said no, and that security would buzz off anyone who was spotted there. Seems amazing that it wasn’t fenced. But definitely a facility like that is needed in Cairns – there’s nowhere to swim in the sea, right along the city foreshore there’s nowhere suitable for swimming. Those places are all further north or south.

Cairns swimming lagoon

If my first attempt at using Flickr works, there are more photos from the long walk here.