Airlie Beach to Mission Beach

Wednesday 7^th September

We breakfasted on the boat, then packed and left at 8.30 when our bus came to collect us. I managed a slightly better picture of Southern Cross, which was one of the smaller boats on the marina. It can carry 14 passengers and the two crew, though we were only 9 passengers. The big black poles are not part of the boat, they are part of the marina and allow it to float up and down with the tides - and storm surges!

It was a fairly boring drive, and unfortunately it went on all day. We were not able to make good time because of the high number of road works, so the road was down to one lane, controlled by people with stop-go boards. This meant that we were then in a long procession of traffic, and after the road works, there is still only one lane in either direction, with occasional passing places. This meant that we had mostly to travel at the space of the slowest vehicle, passing whenever we came to a passing place; but with 40 or 50 vehicles this was difficult – especially with big groups of 40 or 50 vehicles coming in the other direction.

We stopped outside Townsville for lunch, but didn’t go through the town. We were not surprised at the stories of flooding though, it is very flat and there are lots of creeks and even large rivers coming down from the surrounding mountains. We stared carefully at all the rivers and creeks, hoping to see a crocodile, but without result. We have been warned that, now we are north of the Tropic of Capricorn, we must stay 5 meters away from water until we are told it is considered safe and crocodile free. Paul has spent the time since then muttering ‘You see. I was right!’ and hourly expecting to be attacked by a 5 meter one.

A short drive north from Townsville, we saw Hinchingbrook Island, which I visited with a friend 12 years ago. You can see some evidence of the cyclone in February in the number of bare sticks visible amongst the trees, though this doesn’t show in the photographs.

Cardwell was unrecognisable. Twelve years ago, it was very small, but now it is much bigger, with lots of holiday homes and an enormous marina. The marina and a lot of the boats were destroyed by the cyclone, and destroyed boats lay about, some quite close to the road. I couldn’t recognise anything of the Cardwell of 12 years ago, and quite few of the new properties were damaged or even roofless. I would have taken some pictures, but we were late for the sky diving which had been booked for 3 o’clock, and 6 of our party were anxious to get on into Mission Beach and do their sky dive, so we didn’t stop.

We didn’t actually make it to Mission Beach until after 3.30, but fortunately the sky divers were not too late and went to register and sign terrifying forms absolving the company of responsibility in case of accident or death. We went away to get into our rooms and unpack, then came back at 5.15 to see them land on the beach.

After something of a wait, we saw a tiny plane, very high up, and a number of little white dots behind it. After about a minute, the parachutes opened, and we were able to see our six fellow travellers descending. The descent seemed very quick to me, so it was difficult to take photographs that looked like anything at all.

They all landed on the beach within a few feet of us, but very quickly, and sometimes behind other spectators. As a beginner, you come down in tandem with an experienced sky diver, fixed to his front, so it wasn’t always possible to recognise people until they had actually landed. They were all very happy and enthusiastic and babbled about the experience all evening!

We ate in the restaurant attached in the place where we are staying, and Paul was able to eat kangaroo, which he said was delicious!