Winter holidays

An hour and a half on the road from Townsville we drove through Paluma. The kids were amazed that we were actually driving through a cloud.



The turn off to the Lake had a cassowary warning sign. Our eldest son being petrified of birds was not at all impressed. Thankfully we didn't see one up close..



Wasn't long before the tent was up and we were ready for camp fire action.



I threw a few spuds in the coals and we had baked potates for dinner. It was totally gourmet with garlic butter, bacon, cheese, sour cream & shallots. Is now the time to mention that we forgot to pack the bbq utensils and only had plastic knives and forks & a wooden spoon to cook with. Yep, it was intresting.



The camp kitchen. We learned quickly that all food stuff must either be put in the fire or the car overnight because we were kept awake the first night by a persistant native, wait for it... giant white tailed rat!



Looking at this sign I'm glad it was only the rat and not say a snake!



Next day we drove back in to Paluma and took a stroll to Witt's lookout, a 3 km round trip through the rain forest.



It was such a beautiful walk. The smell, the shade, the colours...



The art of nature... a strangler fig having it's way with it's host. love it.



And we made it.



I think the river down there is Crystal Creek and in the distance is the ocean & some islands, i seriously can not see that far.



Fox had the gps in hand and there was a cache near by.



Many adventures to be had with geocaching & treasures to be found (& swapped).

There is a lot of wildlife around this area and each morning we woke up to the beautiful sounds of literally hundreds of birds making their morning calls. It was like a bird symphony at the crack of dawn with the most amazing sounds, you know like the ones on the meditation cd's.



Some birds didn't mind being seen and Dman enjoyed watching the "turkey lurkey show" where the brush turkey's would come down from the forest and try and grab any bits of food that might have been dropped. I guess they're the seagulls of the rainforest.



And after a relaxing few nights with nature it was home time before we knew it. We all really enjoyed staying at the Paluma Dam and can not wait for our next trip out there.