Back-Tracking: BrisVegas & The Tablelands

OMG, it has been ages again since I’ve made a blogpost, but in my defence, I’ve actually been legit kinda busy with driving lessons, community gardening, volunteering, assignments, and reading.

Yes, I have been “busy” with reading – I’ve recently discovered a rad sci-fi book series, which has 500+ pages a book, and at least 9 books in the series, so I’m totally engrossed in the process of reading, in a way I haven’t been since The Dark Tower (so much so, I’m realising that it might be worth a book review).

That aside, recently-ish (more than a week ago TBH) Bae and I went down to Brisvegas for a couple of days to see the fam and shit – nothing swish, so if you’re reading this fam, this post will be exclusively about Brisbane, so feel free to skip at your own risk.

The highlights are as follow:

Seeing the Family and Friends (I guess =P)

This includes my stinky niece and nephews. Luckily I got some photos that have conveniently been obscured and made anonymous by dumb phone filters.

Seeing My Mum’s Dumb Pets

This array of dumb animals includes a guinea-pig named Oreo, with whom I am completely obsessed and in love with, and for whom I would either die and/or maybe kill for (please let me kill for you Oreo).

I have no real reason to love this dumb guinea as much as I do, but I assume that because she’s so small and plump and round and herbivorous and easily startled and ultimately pathetically vulnerable and defenceless, she just inspires an extreme form of maternal-instinct mixed with cute-aggression in my brain.

I honestly believe that if you were to scan my brain while I was looking at her, it would show some kind of serious chemical in-balance.

My mum also has two cats, Piggerly-Wiggerly and Sheldon (left to right, respectively).

Now, you may have noticed that not only is Piggerly-Wiggerly a ridiculous name for a cat, but Oreo also looks NOTHING like the delicious (though appropriately vegan) biscuit for which she was named.

This is because both animals were bought for and named by the niece and nephew above, who then stiffed them with their grandma when they realised that animals take actual work to look after 😂

Oh well, I’m pretty sure my mum likes the company.

Now, the cats might also look cute and adorable, but looks can be deceiving, and Piggerly-Wiggerly is a fucking savage. While I was kissing her goodbye, she boxed my ears and left a massive scratch on my face.

I am honestly surprised that the Coles self-check-out chumps haven’t mistaken me for a crack-head (which is quite common in Innisfail), and insisted on searching my bags (which has also happened when we first got here and I was routinely mauled by mosquitos).

OH WELL.

THE FOOD

As explored in previous posts, I am a complete and unabashed food wanker. I make no apologies for this, and I think I’ve done a pretty good job adjusting to country-eating.

As such, I did enjoy my foray into Brisbane food again. In no particular order:

Taro’s Ramen

I didn’t get any photos unfortunately, but I got a delicious spicy, vegan ramen from this place in West End. It had pretty good serving sizes that were more filling than they appeared, and Japanese beer. The seating was a little cramped, so I give it 3.5 *Italian Chef Kisses*

Harmony on Carmody

What’s the only thing I love more than eating wanky food? Feeling self-righteous while I do, HAHA!

Seriously though, this place is run by a not-for-profit organisation called ‘Access’ that does all kinds of cool community-services work and shit. On this theme, they opened a social-enterprise café that gives immigrants, refugees, and other disadvantaged peeps in Logan the opportunity to work and get hospitality experience, improve their English skills, and get a foothold into the employment industry.

Feel-goodery aside, it was actually real’ tasty – the avocado on toast was the cheapest I’ve had in ages, while still having a generous portion size, and delicious little extras like spring-onion, spinach leaves, diced tomato, and feta. Bae had a plain but hearty big-veggie-breakfast, which he said was on-point and very satisfying.

I give these guys 4 out of 5!

The Green Edge

This place is fucking amazing because not only is it a vegan restaurant, but it’s also a 100% VEGAN GROCERY STORE with a crazy extensive range.

Pre-made take-home ravioli? Vegan.

Ice-cream including ice-cream sandwiches? Vegan.

Gummy-bears, and wine-gums, and other jube-type sweets? Vegan.

Honeycomb? Vegan.

Cakes and pastries? Vegan.

E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G I-S V-E-G-A-N.

Now, as a big ol’ atheist, I’m not a particularly spiritual person. As a vegetarian/lazy-vegan though? This place is sacred, and I was all too happy to make the pilgrimage from mum’s house in Logan to the North-side for my obligatory vegan fix.

For my meal I got my ALL TIME FAVOURITE, the “meatball” sub with hand-cut chips on the side. I’ve eaten this thing like, 20 times, and never get sick of it.

Did I take a photo though? No, ’cause I was too busy LIVING IN THE MOMENT LIKE A LOSER.

For dessert I got a vanilla ice-cream sundae with chocolate fudge sauce, honeycomb, and bits of choc-chip biscuit and brownie.

Luckily I was so full by this point I had to take a moment to get my bearings, and took this opportunity to get photographic evidence of this vegan deliciousness.

*DROOL*

As always, The Green Edge gets the ever elusive 5 out of 5

Carl’s Jr

Now, as well having a penchant for wanky food, I also LOVE Americano-style junk-food.

Burgers, hot dogs, pizza, bagels, onion rings, milkshakes, all of it, just in-and-around my mouth.

This is, of course, complicated by the vegetarian-ness etc.

DAMN MY SUPERIOR MORALS.

As such, whenever I do find-out that a filthy multi-national corporation is trying to shamelessly grab my hard-earned dollar by flogging their singular token veggie item… you bet your ass I am making a fucking bee-line for that greasy-ass shit.

GIMME GIMME GIMME.

Now, Carl’s Jr hasn’t even been in Australia that long. However, I’m assuming that with the relative and recent success of Taco Bell in Brisbane (~World City anyone~), the US were like, “Oh yeah, these Yankophiles are sick of being the little tubbers on the block, and are ready to join the big boys’ obesity club”, and thus decided to gift us with a Carl’s Jrs (or vice versa, whatever).

I was at first, quite sceptical, but the burger was serviceable, the re-fills free and unlimited (rare in Australia), and the logo appropriately and adorably anthropomorphisized to appeal to my brain, which is always one cell away from losing its fucking shit over anything vaguely cute.

For sheer novelty, and the fact that I was super tired and really just wanted to stuff my face in an airport, I give Carl’s Jrs a 3.5 out of 5.

Well Brisbane, it was fun, but aside from the fam and shit, I could probs leave you alone for quite a while.

Au revoir!

P.S. I’ve belatedly realised that I never finished Part 3 of my previous long-weekend posts, due to the same ~~laziness~~ extremely busy reasons listed above.

And yes, I know, you’re simply ~devastated~ that it’s taken me this long to get ’round to it.

But in all seriousness, while it has been quite a while, and it seems almost disjointed to mention here, there was one particular part of the long-weekend that was too good NOT to post about.

So without further adieu:

The Historical Village Herberton

Now, I know what you’re thinking.

“Michelle, didn’t you already visit a historical museum on the first day of your long-weekend? What are you? Some kind of nerd?!”

Yes, it is true unfortunately, Bae and I are massive nerds, and our future children are already condemned to this fate, but this place was well-worth the visit.

It has just over 50 original and restored Australian pioneer buildings sprawling across SIXTEEN acres of land, including an old-timey suspension bridge that spans across a gorgeous river that splits the property in two.

Amazing.

That aside, there was honestly too much to cover, so I’ll only include my absolute favourite exhibition, the hospital.

Anyone that knows me probably knows that I am pretty fascinated with all things medicine – from ob/gyn maternal health and pimple-popping dermatology, to mental-health and furiously googling any gnarly disease or syndrome I come across, to ancient-Greek contraception and abortificients to social inquality in medical practice.

I really dig it, and this place really delivered.

Exhibit A: Old-Timey Pharmaceuticals That Are Disturbingly Similar To Modern-Day Equivalents. And Yes, There Was A Tonne Of Opium-Based Shit, But Hemorrhoids Are Funnier.

Exhibit B: Things That Made Me Want To Barf Because They Were Honestly Just Too Much.

Exhibit C: Holy Shit, A Reminder That Women Really Used To Have To Do This Shit Without The Aid Of Modern-Medicine.

Exhibit D: Oh Wow, I Never Realised What We Did Before Plastic Syringes. There’s Hope For The Zero-Waste Movement Yet, I Guess.

Now, I truly do mean goodbye and until next time!

Look at These Fucking Tourists: Long Weekend Edition – Part Two

The second day of our long-weekend get-away was a big one.

We did SO. MUCH. STUFF, so on we go!

Mareeba Coffee Works

To start the day, Bae and I desperately needed a coffee-hit, so we drove to the Mareeba Coffee Works. And yes, if you Google Maps the trip from our AirBnB in Tarzali to the Coffee Works in Mareeba, it was a 54 minute drive, and yes, we both had caffeine-withdrawal-induced headaches by the time we got there.

WHAT OF IT.

That aside, the Coffee Works is a slick example of tourism done well, in that you can just go to the café and get some good food – which obviously a bunch of the locals do, based-on how busy it was. To make a whole day of it though, you can spend a bit more doing the $19.00 Coffee Works tour, and then splash even more cash buying the cleverly marketed coffee mugs, plungers, and all other kinds of homeware knick-knacks from their gift-shop.

Fortunately for Bae’s wallet, neither of us were super interested in the tour, and we’ve both sworn-off buying unnecessary kitsch-items for quite a while, so we did just enjoy the food and coffee.

For his meal, Bae had sautéed mushrooms and zucchini, with poached eggs, pine-nuts, and feta, while I had a house-made roast-veggie and bean-patty, with beetroot hummus, pumpkin pesto, and avocado.

So fucking good. I just wanted to eat more and more and more.

For good vegetarian options, locally-grown coffee, and not-completely-ripping-off-tourist-prices, I give the Coffee Works Café 4 out of 5 *Italian Chef Kisses*

Meerba Heritage Museum

After Coffee Works, Bae and I trotted over to the Mareeba Visitor Centre just to get an idea about what we could do in the area. Little did we know, the Visitor Centre had a cool little historical museum attached to it, which was not only FREE, but surprisingly comprehensive.

Because I am such a fucking nerd, here are some of my highlights of the museum:

First there was this little school corner exhibit, complete with old-timey writing-desks and some sort of primitive iPad and stylus.

Bae hated this exhibit and couldn’t wait to leave it, as he informed me that growing-up in a country-town in the 90’s, he’d had a super mean music-teacher with this EXACT classroom furniture and outlay.

Yes, the 1990’s, not the 1890’s.

I on the other hand, was absolutely losing my shit over how quaint and kitsch-y it all was.

As you can see, the museum also had both a saloon and a jail, in which I re-enacted the shenanigans of my early twenties.

Finally, here I am trying to kiss a cutie moo-moo-cow.

Interestingly enough, this is about the same height disparity between Bae and I…

My absolute favourite exhibit though?

The Railway Ambulance.

What the fuck is that you say?

Well, back in the day in Australian, when country towns were even more in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere than they are today, rural areas had no proper roads or the Flying Doctors Service. As such, ambulances simply couldn’t reach people living in the outback, and people in the outback couldn’t get to hospitals in a hurry. And they died because of it.

However, there were plenty of railway tracks, so cue the ingenious invention of an ambulance on railway tracks.

This was apparently a particularly large and well-outfitted ambulance, with a stretcher for the patient, a microscope for examining blood and pathogens, a baby weight-machine and incubator for any deliveries that occurred en-route to the hospital, a suction thingy for fluids in the throat and lungs, and more.

It really was just fucking rad, and blew my mind. Unfortunately, that was the only photo I could get, as you weren’t actually allowed in the ambulance, but it still shows how cool and innovative people had to be back in the day.

Kuranda

After spending an hour in the (free) museum, we then kept driving north to Kuranda.

Now, I have been waiting to go to Kuranda ever since we moved to Far North Queensland, because it has not only a Koala/Marsupial Garden, but a bird-aviary, and the Southern Hemisphere’s largest butterfly dome and hatchery.

Not gonna lie, the Koala Gardens were a little bit average, as aside from this little potaroo and her pouch-baby, there wasn’t much that I hadn’t already seen before.

I did however, love anf would die for this tiny cutie baby turtle, while Bae had an encounter with his arch-nemesis, the snek! Hiss hiss!

The Bird Aviary on the other-hand? Absolutely amazing.

When you walk in, straight away you’re on a viewing and feeding platform, where heaps of the birds gather around and above you to feed on fruit and seeds. This included heaps of native and non-native species, as well as some rescue animals, a bunch that had been surrendered by people who couldn’t look after them anymore, and some that just naturally bred within the aviary – though the keepers did admit to buying from breeders too =(

Among the birds there were plenty of clever parrot species, who kept perching on peoples’ hats and bags, and trying to steal jewellery, belt-buckles, buttons, and anything else shiny!

We also spotted lots of beautiful berb couples, preening and grooming each. So cute!

Any finally, it turns out that Booboo had somehow managed to escape the house, follow us to Kuranda, and trans-figure herself into this exact fucking cassowary.

The angry face? The ‘bitch-please’ pose? Big black butt and yellow eyes? I swear to god, Booboo and this cassowary are 100% spiritually embodied within one another.

We are not even done though, and this was an action-packed day, because we then went to the Butterfly Sanctuary.

Now anyone that knows me well knows that moths and butterflies scare the mother-fucking daylights out of me. I don’t even know why. Like, I think they’re beautiful and shit, and I like to look at them, but they have creepy little insect legs, but they’re so small and fragile, and they fly so erratically and are REALLY unpredictable, and I’m just scared that if they fly in my face or anywhere near me, I’ll freak-out and accidentally hurt one, OKAY?!

It’s too much stress, but I still went into the dome of fluttery doom anyways.

And it was everything I thought it would be.

Beautiful and terrifying, and I had a really bad stomach-ache afterwards, because I swear, I was so hyped that my parasympathetic-system like, shut down while I was freaking-out. I even had to do some deep yoga breathing in the car afterwards to chill out.

But I did get some cool photos for my Instagram and Facebook and blog though, and that’s really what life is all about.

To finish the day (I know – I was wondering when it would end too), we found a little Thai place, by the name of Thai Kai Cafe, which was miraculously still open, because apparently in the country everything is just fucking done by 3:00PM and my eating patterns haven’t adjusted yet.

On top of reasonable opening hours, the service was good, and the food was even yummer, including a delicious lemon-iced green-tea. Combined with having clear veggie options, I give this place a 3.5 out of 5 *Italian Chef Kisses*

Well, this was a long post, but it was a long day, and there is so much to do in Mareeba and Kuranda!

‘Til next time!

Look at These Fucking Tourists: Long Weekend Edition – Part One

So in my last post I boasted about writing two entries in one week, and then… nada for three weeks, because in some kind of Shakespearean twist of hubristic fate, only a few days afterwards, I slipped over in the bathroom, slammed my elbow on the floor, needed two x-rays to confirm it wasn’t broken, after which it was still so swollen, I couldn’t straighten it for a week, and then couldn’t bear weight on it properly for another week and a half.

FUN TIMES.

But what does that really have to do with something as simple as typing a blog-post?

Well, the doctor put me on these pretty sweet pain-killers/anti-inflammatories, but the main side-effect?

Drowsiness. Like, mind-numbing, zoning-out, dying-for-a-nap-everyday drowsiness.

Add to that the general tiredness of healing (I assume?), and that fact that doing anything with a sore arm took twice as long as usual, and I just could not be fucked blogging.

OH WELL.

But it’s pretty much better, and Bae took the Friday after ANZAC Day off, so we got another long-weekend, and so decided to have a bit of a get-away in the Tablelands.

Australian Platypus Park

To kill some time before checking-in at our lil’ AirBnB in Tarzali, we stopped at the ‘Australian Platypus Park’. Now, this place ain’t anything fancy, but for 10-bucks you get a guided-tour around the property’s beautiful lakes, you can stay as long as you like, and you’re guaranteed a platypus-viewing. If you don’t see a platypus, you don’t have to pay; simple as that.

I was, of course, super excited about this, particularly after our trip to Yungaburra yielded NO platypus sightings.

>=\

Luckily we saw MANY platypus this time, and they looked like small, wet versions of baby Booboo! I was overcome with that cute/playful-aggression phenomena (which is honestly pretty common for me), and I just wanted to pluck their fat little blubbery bodies out of the water, and mush them into my face over and over again!

>8D

Unfortunately, the platypuses were so fast and wriggly diving in-and-out of the water that it was impossible to take a decent photo of them…

=,(

While touring the property, the ‘ranger’ also told us the following little factoids:

Platypuses don’t have stomachs, so they don’t digest or metabolise their food in the same way we do, meaning they have to eat a third of their body-weight in food every day.
To deal with the cold in Tasmania, Tasmanian platypuses are EXTRA FAT compared to their northern counterparts, and have to eat even MORE than them.
Platypuses are completely carnivorous, and ONLY hunt and eat live prey, which is a little creepy when you consider 1) how fucking cute they are, and 2) the fact that most Australian animals are herbivorous, insectivorous, or omnivorous; and if they are carnivorous, they’re at least opportunistic scavengers, like the Dingo or Tasmanian Tiger. Hell, even crocodiles and snakes will eat frozen or fridged meat. What gives then? Is the platypus just ultra-sadistic? No actually; rather, because they’re essentially blind underwater, platypuses use their sensitive snoots to sense movement via the electronic-pulses that every living animal emits. Dead animals = no buzz-buzz = no food, so fresh it is.

Lastly, the Park also had a bunch of hokey-but-adorable tourist signs, which I was more than happy to take advantage of.

Malanda

After the Platypus Park, we kept driving north to Malanda, home of the ‘Malanda Falls Swimming Pool’.

Half natural, half-artifice, the Falls are fed by an actual fresh-water river and waterfall, but the river-banks have been built-in with cement, with the bottom left as sand. So even though there’s no chlorine or chemicals in the water, it’s almost as clear and fresh as a completely natural swimming-hole.

These kind of manicured swimming-holes (or ocean-holes) were super common in the late 19^th to early 20^th century (and supposedly pretty unique to Australia), so whenever I think of them I imagine old-timey people in full-body cotton-bathing suits – though even in the ’20s they apparently needed signage to deter local nudists.

The falls is also situated in a National Park, so it’s surrounded by walking tracks, beautiful rainforest scenery, and a cool Visitor Centre with some interesting information on the local Aboriginal people, and native wildlife, such as the tree-kangaroo.

Overall, both places were really lovely, and I would definitely go back.

Sayonara!

Swimming (and Other Adventures) in Nature Part 6: Bingil Bay, Lacey Creek, and Licuala State Forest

Two posts in one week. What kind of Stephen King writing prodigy am I?

My last post was actually from doing stuff two weeks ago, but I was just too l-a-z-y to write it up earlier ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

So another weekend, another day in paradise.

Here we go!

Bingil Bay

“Where the bloody hell are you?”

Thankfully this Bingil has nothing to do with that Bingle shit-show.

We started this trip with not much in mind, but that’s the great thing about Far North Queensland – you can just pick a direction and start driving, and you’ll eventually stumble upon something to do, whether it’s a beautiful look-out, a scenic hike, or an old country pub.

On the other hand, you’ll sometimes see a sign on the side of the road for a local business or so-called ~tourist attraction~ and decide to give it ago. Lo and behold though, when you pull-over, you realise the place has bizarre opening hours, tiny fine-print on the badly designed signs, and the building itself seems a little too ramshackle to be inviting.

Pro-tip to all tourism providers: If your prospective clientele feels apprehensive and has to ‘work-up the courage’ to walk through the front-door, you’re not doing tourism right – the obvious exception being for sky-diving, hand-gliding, and adventure-type stuff.

Fortunately we kept on driving and came to this amazing pub-lite in Bingil Bay, called the Bingil Bay Café.

It initially caught my eye, because, quite frankly, I am a massive hipster, and it was painted purple. How was I supposed to resist? Appearances aside, it had some really good veggie food options, a chill atmosphere, and was surrounded by a veil of plants.

Best of all though? THE GERMAN BEER.

I don’t care what anyone says, Australian beer is (generally) shite. I love the wine – gimme a goddamn Barossa or whatever any day, but the old Milton Mango can fuck right off, and I can’t stand the current trend of micro-breweries making one disgusting variation of IPA after another.

The beer was a tad on the expensive side, but I haven’t seen it in any local bottle-o, so I’m happy for them to take my money.

On a side note: Mum, I definitely plan to take you here when you come-up in September!

Lacey Creek in Djiru National Park

After lunch, we wanted to go for a swim, and decided on Lacey Creek.

This is a much smaller, more low-key kinda swimming-hole, made for relaxing rather than adventuring, but this meant it was completely deserted, without another soul in sight. On the downside, the creek did have an animal warning – no, not for crocs, for Bullrouts.

“What the fuck is a bullrout?” you ask.

Better known as a stonefish, these guys are covered in spikes, camoflague in the river-bed sand and stones, and are said to have an extremely painful sting.

Fun times.

Look out, it’s a bullrout! Oh n0, it’s just me squatting like a goblin in the water…

I was a little terrified of stepping on one, and it did take a while before I was able to really relax in the water. There were some leaves on the river-bed, and I refused to even swim over them, I was that paranoid.

We emerged unscathed however, and continued to Licuala National Forest.

Licuala National Forest

This place is GORGEOUS.

It has a specific Fan-Palm Walk that shows off the giant fan-palms canopy.

The place is also so full of cassowaries that the day-use/BBQ-area is surrounded by a cassowary-proof fence, because those bitches are not as shy as Wikipedia will have you believe.

Au revoir.

Swimming In Nature Part 4 Brazilian: Cardwell Spa Pools, Golden Hole & Alligator’s Nest

George Bush was once informed by Donald Rumsfeld that 4 Brazilian soldiers were killed while on-tour in the War in Iraq, to which Bush replied, “But how many is a brazilian?”

At which point you the reader may or may not realise and ask, “Michelle, did you just retroactively re-name all of your swimming-hole blog-posts by ‘part’, just so that when you got to the fourth one, you could make a reference to an American political faux-pas that is over a decade old?”

To which I would respond, “Yeah, duh, that’s just who I am.”

Cardwell Spa Pools

Anywho, guess what I did on the weekend? That’s right, SWIMMING. Surprise, surprise.

This weekend it was the Cardwell Spa Pools. Why are these pools extra special?

WELL, they are a cool aquamarine, teally, bluey-green colour!

According to ‘science’, the colour is probably something to do with minerals in the rocks interacting with the water – so pretty much, it’s like a giant Lush bath-bomb. I think it looks the most like the ‘Big Blue’ one.

Whatever the case, I swear the water in this place feels different to other water-holes, like thicker, more minerally, and my skin was sooooo soft afterwards… So it was just like a big Lush bath.

It’s not too deep, so good for just sitting around, or for people who aren’t strong swimmers. There is a little detritus (leaves and shit) on the river-bed, which I stepped-on and screamed at once or twice, but somehow not enough trees overhead to completely shade from the sun. Bae and I actually got star-damage for the first time in ages, so bring sunscreen.

The Cardwell Spa Pools are part of the Cardwell State Forest, so you can also go to Attie Creek Falls, and Dead Horse Creek. Attie Creek Falls reminded me of Millaa-Millaa in that it was super cold, and had a beautiful waterfall. You apparently need a 4-wheel drive to get to these places, but we made it in Meep-Meep (our 2017 Suzuki Swift) regardless.

Golden Hole

The weekend before we also went to Golden Hole (yeah, we giggled at that). This place is beautiful, but there’s a croc-warning, and the place was DESERTED, like no locals around whatsoever, which has never happened at any of the other swimming-holes that don’t have croc-warnings. So Bae and I were not game to swim. We did however take some cool photos, because again, if I see something cool in real life, I have to prove it on the internets ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Alligator’s Nest

Instead we went to Alligator’s Nest, a five minute drive away, which contrary to the name has NEVER had a croc. This place is giant, and it’s so easy to find a private place to swim.

Now you might be asking yourself, Michelle, what exactly do you do at these swimming-holes every weekend? Don’t you ever get bored? Well, no, and let me tell you why. Through careful trial and error, I have crafted the following:

Michelle’s Definitive-and-Official-Best-Things-To-Do-In-The-Water Guide:

Look at cutie berbs and animals – try to take a photo of a Ulysses Butterfly, and fail miserably.
Make fun of tourists – having been in the far-north for approximately 8 weeks now, Bae and I are officially no longer non-locals or blow-ins, and can therefore make fun of tourists with impunity.
Pretend to be any of the following: a walrus, a river-otter, a mermaid and merman, a water-nymph, a beautiful fish, a snibbity-snabbity crab, a dugong/manatee, a river-pupper, and so forth. Please let me know if you think of anymore, as I am always trying to pioneer new and exciting river-animals that I can impersonate.
Spin around in the water like a washing-machine or ballerina in a musical jewellery box.
Debate with Bae as to whether or not you really have to shower anymore after going for a fresh-water swim (apparently I do).
Ohhh and ahhhh over how you don’t have to moisturise your skin or wash your hair after going for a fresh-water swim (Bae has conceded this point reluctantly).
Try and fail to romantically carry Bae in the water, and just resort to dragging him around by his legs while he slowly drowns.
Practice your swimming, and then wonder aloud how fit, sexy, and swol you’re getting.
Ask Bae if he’s still cold, and then when he inevitably says that he is, brag about the superiority of your Germanic/Scandinavian genetics in keeping you warm.
Do any and all of the above while humming Dance Of The Sugarplum Fairy, Waltz Of The Flowers, Dance of The Reed Flutes, and Dance of the Hours obnoxiously, and pretending to be a fairy (If you’ve never watched Fantasia, I really recommend clicking on those links and watching those videos).

Voila! And now you too are ready for fun in the sun!

Swimming in Nature Part 3: Josephine Falls & Mossman Gorge

Josephine Falls

Another weekend, another swimming-hole(s).

Bae and I tried to go to Josephine Falls a couple of weeks ago, soon after moving. It was actually the beginning of that relentless couple of weeks of rain that ended-up flooding Townsville, and it was royally farrrrrked.

Like the Devil’s Pool, peeps have died at Josephine Falls after flash-flooding. I couldn’t get an exact number on the death-toll, but it seems there were at least two in 2018, one in 2016, and another in 2004.

So we decided to wait until there was a couple of days of dryness before even attempting another swim.

Good idea.

We spent a whole like, 3-ish hours at Josephine Falls. Overall, very good – nice currents for swimming, super shaded from the sun, minimal amount of weird floaty stuff to freak-out over, and lots of rocks to sit on in the water.

Bae said it was like “jumping into peppermint oil”, which is surprisingly accurate and complimentary since everyone loves peppermint oil.

This would be the PERFECT photo without the people ;(

SO, let’s review:

The Boulders is cool because of well, the big-ass boulders, and the ~~Death~~ I mean, Devil’s Pool.
Millaa-Millaa is rad because it’s hella cold and has some lame claims-to-fame (Also, no deaths… that I know of???).
Mossman (below) has a mini-forest-canopy-walk.

So what does Josephine Falls have that sets it apart? A SLIDE AND A SWING (both natural of course!). It’s like a pool and a playground combined!

To go down the ‘slide’ you have to:

Swim over to the rock-face.
Claw your way up and out of the water over a rock with a gross algae strip;
Inevitably fail at least once and fall back into the water (and if you’re wearing a thong bikini, you might even accidentally give everyone an eye-full of your ‘twinkle tush’ if ya know what I mean).
Act superior when you do make it to the top.
But then fall over again either while waiting for your go, or when you’re trying to find the perfect insta-worthy pose to do on the way down the slide while carrying a water-proof selfie-stick.

Pretty rad.

Now to the swing… Say for example you’re waiting for some wanker of a barefoot-tourist-guide or whatever to give his gullible group of tourists an in-depth $100.00 explanation of how to (no joke) swim in a straight line, and then go down a slide – an explanation which also somehow involves a suspicious amount of touching and re-arranging of the lady tourists, but not the dude tourists.

While you’re waiting for these shenanigans, there’s a section of Josephine Falls called the ‘Top Pools’, right behind the unofficial waiting-area of the slide.

Growing on the side of the Top Pool and overhanging it is this big ole’ massive fig tree. Down in Brisbane I’d assume it was a Moreton Bay Fig, but up here I’m not sure. It’s a fig though, and it has some super old, cool vines hanging from it, thicker than my wrist, draping and twisting in gigantic U-shapes, just begging to be swung on.

Anyone who says otherwise, and insists on giving you filthy looks for living your best life?

They’re just a miserable binch, because guess what my dudes?

I’VE DONE MY INTERNAL RISK-ASSESSMENT AND THOSE VINES WEREN’T GOING ANYWHERE!

Unfortunately, no photos, because of the proximity of water, but here’s a good idea of what it looks like.

We climbed all over the vines, and they could even support Bae’s weight, with no creaking or cracking, or anything that indicated they would break anytime soon, so hopefully they should still be there when we go next time.

Mossman Gorge

The next day we went to Mossman Gorge, north of Cairns. The drive is absolutely gorgeous with beach after beach after beach.

The Gorge is a tad unusual, in that it is located within a National Park, but has limited access because of the small roads, and the Aboriginal Community that lives at the foot of the mountain/gorge. You gotta catch a bus up (or walk 4km, which let’s be honest, I can’t be fucked doing), and the bus does cost money, so be prepared for that! Once you get off the bus, you walk through the forest canopy on an elevated platform, and get to see all kinds of cool rainforest plants and fungi before getting to the river.

The only thing that kinda sucks about blogging/reviewing swimming-holes: How many times can you say, “Oh yeah, it was gorgeous, magnificent, invigorating, amazing etc.” before it just begins to sound dull and/or seem like you’re rubbing it in someone’s face?

BUT IT WAS ALL OF THOSE THINGS.

I can’t help it! Places like this were the reason we moved here!

Mossman Gorge definitely has been the most challenging swim so far with the strongest, most persistent current, and my shoulders and arms were just straight-up knackered afterwards. Technically the conditions were “Swimming Not Advised” due to the rain-cast (again, people have died/been maimed), but we gave it ago anyways.

Even the rocks were harder to get onto, as evidenced by my river-walrus impersonation below. Feel free to really zoom-in on that ~flattering~ shot.

An additional bonus? The fish in Mossman must be super used to humans, ’cause they’d swim literally like, 30cm away from your foot.

So cute!

Swimming in Nature Part 2: Millaa Millaa Falls

Since I don’t have a job yet, and Bae is still getting used to working predominantly in an office, we’re both trying to make the most of every weekend by doing something nature-y one or both days, so neither of us ends-up going cray-cray.

Nature Deficit Disorder, they like to call it.

I’m happy to just go to the same place over and over. I reckon I could go to The Boulders every weekend for a month, and still happily go back for more, but Bae is more adventurous, and wants to try something new every time.

So this weekend it was Millaa-Milla Falls in the Atherton Tablelands.

The blurriness isn’t from the camera, it’s the splash from the waterfall, and mist from the mountains!

This place is pretty famous (by Australian standards), which means it’s featured in a Peter Andre music video (yeah who? The only reason I know the guy is because at the height of my morbid obsession with all things tacky and celebrity in ’06, I was obsessed with Jordan/Katie Price – that former UK Page 3/Glamour model with the giant fake titties, whom he was briefly married to).

According to Wikipedia, it’s also apparently in some random Indian Lotto and Swedish shampoo ads, as well as this recent Herbal Essences one, which I guess is at least kinda funny and tongue-in-cheek? I can’t even tell when the waterfall is supposed to feature though. I mean, I think the blue butterfly at the end is meant to be a Ulysses Butterfly, which is endemic to the region??? I don’t fucking know.

Delusions of grandeur, classic Australiana.

That aside, another great place to swim. Absolutely freezing (if you ever come-up here to visit us mum, we WON’T take you there, unless it’s the absolute dead of summer).

A local showed Bae and I the best way to get into the pool (it’s very rocky and slippery and steep), and to reward the poor guy, we were screaming and hollering at the cold, as we submerged ourselves inch-by-inch.

Made me very thankful my genitals are located inside my body.

Luckily my Germanic and Scandinavian genetics kicked-in pretty quickly, and I soon felt just a little chilly under the water, while Bae was still actively shivering the poor thing. Reminds me of that ‘Cold Water Therapy’ that’s supposed to help you lose weight, with like, 15 minutes of shivering being the equivalent of burning an hour’s worth of cardio calories.

Can’t wait to go during Winter to get that Summer bod, it’ll be fab!

Once again the recent rain meant the waterfall was extra fierce, meaning we weren’t game to go under the actual flow (in case it drowned us or something), but it was still definitely worth swimming around it.

Afterwards we continued driving all around the mountain (Bellenden Ker strikes again!), exploring the waterfall and creek circuits of Wooroonooran National Park. The other two famous waterfalls were not particularly swimmable (one plunges into a rocky water-pool that would 100% lead to your death), and the other one was too shallow, but still worth the look.

Death Falls
Shallow Falls

We couldn’t resist the opportunity for a photo-shoot though!

If I do something cool, but don’t put photographic evidence of it on the Internet, did it really happen at all?

Until next time!

Swimming in Nature Part 1: The Boulders & Mission Beach

The Boulders

On the weekend, Bae and I decided to go to one of the most popular and advertised tourist places in this region, the Babinda Boulders! Located 60kms south of Cairns, this place is beyond words. Beautiful. Gorgeous. Magnificent. Incredible. Any cool, too-good-to-be-true photo of it on Google is no lie.

We took the Scenic Drive out of town, and it was extra *Italian Chef Kiss*

Lush rolling hills, fields of cane swaying in the breeze, trees and vines growing like crazy on periphery foothills, cutie cows mooing everywhere… So, so relaxing. Kinda glad I can’t drive yet, ’cause I just kept zoning-out and almost drifting-off.

Bonus: With all of the extra rain at the moment (which is thankfully not affecting us here in Coconuts), we even saw the flash-flooding make a temporary waterfall down a cliff-face of Bartle Frere (the tallest mountain in Queensland), which is part of the ‘Bellenden Kerr’ mountain range (very LOTR-esque naming).

Bae assures me the waterfall was definitely not there on his drive up to Cairns last week, so very special! No photo unfortunately, as the range was way too far away for our camera-phones, so you’ll have to take my word on it.

Once we got there, The Boulders themselves were gorgeous.

Bae said the last time he was there five or so years ago (on a dudes-only road-trip), it was a lot more shallow and dry, and you could mostly walk upstream to The Boulders, with the two rivers confined mostly to the banks either side, and meeting up downstream.

Once again though, with all the rain and the cloud-coverage overhead dappling the water, the whole thing was flooded with teal, sapphire, emerald, aqua, everything! Crystal clear in some spots, but really deep and dark and unfathomable in others.

Even Bae (who is 6″4 tall) couldn’t reach the river-bed with his feet in some places and freaked a lil’. Me on the other hand? I’m so short I can never reach anything ever, so just normal levels of terror for me.

Unfortunately, my photography skills ain’t great, and I couldn’t do it justice, but here’s a photo anyways. We’re both thinking a proper camera might eventually be in order once some of our other pressing purchases are out of the way.

Such a good swimming spot though – cannot stress this enough, just fresh, clear, *crisp* water, and so invigorating. Again, *Italian Chef Kiss*

The water-current was surprisingly strong, and even after watching a local try and fail to swim upstream to the Boulders, we gave it a go ourselves. Needless to say, neither of us got very far, but it was a good shoulder work-out, and really relaxing just floating down with the current afterwards.

You wanna know the extra cool/spooky/scary/particularly-alluring part of the trip though? People have DIED at The Boulders. Like, 17-people-in-50-years-died, not just one or two, so you know it’s not just a fluke.

The deathly/maim-y part wasn’t the section we swam in thankfully (I flat-out refused to even entertain the idea), but further down on a separate confluence of rivers called ‘Devils Pool’.

You were right about the legend by the way, mum.

According to local Aboriginal lore, a young woman was scorned by her lover, and jumped to her death in the pools rather than live without him. Ever since then, she’s drowned several young men, so she could be with her lover forever.

Coincidentally 16 out of the 17 deaths have been young men…

Me being my morbid self, I was of course eager to have a look at the pool, so we walked along the river (sans phones, and therefore sans photos), and with the recent rain, it was absolutely torrential, roiling like crazy, a complete vortex of kinetic energy.

The photos I’ve linked here and here are deceptively placid, and don’t reflect what it’s like when there’s been a fuck-ton of rain, but it was creepy powerful. You can see where the water has been battering the rock-sides of the river for thousands of years, carving-out these perfect, alluring, circular pools.

Flimsy human bodies just don’t stand a chance against that kind of geological/hydrological power.

Mission Beach

In a glib 180, the next day we tried another popular tourist spot, Mission Beach.

Honestly, as overwhelming cool as The Boulders was, Mission Beach was as underwhelmingly disappointing. Maybe that’s a little unfair of me, since it was literally the end of the tourist season, but there were no lifeguards (despite the website saying there would be), a sunken stinger-net that wouldn’t keep out the biggest jellyfish, and no visitor-centre in-sight. Downside of a small, regional Council I guess?

On the upside, we’d recently bought and brought along a cutie plush Cassowary toy, and decided on an impromptu photo-shoot.

JUST TOO. FUCKING. CUTE.

It broke my goddamn mind, and it’s just a plushie.

Did the locals think I was insane?

Clearly.

Oh well.

Animal Adventures

When bae was like, ‘Plz move to Far North Tropical Queensland with me’, one of the many shameless bribery tactics he employed was the promise of cutie animals =P

And not just letting me rescue Baby Boo-Boo either (Short for Boudica, because she’s fierce and bite-y, like the bad-ass Warrior Queen).

No, I was promised wild animals! Crocodillies, cassowaries, berbs, and more! And Far North Queensland has so far delivered!

We’ve been to Etty Bay twice now, and as well as stinger-nets, a life-guard, beautiful forest up to the shore-line, a local cafe with decent coffee, and being only a 15 minute drive away (try finding that in Brisbane), there have been MANY Cassowaries, INCLUDING A BABY!

According to this cool website about Cassowaries, you can differentiate and identify Cassowaries based-on the droopiness of their butts (boys are droopy, and girls are… perky???), the size and colour of their ‘neck wattles’ (NOT based-on sexual dimorphism – boys and girls can both have big neck scrotes!), and the size and shape of their ‘casques’ (the head horn things).

We also saw another Cassowary on the way to Etty Bay (which I don’t have the photo of at the moment), meaning we may have seen up to FIVE. DIFFERENT. CASSOWARIES. Seeing as though Southern Cassowaries are an endangered species, with only 1200 wild specimens left in Far North Queensland, we have potentially seen up to 0.475% of all of the Cassowaries left in Australia.

BIG DEAL.

Closer to home though – quite literally, only 50 metres form the new house – there is a beautiful river-ocean estuary-type thing, with a lil’ slice of beach and sand. Completely un-fucking-swimmable though. No stinger nets, no life-guard, absolute croc-country, complete with a yellow ‘ACHTUNG’ crocodile warning-sign.

Now, Etty Bay had something similar too, but it was a much smaller ‘sighting’ rather than ‘confirmed’ warning-sign, so I was like, pfft, people are actually here and swimming, there’s no crocodile! So off we went for a walk and a swim, with nary another thought! And of course, nothing. No croc sighting, no danger.

Back at home with Etty Bay in mind, I figured that the local Council is really just covering its arse when it comes to warning-signs. So bae and I went for a walk along the local beach, and lo and behold! Crocodilly!

This was kindly edited by a friend, who pointed-out that I wasn’t actually pointing at the crocodile…

I later found out from the locals that this is only the small crocodilly! He’s either the 1 metre croc, or the 1.6 metre croc, but definitely NOT the 2 metre croc. So yes, I have three local crocs, the largest of which is apparently getting more and more bold when the locals gut their fishing catches!

So I guess the cats are definitely indoor-cats now…