Bloomfield track, lions den, Cooktown, nonsense about a man in the bushes.

Right, so I was without internet for a few days. Here is what I wrote. 


Daintree
Last night the rainforest came alive at about 10pm. I could hear something creeping around outside my tent trying to pinch my rubbish. I tried to burst forth from my tent and catch it but it was too fast. I think it was a goanna. I went for a wander to see if I could track down the other sources of noise but as soon as the tent opens you hear animals scatter and all is quiet again.

This morning while I was packing up the National Parks lady came to take my rubbish away, which is nice because otherwise I'd have to tie it onto the bike somewhere.

I stopped in at the shop in Cape Tribulation and while I was there a guy on a BMW gs650 pulled in. His bike looked so cool. He said he got it for $1500 and it has 104,000 km on the clock.

I left him there and headed off onto the Bloomfield track. It was awesome! My first 4wd only track. 4 or 5 water crossings. Really really steep climbs. The steepest was a 31% grade! Riding along dried up creek beds. It wasn't all that difficult but it was really cool.

I had my helmet camera going but when I pulled up it was off. Flat. I bought it for its 6 hour battery life and it ran out after the Port Douglas ride. I don't know if it captured anything at all. I switched it on right before the first water crossing so hopefully it at least got that.

I was really nervous crossing the first creek. It wasn't that deep but the surface was large river stones. I ummed and ahhed about taking the expensive gear off my bike but that would be literally setting myself up for failure so I just did it. It was fine. Made it across easily. Some of the muddy sections were trickier. Standing up made it easier.

Don't know why I was nervous looking at it now. 

I also finally saw a cassowary. Cars were stopped ahead of me and I thought they were spacing themselves for the big hill, but there was a cassowary lumbering into the bush. It was gone before I could get my camera out. They are dinosaurs.

I stopped at a creek for a look and dunked my head in the creek. The guy from the shop earlier pulled up as I was leaving and I tried to ride with him for a while but he lost me. Too fast. Later 2 guys on dr650s, which are similar to my bike but lighter and faster, went flying past.

After the dirt, there was a fairly nice bitumen ride alongside the river. There was a massive crocodile on the far bank at one section but there was nowhere to stop. I went through Rossville and kept going until I got to the legendary Lions Den Hotel. I don't know why it is legendary but everyone says it is. That's where I'm camped for tonight.

The bar at the Lions den. The walls are covered with messages. The oldest I could find was from 1979 although I didn't look very hard. 

I set up down in this really nice grassy spot close to the creek. Only me down there. It was the dream. I went for a swim in the creek then set my solar panel out and cooked some pasta. As I was finishing 3 caravans pulled up, 15 numpties in matching tour shirts got out. They stood around my solar panel, audibly wondering whose it could be, like I was invisible. Obviously it is mine you idiots.

I got up to get it out of their way and told them their matching shirts were "beautiful". They said "yeah it's a bit of fun" so I think they could detect my sarcasm.

Then I went to get some water and some other campers laughed at me and said I should start walking around naked and revving the bike. These people have set up right on top of me. Only one of them has acknowledged me. The others do the old look off into the distance when they see me. It is really weird. I think we are enemies now.

Lion's Den
It is now the next night from what I wrote above. Last night I met some locals at the pub. They were really nice. Way friendlier than the other campers. One of them has been travelling for a long long time and has just bought a house down the road. The first permanent place she's lived for over a decade. She works as a writer writing travel articles and children's books. Did not expect that. I picked her as maybe an amateur tent boxer.

The others were a couple. He had been an unqualified teacher in one of the aboriginal communities and his wife had been his teacher"s aide. He told me some stories about the kids he taught. He said he ended up quitting the day he had to cut one of his students from a tree that had hung herself. She was the 7th student to kill herself. He highly recommended I work in a community. I shall take that under advisement...

Last night it rained and the annoying neighbours were up at 4am making a rakcet because their monstrous camper trailers leaked and half blew down. Not a drop in my tent. It did look a little worse for wear in the morning from the wind, but that's because I'm using minimum pegs.

They were up again at 6. The women gathered around and shouted at each other about their flaps.
"Were your flaps flapping, my flaps were flapping about all over the place. Nearly flapped into my face. I was so scared they'd flap right off!"

They were genuinely shouting an approximation of that. If they just kept their flaps and their traps shut everyone would be a lot happier. Thank God they buggered off at about 8.

Today it rained. I had a tent day. Watched a movie (Glass) and finished my book. I took my headphones off to hear that some new neighbours had moved in. One of their kids, who sounds like a teenager and possibly with autism or something similar, really didn't want to go have a shower. His mother and father slowly escalated the threats. Word is they're done with him. He can either have a shower or they're calling the police. Either way he's finding his own way home.

He didn't have a shower though. Later I heard him tell another of the adults that his family doesn't love him anymore. She said of course everyone in his family loves him. I think that was probably a lie. I think it might be possible that his family actually never loved him. Later still I heard him moaning and carrying on. He sounded like a cow. I'd feel sorry for him, but he didn't have a shower!  So he bloody won and the police didn't show up so now he knows it is a bluff. I took me keys out of the motorbike just in case he does something stupid. Not that he could go far because his unloving family have camped me in.

The last 4 days I've had really bad kidney pain. The friendly neighbours, who laugh at me when I have shit neighbours, told me it's from the bouncing on the motorbike. That's a real relief because I was worrying it was an infection and that I'd have to go on dialysis for the rest of my life. So tomorrow I'm going to try to find a kidney belt. It apparently is a belt that holds your kidneys in place, not one where you store them for safe keeping. I've been using bum bags wrong all these years! I probably should cancel my Amazon order for a fanny pack too.

Lion's Den to Cooktown
This morning I was woken up at about 3am by a different kid from that family screaming. The mother was telling the kid to shut up or he/she'd have to go sleep in the creek. I don't know why they make these over the top threats.

I packed up and was pretty glad to leave. It is school holidays here so I imagine it will be a progression of parents screaming at kids who just want to stay home and play playstation.

It is very, very windy here in Cooktown. Utterly miserable. It concerns me slightly that I hate the wind as much as my autistic students did.

Cooktown, but now it's night. Before it was morning. This is a long heading and it is only getting longer.
I went out to stay at a bush camp but it was too expensive. I told the owner that and she said she could do it for half price if I was willing to share a site. She told me to wait for her at the camp kitchen while she showed some grey nomads around on the 4 wheeler. I didn't see her again. Waited for about 25 minutes and took off. It was a really nice camp. Absolutely massive amongst the trees. But quite frankly the internet coverage was sketchy.

I came back into Cooktown and am at a caravan park. I'm here for 2 nights and am going to charge batteries and buy some stuff for my trip to the tip. I need to find a kidney belt, epirb, and spare tube for my tyres. I reckon I can get the epirb. Doubtful about the other things. Cooktown is really small and doesn't have much.

I came back to my tent just before and a lady came up to tell me that the owners are moving people from this end of the park because some bloke was standing in the bushes for about half an hour watching some campers. The lady that told me is camped right next to the bushes and she is staying. I'm definitely staying. No way I'm packing my shit up for a move. I told the lady I probably shouldn't leave my axe outside tonight and she thought I was joking until I picked it up.

The people that moved were the people that could do so easily - people in vans - who are also the people that are most secure. I think they just like the drama of it. Nothing wrong with standing in bushes anyway. I'll probably go stand in some later. If I take my fishing rod I'll probably make friends, although I still don't have any hooks.

To be honest I can't really see the difference between Rex Hunt kissing fish and throwing them back, and me standing in a bush with a fishing rod and no hooks. We both end up spending ages acquiring zero fish. It's is now obvious to me that this bloke was having a fish but didn't waste his money on a rod or reel. Smart.

I had a look at the phone coverage for the next bit of the trip and this is it.

So don't expect many updates for a while.

Kudos to you if you read all this. I just tried to read it and ended up skipping ahead.