After spending a couple of days exploring the Northern Peninsular Area it was time to point our rigs southward and head for home. Our plan was to take the coastal run back to Brisbane and spend nights with friends and family along the way.
Our first day’s travel saw us leaving Punsand Bay at dawn then traversing Bamaga Road and then the Peninsular Development Road, complete with horrid corrugations and bull dust for much of the way. After a nine hour drive we got to Coen where we camped just north of town on banks of the Coen River, a beautiful little free camp on sandy bed of the river under shade of paperbarks.
Our second day was a little easier, on good roads and with only a 6 hour run. A coffee from the Lakeland Store kept us fuelled for the morning and to break up the trip we took the Bloomfield Track through the spectacular rainforests before emerging at Cape Tribulation.
Our camp for the night was set up on the grassy sites of Pinnacle Village, a beautifully maintained caravan park and campground at Wonga Beach, near Daintree. Lachie and Sarah knocked up a great dinner of gnocchi before we settled for an early night.
Third day on the road was a long one, about nine hours estimated to reach Proserpine. Highlight of the drive was the Captain Cook Highway, weaving along beaches and headlands before dropping into Cairns.
From Cairns onward the roadworks were almost continuous, with hardly a chance to reach 100km/h before having to slow for another stretch of Bruce Highway in the process of being resurfaced, widened or deviated. I love the drive between Cairns and Townsville with mountains of the Great Dividing Range shouldering close to the coastline, making for dramatic tropical vistas that include view over Hinchinbrook Island and channel.
After spending the night with old friends Al and Kerry near Proserpine we continued southward, spending nights with family in Rockhampton and Hervey Bay before reaching home and our fur babies.
Although the travelling had ended our trip wind down continued – unpacking followed by clean up took several days, with the Landcruiser carrying a patina of red dust in nooks and crannies that I don’t think will ever be gone.
Although we don’t have any adventures planned for the near future we do have an exciting arrival in a few weeks – our new Track TVAN Zenith is about to be born and delivered in a few weeks’ time!!