Thursday, Jan 27, 2005 at 22:42
Mike,
a guy from work asked me a similar question about a week ago so I jotted down our itinerary after reviewing Moon's book. My friend had no kids but we did when we did our trip. Here's a cut & paste from my email to him.
We went last June/July and took 4 weeks up & back from
Brisbane. We had 4 kids (3 in another car and 12mth old in our car).
Here's a copy of my notes to my friend who had no kids. Feel free to email me if you want more info.
Andrew
=====================================
1st thing. You MUST buy a book called “
Cape York – An Adventurers Guide” by Ron & Viv Moon. ISBN = 095787664-5. This book is the master reference for 4WD trips to
Cape York. Includes all distances, maps, routes,
places to see, detailed trek notes, etc.
Also,
check out Exploroz Website.
Check out the Trek Notes section. Very helpful.
After looking thru the book listed above, here is how I remember our trip:
Duration: 4 Weeks (32 days I think)
Day 1: Depart Bris. Drive to Mackay (Caravan Park just south of Mackay. Name escapes me)
Day2: Mackay to
Townsville (Caravan Park on Northern Outskirts of
Townsville. Would recommend push on further, say to
Cardwell) Good thing about populated areas is you can just drive until late in the day and stop at next C’van Park. We don’t like C’van parks generally but they do have showers which is pleasant after 10 hours driving or so.
Day 3:
Townsville to Mt Molloy. Turn west at
Innisfail (100km south of
Cairns) and head north west, away from the coast. You should be able to cover more ground than we did here (we had kids). Not much at Mt Molloy but is pretty much last stop for quite awhile. You should be able to squeeze days 1 -3 into 2 days and make it to Mt Molloy or somewhere west of
Cairns.
Day 4:
Cape York begins. Mt Molloy to Palmer River Goldfields. We took a detour via Palmer River Goldfields (Not to be confused with
Palmer River Roadhouse) &
Maytown. My dad is into gems &
fossicking so this was a nice detour if into old mining towns etc. Very remote & tough 4WDing. You would need a minimum of 3 vehicles with GPS and good maps to attempt it. We had arranged for helicopter drop of any spare parts required if we ran into problems. We spent 2 nights in the area.
Day 5:
Maytown
Day 6:
Maytown to
Laura. 80km in 7hrs. Rough
Day 7:
Laura to Archer River.
Camp right on the
sandy creek bed at Archer River. Lovely place and nice camping.
Day 8: Archer River to Pera Head (Remote
campsite south of
Weipa). We had directions to a private
campsite south of
Weipa. We turned off the main road to
Weipa and headed toward Arukun. Quite remote and I’m not sure I’d do it again.
Day 9: Pera Head to
Weipa. If you are short on time, you could completely bypass
Weipa. It’s a big mining town. Not much else unless you want to organize a fishing trip while there. It is also good to have a look around but if you are short on time, skip it. It’s quite away west from the main track north and will cost you atleast 2 days.
Day 10: Fishing at
Weipa
Day 11:
Weipa to Delhunty River. Now on
Overland Telegraph Line (OTL). Delhunty is lovely camping & swimming in Freshwater Creek. There are some lovely campsites off the main track here. I really enjoyed this part of the trip as the creeks and swimming is just great.
Check out a
campsite about 4km west of the track via small side track. Also recommend a
campsite on northside of Bertie Creek (just North of Delhunty).
Day 12: Delhunty to
Twin Falls. This is where you cross the famous
Gunshot creek with several very nasty entries. Quite a few people park on the northern side and watch other people coming thru. I found it an anticlimax as there are other more ‘adventurous’ creek crossings. This is some of the nicest country on the Cape. The creeks are just magnificent so we spend days just swimming and exploring. I think we stayed here 2 nights. There is a main
campground at
Twin Falls with
toilet facilities so it’s quite mainstream and popular. Although it is lovely here, there are more isolated spots that are just as nice. Elliot Falls is quite near
Twin Falls so when you go there, take note that you can actually climb under the waterfall and sit behind the water. Take care and do it slowly so you don’t slip down some of the crevices, but it can be done quite easily. We swam from Elliot Falls to
Twin Falls using inflated tyre tubes (from our spares). I recommend it.
Day13:
Twin Falls (I think)
Day 14:
Twin Falls to Nolan’s Brook (or
Bridge Creek). This is about as far north as you can go on the OTL. You turn west from here and head across to the Northern Bypass Road to cross the
Jardine (by Ferry). The original track heads north from
Bridge creek but you would need to ford the
Jardine (not recommended). Worth a look though just to imagine what everyone used to do. Quite intimidating.
Day 15: Nolan’s Brook to Seisa. Seisa is actually the town at the very tip, not
Bamaga.
Bamaga is just before
the tip (not on the coast). Seisa is where the boats come in. We stayed at a C’van park just east of Seisa (Loyalty Beach I think). There is only one C’van Park in Seisa and it is right near the boat jetty and we had heard it can be quite noisy with boats loading/unloading at night. You need to turn east just as you come into Seisa to get to the park we stayed at.
Punsand Bay Safari lodge is further east and looked like a superb place to stay. I’d recommend checking out their prices and checking to see if you need to book. My preference.
Day 16: Exploring
the tip. Drive to the very tip (Pajinka) and
Somerset.There is some very good camping at
Somerset and on
the beach south of there. We only went to
Somerset and there is some secluded camping down by
the beach that was quite popular. You can also get down onto the eastern beach and I’ve seen photos of camping there and it looks good. It depends on whether you want access to showers and washing machines by this stage (available at C’van parks) We didn’t go to Thursday Island but many people do. You can also hire fishing boats (drive yourself) and go on fishing charters.
Day 17: I’m not sure if we stayed at Seisa again this day.
Day 18: Seisa to
Twin Falls (The return trip) We decided to avoid the Bypass Roads and return on the OTL. While the Bypass Roads are fast, the corrugations are just horrendous so we used the OTL. While it carries the same traffic, it is at a much slower pace and doesn’t seem to suffer from as many corrugations (although we noticed a big increase on our return trip!)
Day 19:
Twin Falls to Chilli Beach (East Coast). We turned east and traveled across Frenchmans Rd to Chilli beach. Several very nice and adventurous creek crossings on the way (especially
Pascoe River). Chilli Beach was nice but very windy (by the look of the many coconut trees it is often windy here. We stayed 2 nights and visited nearby
Portland Roads while here.
Day 20: Chilli Beach 7
Portland Roads
Day 21: Chilli Beach to Archer River
Day 22: Archer River to
Cape Melville (almost). We once again turned east and traveled across to the south eastern part of Princess Charlotte Bay. We were aiming for
Bathurst bay but didn’t make it in one day so camped beside track in isolated area. This track may see one or two vehicles per day. This is about the only place we had to be careful with water. Almost all other campsites had easy access to shower & washing water while we carried water for drinking.
Day 23:
Bathurst Bay: Absolutely lovely. We camped at the eastern end of
the beach. It is a long north facing beach. Very lovely and highly recommended but very remote. There is a freshwater spring at the eastern end so we camped near there. I recommend this spot but it is the place where a guy was taken recently by a croc. I don’t understand how because the camping is an awful long way from the water (~300 metres) so I suspect there is more to that story then the media showed.
Day 24:
Bathurst Bay to
Cooktown. There is a track south from
Bathurst Bay to
Cooktown but you need to
check it is open (ask other travelers via UHF). It is quite rugged but saves doubling back to the main road. You will pass
Bloomfield Falls so make sure you take the detour & have a look.
Day 25 & 26:
Cooktown. Lovely place you could spend a week or more just exploring. We stayed in a C’van Park in town in Howard St I think. Quite OK.
Day 27:
Cooktown to
Daintree. We traveled via
Cape Tribulation which was lovely. Not long after you leave
Cooktown you will pass the Lion’s Den Hotel.
Well worth a look. We found it difficult to find campgrounds in Cape Trib so traveled on to
Daintree. Apparently the
campground in
Cow Bay is lovely so I’d probably try there next time. The alternative route is via the
CREB track. I’d love to do it but it is quite serious so you’d need good & capable company.
Day 28:
Daintree to
Cardwell (I think seems too long a distance so may have stayed somewhere in between). Make sure to stop at
Mossman Gorge. We also stopped at
Port Douglas but it certainly didn’t do much for me. Way too developed. We bypassed
Cairns (big cities don’t do much for us) & I’m pretty sure we traveled thru to
Cardwell. We stayed at c’van park here but there are some lovely National Parks worth stopping at. Depends how you are for time by this stage.
From there we travelled
home from there over about 3 more days via an inland route to visit my brother.
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