With Rocky passing its first test, the Kuranda Range, with flying colours, I felt confident in hooking up Matilda and resuming our great adventure. It took us a little time to reorganise ourselves so that everything was back in its proper place, but it was all part of a process to ensure we had everything we needed.
We bade farewell to Mama, Pa and Chris and Shelly and headed into Atherton to refill the fridges and pantry. The IGA had one of the best selections of fresh food we had ever seen - and the large carpark meant even we could get an undercover park, keeping everything nice and cool.
Full of food, fuel and water, it was time to head west. With every passing kilometre the landscape became browner and dryer as we moved from rich dairy farms to open savannah woodland. We pulled off the road to check out Millstream Falls, reputedly the widest single span falls in Australia. During World War II, nearly 100 000 troops were camped in the vicinity, and some of the evidence of their traning camps could also be seen in the surrounding countryside.
We considered stopping for the night an Innot Hot Springs, but decided to continue on to Undarra. Undarra Lodge is the stepping off point for tours of the Undarra Lava Tubes - a network of lava tubes stretching a whopping 160 kilometres from the 190 million year old Undarra Sheild Volcano.
We set up camp late in the afternoon - and the boys wasted no time in checking out the quality of their workmanship in their regreased and refurbished push bikes.
Undarra Lodge is set up at the site of a former outstation of Yaramulla Station. Resumed into National Park, it is still operated by the Collins Family - original settlers in the area. When it was established, they took a slightly different approach to a prefabricated low footprint building solution. Their collection of 23 original railway carriages have been tastefully refurbished into accommodation and dining carriages - and Jo was more than a little taken with the concept!
With the bulk of the tourists leaving this part of the world by the end of September, we felt like we had the park to ourselves. With the only tour of the day running after lunch, we took advantage of the cool morning to hike to the crater of Kalkani Volcano, a classic cinder cone volcano not far from Undarra.
Kalkani Crater Walk
Kalkani Volcano was one of over 160 volcanoes in the area. It is a cinder cone volcano, meaning it has steep sides and a deep crater - clearly visible today. We walked around the crater rim - and were afforded good views of other volcanoes in the area, as well as being able to clearly see ribbons of remainent rainforest in the collapsed sections of the Undarra Lava Tubes.
After lunch we joined a tour of the Arch Tube, and our host Clive provided an excellent run down on the history of the region, the discovery of the tubes and their subsequent study leading to the formation of the National Park. It is believed that the Undarra Shield Volcano was consistently active for a period of around 32 years producing some 23 cubic kilometres of lava which flowed along the original water courses in the area some 190 000 years ago. As air cooled the exposed lava, the outside set, however inside the lava, now insulated from the cooling air, remained hot and flowed like treacle. The tubes wind and twist just like you would expect any natural water course, diverting and even splitting around obstacles.
One of the collapsed sections
The sheer size and scale of these lava tubes has to be seen to be believed. We had gingerley ventured into some lava tubes in Western Victoria durin the first part of our journey, and we didn't feel particularly comfortable in them at all. These much larger tubes felt much more stable - but that could be because we were with a tour and if something happened we were pretty sure we would be missed!
We found the camping at Undarra very relaxing, but the following morning we packed up and continued west to Mount Surprise. One of the by products of volcanic activity is often gem stones. We had discovered the thrill of fossicking for garnets at Gem Tree in the Northern Territory. Mount Surprise is better known for its Topaz. This clear gem stone looks like glass - and we set to work early the next morning to make our fortune.
We arrived on the fossicking area shortly after 7.30am, and set to work turning over rocks and processing the gravel. It was a good thing we arrived early as the temperature continued to climb into the mid 30's. The Little Helper soon tired of the effort, and took some time to read some more Harry Potter, whilst the Little Fisherman continued to dig - his enthusiasm unabated.
We were prepared not to find much Topaz - but we started to second guess ourselves, and we soon had a little pile of rocks of various crystaline forms. Some were very pretty, and almost opaque when held up to the light. Our illusions of granduer were fading fast - and when we finally called it quits around 10.30am we desperately hoped we had found at least something!
When we took our gear back to Pat and Pete and the Gem Shop, our little pile of rocks was politely examined. As all hope faded, Pat plucked a small piece of glass like Topaz from the bottom of the bag. Success!!! We were thrilled we had indeed found something - and dutifully acknowledged we should perhaps have paid more attention to the instruction provided.
So, what was it worth? Well, that is a hard question to answer. You could buy nicely tumbled larger pieces of Topaz for the pricely sum of $2.50, our little specimen represented a full morning of memories - it was, in a word, priceless!
But does it all really matter? Not really, but there was no better way to wash off all the dust than a swim in the Bedrock Park Pool!
The only other outcome of the day is a new souviner... I am going to come up with a new mandated minimum distance trees can be spaced on rough access tracks... Damn it. We have squeezed through some impossibly small places before, but this one added insult to injury by leading to a dead end requiring some careful reversing to get back through. Jo kindly pulled the offending sapling on the return journey ensuring we didn't smash the wing mirrors. Another dent - another story!
The next leg of our journey sees us return to the coast. Our intended track down towards Cardwell along the old Cobb and Co road - also called the Kirrama Range Road is still closed. It has been closed since Cyclone Larry and then Yasi battered the range and caused major damage to the surface and bridges on the road. Originally it was the main route to the tablelands, and the telegraph line followed much of its course to Normanton. It is due to open any time now - in a matter of weeks, but sadly not in time for our travels. Not to worry - we have something else special planned.
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