After spending one night in the Atherton Tablelands three years ago, we decided to have a real good look around and almost three weeks later we are still here.  Its been a lovely area to explore with so much variety in a compact area and extremely well set up for visitors with lots of great places to camp or stay.  Its known for agriculture and we think you’d be hard pressed to find another area in Australia that produces the following: fruit and veg, dairy, nuts, tropical fruits, beef, honey, wine, liquors, whiskey, tea, coffee and of course, chocolate!

We’ve done heaps of walks, camped in 8 different campsites and visited lots of interesting places -including some on a food theme (ie two dairies, an ice creamery, coffee, chocolate and a tea plantation), some man-made sights (gems and history) and amazing nature (plants, animals, hot springs and waterfalls) .  The photos below tell the story.

 

 

In Yungaburra, which is a lovely, quaint village, we did the Peterson Creek 4 km walking track, along a wildlife corridor replanted by volunteers in 1998 and still maintained by volunteers.  Got a stiff neck from trying to see a tree kangaroo there (no luck).

THE HUNT FOR A TREE KANGAROO CONTINUES – We’d heard that they have two tree kangaroos at the Nerada Tea Plantation, so we headed off.  On the drive through some back roads, an oncoming car stopped us and said there was a tree kangaroo on the road.

MORE INFO ON TREE-KANGAROOS – Although aboriginal people knew them all along, they were first found by a Norwegian naturalist, Lumholz in 1882. Size – 0.5 m tall, av weight 7kg and a long tail (600-700mm).  They are not nocturnal so active day and night (cathemeral), and they are the only kangaroos that can “walk” or move each foot independently forwards and backwards bipedal (which is up on backlegs and helps when climbing).  After habitat loss, the biggest threats to them are being hit by cars or killed by dogs when moving on the ground between trees or forests.

The only other species of tree-kangaroo in Aus is called Bennetts Tree Kangaroo and it lives from the Daintree to Cooktown and is larger.  There are 14 other species in PNG (Papua New Guinea).  After the excitement of our personal sighting, we continued on to the Nerada Tea plantation and saw one of their ‘almost pet‘ ones very high up in a tree near the cafe. All we could see was the back of him – no excitement there!  We missed out on the tour of the tea plantation (Nerada is the largest supplier of tea in Aus) so continued on to Gallo Dairyland and indulged in extravagant cheese, chocolate, and ice cream purchases.

SOCIALIZING IN THE TABLELANDS – Even though there is less socializing happening during these times, we seem to still meet fellow travellers and enjoy sharing stories, playing ukes, and playing games. Ran into fellow Explorer owners, Jeff and Sue, in a Herbeton car park, had drinks with the neighbors, Wendy & Colin, in a Caravan Park (CP) on Lake Tinaroo, had a great uke playing session with Shelley in a Mareeba CP and then enjoyed catching up with Geoff & Vicki and learning a new game, Sequence, with them.

The Historic Village at Herbeton is the largest privately owned historic village in Aus and its set within 16 acres of beautifully landscaped grounds.  Its a living museum experience and has been laid out to resemble a tin mining town with a garage, newspaper office, butchers, chemist, grocery store, frock salon, toy shop, coach house, tractor shed, radio store and tool shed; all stocked with period wares.

In 2008 the owners, Craig and Connie Kimberley were on a driving holiday and spotted the closed attraction.  Five months later, they owned it and undertook extensive restoration and repair projects to reflect everyday life in FNQ as it was from the 1880’s onwards.

 

PS – WE LOVE OUR BOOTS!!! They’ve looked after us well and taken us hundreds of kilometers into interesting places.