Proserpine, Tully and now Mossman. We are discovering that small 'cane towns' have much in common. A bustling main street, the ubiquitous cane train railway lines, often either crossing or travelling along main streets of the towns, cane fields abutting footpaths, and, dominating the skyline, the imperious stacks of the sugar mill which, between June and November continuously belch smoke from the boiler fires and steam from the driers. And for those lucky enough to be downwind, the added bonus of airborne soot and the all pervading, sickly 'molasses' smell.
Indeed, at this time of the year in the cane growing landscape in FNQ between the coast and the towering, rain forested spine of the Great Dividing Range, the horizons are dotted with the outpourings of the many mills, all spitting the evidence of their activity skywards like a series of smoking volcanic plugs. As seasoned FNQ cane season travellers, we drove into Mossman with a sense of familiarity despite the fact this was our first visit.
But Mossman does have at least one point of difference....Jamaican Rain trees. The approach to the main street from the north is dominated by a short but spectacular avenue of these giants
which look equally grand when viewed the other way from the northern end of the main street.
Aside from the visual impact of this extraordinary arboreal display, it is of some historical significance.
Mossman, which interestingly was originally spelt 'Mosman' but later changed to avoid confusion with the Sydney north shore suburb, was founded in the late 1800's when those pushing south out of Cairns realised that the area was highly suitable for sugar cane production. A chap by the name of Dan Hart, who arrived in Mossman in 1874, was one of the leading lights in the town's development. Now Dan just happened to have spent some of his previous life in Jamaica (where they did grow the odd stalk or two of sugar cane!) and where, as you may have now guessed, Rain Trees flourish.
In 1904 Dan gave some seeds of these trees to the Reverend Edward Taffs, the local Anglican vicar, who thought they would make a splendid backdrop to his church. The good Rev. duly planed the seeds which clearly thrived and indeed do now line the street either side of St. David's church.
St. David's itself has had an interesting history. It began life as a typically wooden building, but, equally typically for this part of the world, it was destroyed by a cyclone in 1911. The rebuild in stone was designed to give it an old 'venerable' character. The rebuild was plagued by problems from the outset including the intervention of two world wars, further cyclone damage and a shortage of materials. The church was not completed, believe it or not, until 1952, which means that despite it appearance, it is relatively modern. But notwithstanding this spot of architectural sleight of hand, the interior is charming.
The quality of the stained glass windows, of which this is one example, was a real surprise,
as were the mosaics. I was glad I happened by on a day when this delightful place of worship was open to visitors. It is a gem in a town of otherwise generally unremarkable buildings.
And before we move on from this particular area, one more shot of the rain trees, this time of the absolutely incredible epiphyte growth which was to be found on almost every branch of every tree.
Each Saturday morning these 'be-whiskered' trees overlook the Mossman markets, the stalls of which are set up in the grounds surrounding St. David's.
Liz was a regular visitor, returning after each sortie with some wonderful home grown tomatoes, snow peas and other veggies. It was just great to be able to stock up with tomatoes which actually tasted like tomatoes rather that the hard, wooden, bland offerings from most of the supermarkets.
The successful development of Mossman as a thriving township was largely attributable to the fact that, very early in the piece, transport was provided by means of two 'tramway' systems, one of which provided for the movement of freight and passengers whilst the other serviced the cane industry by making deliveries to the local mill.
Much of this system remains active today as can be seen here, where the line from nearby cane fields crosses the northern end of the main street en route along Mill Street (imaginative!) to the mill at its end.
Sharing Mill Street with a cane train can be an interesting experience particularly when on the same side of the road and in the face of oncoming traffic.
This line ends at what is, by current standards, a relatively small mill. But in its day it was no slouch. In 1906, for example, the Mossman mill crushed 100,000 tons of cane, a record to that point. And then in 1971 this rather quaint little mill became the first in the country to fully computerise all its operations, so little Mossman mill has not been without its moments in the sun.
With the advent of a good local road system the rail passenger and freight services have long since ended in Mossman and the station is defunct, but like all cane areas, the rail network supporting the movement of the cut cane to the mill spreads throughout the countryside like a complex spider's web. We would love to know just how many kilometres of cane rail exist in Australia. It's my guess that the number would be mind boggling.
As I mentioned earlier, the main street of Mossman is a very busy place during the week. I took the opportunity to prowl around early on a Sunday morning, when I hoped to be able to snap away without becoming the mascot on a local's bull bar. Mission accomplished!
The northern approach to the main street through the avenue of rain trees brings one to a rather challenging intersection, for the uninitiated at least,
where a five way junction including give way signs and the can train crossing all add to the confusion. To enter the south bound carriageway of the main street from this point, the road actually curves to the left and then immediately to the right. I very nearly made the new boy mistake of travelling the wrong way up the main drag on my first effort!
This is a shot of that intersection looking east down Mill Street (the mill smoke stack is just visible above the give way sign). The main street runs to the right of the photo, past the rather grand Daintree Hotel, whilst the roadway off to the left takes one to the colourful building which houses an excellent butcher.
We had a much more convivial ale at the nearby Post Office Hotel, and as for the Mossman Hotel, once glance at the usual custom at the bar was sufficient to have us declining its offered delights.
The main street of Mossman stretches south from this corner for a distance of a kilometre or so and is home to an array of various shops and business which one would expect to find in a country town. The architecture of this, and most other parts of the town, is somewhat bland and, I must say, a little jaded looking.
But there were a couple of buildings which created some interest. This rather odd looking and quite incongruous building in Mill Street was built for the National Bank in 1935. Its designer was charged with the task of styling a façade with one sole purpose..."to give confidence". I'll let you be the judge of the result!
Far more impressive from our perspective was the Catholic Church and adjoining school building, which we discovered as we walked to the Mossman showgrounds (more of this later). This really is a gem.
In the piece on the Mossman Gorge, I mentioned that the Mossman River takes on a whole new attitude when it tumbles out of the rocky ravines of the gorge and flows past the caravan park towards the Coral Sea. To do so it passes under this bridge which heralds the northern extremity of Mossman and the beginning of the road to the Daintree and beyond,
where, as can be seen here looking upstream, it presents a picture of absolute tranquillity.
Despite the fact that here the water is probably nearly two metres deep, it is so clear that every feature of the river bed is easily discernible.
To reach this bridge, one walks northwards past the avenue of rain trees along a footpath on the western side of the road. And here is a prime example of that 'cane town criteria' I spoke of earlier.....fields of cane growing right up to the roadway.
If you look really closely you may be able to pick out two white upright objects in left middle distance.
Well, here they are again, at night. What is the answer to this riddle? The Mossman Show of course. To reach this bridge, one walks northwards past the avenue of rain trees along a footpath on the western side of the road. And here is a prime example of that 'cane town criteria' I spoke of earlier.....fields of cane growing right up to the roadway.
The object on the left is this huge rotating tower, seen here behind the Ferris wheel, on which, for some reason which completely escapes me, punters part with good money to determine whether or not they can keep their lunch down, or conversely, who can scream the loudest. Irrespective of all this, it does stand out, even at night as you have seen.
In town after country town during our travels we have always missed "The Show', sometimes by "that much" (just for all you 'Get Smart' fans!) But we finally cracked it in Mossman, where, I have to tell you, it is taken very seriously indeed. Whilst shopping during the preceding week we were told on more than one occasion to remember that they would not be open on 'show Monday'.
The circus rolled into town on Friday and Saturday. By opening time on Sunday it was all go and so were we.
Our first surprise greeted us at the entrance. There were no barriers or turn styles to ensure that all who entered had first paid the due fee. It was almost an honour system whereby new arrivals presented themselves at the small ticket box on one side of the roadway and did the right thing. With the number of folk coming and going free access would have been a doddle, but to the credit of the citizens of Mossman, their guests and children, all seemed to pay as required, including our good selves. And then it was off along side show alley,
which, for a small country town show, was surprisingly long and well found by way of rides and stalls.
But, even as we made our way along this avenue of hopefuls (the carnies hoping to relieve passers by of their hard earned..the punters hoping to overcome the challenges of the various stalls and walk away with one of the useless prizes on offer), the abutting cane fields served to remind us where we were.
The crafts on offer for judging were of a surprisingly high standard, and, as two who have in the past listened with combined amazement and awe to the advice of several worthies from the CWA on the subject of cake making, we were more than satisfied to note that the winning current cake was applauded for 'having the fruit evenly spread throughout'!
One thing which did really surprise us was the fact that here in the tropics a number of folk actually grow more than passable roses and gladioli. But the flower section contained one species (the name of which I have embarrassingly now forgotten) which was quite extraordinary.
We had never before seen anything like this hanging display of colour. The size of the flowering stem was a testament to the strength of the stalk from which it sprouted.
But enough of these oddities. Off to the main area, where, by the time we arrived late in the afternoon, all but one 'horsie' event had concluded. We decided, as we had a drink or two in the designated bar area, that we would not wait out the next two hours to savour the local band's offerings (believe it or not it was becoming a tad nippy) but we did stay around to watch the performance of the Far North Queensland FMX group.
Much to my annoyance I had a camera malfunction during the performance of this incredible team of young lads on motor cycles. The best I can do is to point out the truck on the right of this shot carrying the sloping platform and the impossibly steep looking small ramp almost centre shot.
Yep, these chaps riding very noisy cross country motor bikes hurtled across the arena, shot up the small ramp to gain some serious height in the air and then performed acrobatics with their bikes as they flew across the not insignificant distance between the top of the launching ramp and their designated landing site on the back of the truck, which had been positioned appropriately.
Some of the tricks included actually severing all contact with their machines whilst airborne, other than one hand on the relevant handle bar grip, and then twisting back into saddle just prior to thumping onto the landing platform (and all sorts of variations of this type of antic). A truly daring and incredible performance.
Of course, as is human nature I suspect many were just waiting for one of these dare devils to come to grief. One of their number did eventually oblige with a most inelegant landing which saw him and his bike up-ended in the grass, but, to the acclamation (and relief) of the crowd, he duly rose and rode off (but did not take any further part I might add).
Well, so much for the Mossman show and the township of Mossman itself. We did venture well beyond Mossman during our stay, including, as I have previously mentioned, trips to the Daintree, Cape Tribulation, and Daintree village, which I'll present as a blog itself.
During our stay we did take the opportunity to scoot down to Cairns for the day to have the Cruiser serviced and, as importantly, visit the nearby Dan Murphy's for a much needed re-supply.
I only mention this as an introduction to the next shot of a side street near Dans, which we couldn't resist. It will not mean much to many, but hopefully more so to others!
Port Douglas, which is a mere fifteen minute drive from Mossman, also rated a short day trip. Given that we had spent some time there during our trip to Cairns some years ago, our sortie on this occasion was really a venture of comparison. And it has changed. Port Douglas was not exactly 'sleepy' when we were last there, but now it is positively crowded, yuppie and becoming 'flash'. Not our scene at all.
Apart from the Daintree etc, we did venture north of Mossman to check out a couple of beach locations which had been on my radar for some time. Wonga Beach in particular had featured large in my thoughts. In fact we initially booked into Mossman for only a week on the basis of the thought that we might spend the second in this area at Wonga.
The value of a recce! Of the two parks at Wonga beach, only one takes pets, and frankly, having made an inspection of what was on offer, a second week in Mossman did not even rate the need for a discussion. Absolute beach front on crowded sites which are little more than bare dirt might be fine for some....not us. We had spoken with friends who put out their shingle here for a few days to discover that the lack of amenity is infinitely worse when the south-easterly on shore winds whip up, as they are very prone to do at this time of the year. Another idyll shattered!
As we were driving along the Esplanade we spotted a rope hanging from one of the many coconut trees on the roadside. Odd, we thought. What's going on? Well, it was a case of what's coming off! Coconuts.
A closer inspection revealed all. Enquiries with this delightful young lass, who was busily stowing the harvested nuts in the pictured van, revealed that she and her intrepid partner,
who was indeed at the upper end of the rope,
contract with the locals to harvest the coconuts when they are ready. The home owners on whose front verges these trees grow are quite keen on this arrangement. It saves them a deal in public liability insurance...a falling coconut can make quite a dent! Oh, and by the way, the rope is merely to use lowering the nuts to the ground. Our indomitable harvester actually shimmies up the trunk of each tree using nothing more that a waist belt and large crampons on his boots. I hope the product of this venture provides them with a good return!
Our trip to Wonga and beyond took us past an area some 15 kms north of Mossman which boasts a number of pretentious looking houses perched on a high ridge. As we passed the entrance road to this area we noted that it carried the name 'Port Douglas Views Estate' Well, there was nothing for it but to see if this was correct.
It was! We had seen one particular white house from the bottom road and managed to find it. From the vacant lot along side this mansion we were afforded magnificent views,
south along the coastline to Port Douglas (the last knob of land in the middle distance...it was an unfortunately hazy day)
and, with a sweep of the camera to the right, over the patchwork of cane fields growing, freshly cut or recently replanted and the mountains beyond.
This was one of those occasions when the trusty camera was not an entirely faithful servant of reproduction....these views were nothing short of stunning. God only knows what our friend of the white house on the hill paid for the privilege of enjoying them whenever he chose. His was the only one so positioned.
And finally, as we made our way back to Mossman, a snippet of WW2 history. We popped in to visit the site of the only Japanese bombing of the eastern coast of Australia, and a fortunately petty effort it was at that.
This rather tarnished plaque most adequately describes the events of this particular morning, events which are commemorated with what I would have to describe as the most quaint, home-made memorial we have ever come across.
We rather felt that young Carmel deserved better recognition for her unwitting place in history.
Let me finish this offering with a real time update. Liz and I are now beginning the second week of our month in Kurrimine Beach, where, at last, the weather gods are truly smiling on us. Night time temperatures of mid teens followed by balmy days of very high twenties to low thirties. And at the moment, no wind to speak of.
Liz remains in fine fettle, although I am still struggling through the beginning of the third week of shingles. Things seem to be slowly improving but I am afraid mine seems to be a bout which will run its full month before real improvement.....roll on...I'm seriously fed up with the constant pain and lack of energy! Next, our visit to the Daintree and Cape Tribulation followed by our few nights at Fishery Falls (probably in four or five day's time).
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