COOKTOWN - PART THREE (1 - 10 JULY 2013)

"Make the most of it" is the unwritten creed of us knights of the road, irrespective of how hard it may be to genuinely embrace on occasions. 

 

And that is exactly what we have been doing in Cooktown over the past few days whilst we have been belted with gale force winds of unrelenting ferocity. 

 

My old mate Hens B would be proud of the manner in which I am now studiously ignoring the potential outcome of the constant screaming eddies which are clearly set on ripping our awing from its mounting.  In all our travels we have never encountered anything like this....moments of almost complete calm followed by howling assaults which reach a crescendo within a minute or two before again dying away.  It is a real bugger at night.  But we are learning another lesson in what we and the van can take without breaking something or loosing our sanity.  What doesn't kill you makes you stronger??  The one thing with which we are still struggling in all of this is the fact that these onshore gales are warm.  At home we would not only be bashed but freezing.

Enough of the grumbling (it's survival bragging really!)..let's see some more of Cooktown.

 

Indoor pursuits beckon strongly in this weather, so it was off to the James Cook Museum,

 

 

 

a definite Cooktown 'must do'.  The building itself is almost as much a story as its contents.  Completed in 1889 as home to five Sisters of Mercy, a Catholic chapel, but more importantly, the local school, the building was left vacant with the evacuations of WW2.  As an interesting aside, the nuns were all transferred to the little Tableland town of Herberton, one we visited not so long ago.

This magnificent building then became the home of a US forces communications centre which played a crucial role in the battle of the Coral Sea.  With the withdrawal of troops at the end of the war, and the decimation of Cooktown's population, there was no longer a need for a school.  The building remained vacant and becoming increasing derelict until serious damaged was inflicted on it during the 1949 cyclone.  

Almost unthinkably now, this ornament to the original wealth and importance of Cooktown continued to rot away until 1969 when the Catholic Church lit the fuse...it placed a tender in a local paper for its demolition!  Outrage! And outrage was just what was needed.  

A scrambled petition to the Bjelke-Peteresen government of the time resulted in a promise of dollar for dollar if the locals could raise $6,000.  They did.  Then some bright spark in government actually had a good idea.  The Queen was due in Cooktown in mid 1970 for the bi-centennial celebrations of Cook's landing.  Would she formally open the museum?  A request to Buck Palace received a positive response.

But that left just four months to complete a massive restoration programme.   Incredibly the government came up with another good idea...two in a row.  Rather than put the work out to tender, it assigned a clutch of employees from its own public works department to Cooktown to undertake the task.  By all accounts they achieved their assignment with goodwill, good humour and obviously good speed.  Good job all round, and 'her nibs' duly did the honours.

The building is now home to a wonderful display of items associated with Cook's landing, (including an original anchor and cannon from Endeavour......it is seriously large close up), together with wide ranging displays of the cultures of the local Aboriginals, the immigrant Chinese who played such an important role in Cooktown's development and the lives and roles of the various prominent early families.

Another significant building to be found in the 'backstreets' of Cooktown is the original hospital which has been somewhat cut down, but essentially saved and restored to its original splendour.  The 'Kingdom Hall' is now the home to the local Jehovah's Witness group, of whom, given the limited population of Cooktown, there seemed to be many.

 

 

 

 

With the advent of slightly improving weather we finally returned to Charlotte Street to complete our jaunt along its easterly end to the wharf area where, surprise surprise, visitors and locals alike can indulge themselves with a seafood meal in a café,

a particularly smart (and pricey) restaurant,

shaded by an expansive planting of palm trees for that 'tropics' look (or out of newspaper on the dock.) 

On the approach to the wharf one passes the 'Milbi Wall', created by the local aboriginal groups, on which some wonderful artwork supports the text of a number of local 'dreamtime' creation stories.

The wharf area is the home to a small local fishing fleet, a number of reef charter boats and to smaller vessels plying the reef sea routes.  We took some comfort from the fact we were on dry land as we watched one such boat, refuelling complete, thump its way south-east into the inshore swells whipped up by the days and days of wind.  We could only imagine what it must have been like further to the east beyond the reef barrier on the open sea.

 

One real boon of having a resident fishing fleet is the opportunity to buy directly from the boats, the crews of which hang large signs in the nearby parking area to advertise their catch.  And the word of such an event wings its way around the town at warp speed.  A constant flow of traffic to the dock is the inevitable result. 

Liz and I were the recipients of this bounty on one occasion when I was able to buy enough Spanish mackerel for two meals each for the princely sum of $20 direct from the decky on the 'Arafura Queen'  (seen here before the weather broke)

 

What a delight this was for more reasons that one.  I had been previously peeved by what I considered to be the 'let's con the gullible tourists' price for the same product in the dockside 'Gilled 'n Gutted' seafood shop where a similar offering of 'makie' would have set me back $30.  Ah, the benefits of local knowledge.

As would be expected, the dock area also provides the venue for varying numbers of piscatorial hopefuls of significantly different skill levels.  I did not join their numbers.  My local informants made it clear that at this time of the year fishing that spot is very much a cast and hope affair, one undertaken if there is absolutely nothing else to do, or a chill out in the sun is the order of the day.  What sun?? 

 

And, of course, there was another small disincentive on a number of the days of our stay!  This sign is only posted when a confirmed and credible sighting has been made, and whilst it is highly improbable even the biggest croc could actually make it up to the top of the wharf, I had no desire to prove the exception.

Apart from our extensive wanderings around Cooktown itself, we did venture further afield on a couple of occasions, firstly to nose around Archer Point, a bay which is accessed by traversing 10 kms of dirt off the Mulligan Highway. 

We were told that the track was in reasonable condition.  Everything is relative!  As we hammered across some serious corrugations and made our way through a number of dry river beds we were both reminded of trips along the Kangaroo Island north shore road many years ago.

Now, I accept that Archer Point was not at its best on the day of our visit.  (the beach can just be seen on the right of this shot)

It is normally the windiest place in Cooktown's natural environs at the best of times, and today it was really turning it on.  (panning left from previous..looking out to sea from the bay)

 

To our astonishment, as we climbed the track north of the bay, we came across a group of 'free campers' ranged about a nearby beach area.  Apart from the drama of actually accessing the place, we were convinced they must have been anchored down to star pickets to remain in one place.  Why would you?  In fact, one of this intrepid group actually drove past me as I was taking some photos with the shouted plea, "Can you turn the fan off?"  "Sorry, mate, and don't put your awning out for at least a week."

 

I am sure Archer Point is a fine spot on a good day, but today was not one of them.  As surprised as we were to find the caravans, we were equally taken aback to find another group of campers in tents tucked away in thick bush at the edge of the shoreline.  Liz was horrified.  After all we had been recently told of the dangers presented by the local taipan population her comment was, "Crocs, snakes, spiders, mozzies and sandflies.  Howling winds and rain. What are they trying to prove?"  I had several thoughts, none of them really complimentary.  You just have to love the spirit of some FNQers!

Which leads me to another aside.  We were recently discussing the number of travails suffered by those who inhabit this part of the world on a full time basis.  Floods, fires and cyclones are merely a way of life.  The general view of the manner in which the locals cope usually runs to words such as 'resourceful, resilient, responsive, and reliable.'  Not for Liz....she is sure they are just 'resigned'!

The coloured sands at Elim beach is another local tourist mecca...a 'must see' so we were told.  Off we went, 50 kms north of Cooktown to the aboriginal township of Hope Vale where the necessary entry permit was duly obtained. 

And it was on this trip that we learnt another bit of 'FNQ speak'.  A 'fully sealed' road, is not necessarily that, despite local advice and all that shows on the maps.  "Mate, you can't have everything...just be grateful most of it is black top these days".

Permit in hand (the sands are in an Aboriginal Reserve area) we set off on the twenty minute or so drive to the beach.  Here we were pleased to find that the 'pretty sandy track' we were expecting was actually being covered with a good layer of hard dirt,

well, for all but that last section that is,

   

which took us to a collection of ramshackle tin sheds and shacks

 

and the entrance to the 300 metre beach walk to the coloured sands.

Liz took one look at the muddy tidal flat over which we would have to ramble, complete with its fringing mangroves and immediately decided that this was ideal croc country.  She decided both firmly and on the spot that she could live without a close look at the coloured sands.

I ventured a distance past the entranceway from where I could see that the sands were underwhelming in the extreme, particularly when compared to those at, for example Rainbow Beach.

That's it folks...those steaks of brownish red are the 'coloured sands'.  We were very glad that we had actually enjoyed the drive out here through country that in many places reminded us a great deal of much of the topography of Kangaroo Island, because as a spectacle 'the sands' were a consummate waste of time.

 

 

So, let us farewell Cooktown with sunset from Grassy Hill.  We were so glad we did this early in the piece before the weather closed in.  Despite the lack of cloud for colour on this particular evening, it was still a spectacular sight looking out over the sea at the freighters highlighted by the fading sun as they plied their way north and south on the passage inside the reef

 







and in the other direction, over the Endeavour River estuary, the township and the mountains beyond.  

  



 

After what had been almost an 'historical overload' in Cooktown, we were off for a complete change of pace....two nights at that iconic Aussie pub some 30 kms south......the redoubtable Lions Den, where, to my dismay we found we were completely electronically incommunicado.  My plans to have completed this blog four days ago were in tatters. 

 

But we did manage to pass the time!  More of that and our sojourn in Lakeland in my next.  We have now dropped anchor in Mossman for two weeks which should allow me to catch up.