Cardwell

Monument to early settlement in the area? No guesses for who got the pointy end of the stick.

The weather has remained kind to me. After waiting about Townsville area for a week, I returned north for a bit.  Need a bit of rest and recuperation.

The Strand, Townsville

Holey dooley, Townsville is going flat out!  Stopped for a breakfast on The Strand just on sun up and for a quiet spot of brekkie. But it was not to be. First was the guy with the whipper snipper. He left and noise was still settling down, when the edge trimmer strolled past. He was followed a short time later by the dreaded leaf blower. Peace now? No, the leaf sucker was next.

Finally some quiet?

No.

A monument to turtles of the past, while their smaller offspring are harvested in the background.

The turtle harvesting commenced on the beach. Once they were large, big enough for two men to pick up and carry away. Now they are a lot smaller, and it's faster to harvest them with machines. 

Australian Slang:

Holy dooley: Exclamation of surprise.

flat out: busy

Brekkie: breakfast

Rollingstone: I won the cake!

So excited. -You beauty! I won the cake! And a six pack of beer, but who cares about that. I won the cake!
I'd picked up coins today on the road, and when I counted them had $1. The Lions raffle was on, and the couple coming around asking to buy tickets. Tickets were $1. I knew it was mine:- I'd found $1.
Of course I won, else I would be so excited, eating cake and writing about it! Still, it's exciting :-)

Cardwell

Been slow to leave Cardwell. Bruises on my legs needed time to heal. The calmness and scenery have also played their part..
I won't miss the sand flies though. They are well fed now.

On the road again, Cardwell

Well, 5 hours later, I'm back where I started in Cardwell.

The day before rode over a hill to see two cyclists on the road! Wow.. Need to catch them. And I did for a bit. But I think they didn't like my music, and soon pulled away. We met up again and spent the night at a caravan park in Cardwell. They are riding for Break the cycle campaign 2015.  Great stuff. We talked long into the night. Was really glad that we'd chanced to meet up.

We rode out next morning, but my destination was Long Pocket. Will and Safi were off to Ingham.  Unfortunately the "road" to Long Pocket closed in 1881, and is now a very rocky walking track. Never letting that stop me, I spent an hour pushing up hill before admitting defeat having covered less than 1km. Running out of water also, and pretty stuffed, battered and brused, I returned to Cardwell for the night. 

The lyrics from the Toby Keith song were running in my head;

'Now my body says, "You can't do this boy"

But my pride says, "Oh, yes you can

I ain't as good as I once was

Thats just the cold hard truth'

Maybe it wasn't a wise decision to have tried that. Now I'm bruised and sore. And will have to take it easy for a while to recover.  I've also reconsidered my plan to head to Charters Towers by a similar route, that would have involved much much more climbing.