Waltzing Matilda: Cooktown to Cape Mellville -the Starke track! Oct 15

After a delay of some hours waiting for a legal document to arrive we finally got out of Cooktown about 4pm! On the Cape at last! But the first stretch is bitumen and no challenge at all. We arrived at Isabella Falls about 5pm ready to camp if it was nice, and found another camper there. After introductions it transpired that they were also considering Cape Mellville but were put off by a magazine article about the trip and had decided against it. They also told us about a camping spot about 50m from them with a lovelly little "bath" in the creek.

They (Stuart and Nira) also loaned us the magazine. The story was at once disturbing and inspiring! We decided we would do the Starke Track! to Cape Mellville, but not go to Bathurst Head where we would have to drive over mud with a surface crust and who knows what underneath!

In the morning we suggested to Stuart and Nira that if they still wanted to go to Cape Mellville we could travel in convoy. There is security in numbers - they have HF radio and we have sat phone etc. Already we have been able to help them out with txt messages to their friends who are broken down in Cooktown. So it was agreed. We will meet at the boat ramp at the mouth of the Starke River tomorrow morning, for the start of the track proper.

The Starke River boat ramp area was thick with sand flies! We managed with lots of repellants, but decided we could not stay there another night! In addition another camper there told that a croc had come up the bank after his little dog a few days before, so we shouldn't go close to the water's edge. Well we don't have to be told twice! So when Stuart and Nira arrived we headed straight off to the Starke Track.

Now we were starting into 4wd country. This is not a mainstream track, and is not maintained.

The road is washed out, there are numerous dry creek crossings with steep entries and exits.

Things were going along fine, with some weaving and tight fits between trees on the sides of the track and overhanging branches. Until they didn't go along fine! Joe was trying to fit the vehicle between trees on the side of the track, with only centimeters to spare, when CRUNCH. The drivers side wheel went up on a termite mound, tilting the camper to the left and into the tree he was trying to squeeze past. The sickening crunch was caused by splintering fiberglass. :(

It was not easy to get put of either! We couldn't go backwards or forwards without doing more damage. Joe dug the termite mound down to avoid the wheel lifting up over it.

He also started to cut down the tree with the chainsaw but soon saw that it would fall onto the car possibly damaging the solar panels, so that was no good. Eventually he put the "Treds" under the left side wheels to tilt the camper away from the tree! and then he could back out. Then he cut down the tree so we could go through. Now the window is taped up to keep the dust out.

And there was certainly lots of dust -bull dust in fact.

The bull dust turned to sand which was quite deep and soft. Stuart and Nira got bogged twice and each time let their tyres down further.

We noticed the scenery in spite of the driving challenges though, with a number of different vegetation types in white poplar gums, paperbarks, and a very pretty tree which we think was E. Tesselaris.

There was also a strange termite species which built up the trunks of healthy trees. It's colour was red which must have been the colour of the deeper soil, since we saw other termite mounds the same colour. The surface soil was white so it did look surprising. See the orange trunk in the background here...