Today's sightseeing took us to The Curtain Fig Tree; Yungaburra and Lake Tinaroo

The Aboriginal Traditional Owners of the Curtain Fig National Park welcome you to their country and ask that you respect their special place....

The tree is situated just outside Yungaburra on the Atherton Tableland  - ask what's special.................

This park protects the endangered Mabi Forest and a large fig tree. The formation of this fig tree is unique; its extensive aerial roots drop 15 m to the forest floor and forms a 'curtain' 
A truly majestic tree which is very hard to capture due to its enormous height.  The tree is well protected by way of a wooden walkway around the circumference of the base of the tree

Yungaburra Platypus Viewing Area

Yungaburra boasts a platypus viewing area on the Gillies Highway, located on the Atherton side of the village. It provides you with a convenient viewing platform from which to watch the resident platypus swim and dive.  While we weren't lucky enough to capture one on film we did spot one who surfaced 4 times during our visit.  He was situated in the area below & not around the viewing platform area.  This is now our 2nd viewing of a platypus, the other time being at Eunguella National Park near Mackay

Under the Bridge viewing area for  sighting  Platypus

THE ATHERTON TABLELANDS

 There was folklore and romance of yesterday’s Australia in every piece of the collections , an outdoor museum of pioneer history where you can sit in the schoolhouse, stand at the bar of the pub and enjoy lunch at the Bakerville Tearooms.  
The collection currently features over 50 original buildings with intact interior displays, original machinery and vehicles, plus thousands of antique items and period memorabilia. It is regarded as the most significant ever assembled in Queensland. We spent nearly an entire day there absorbing it all -  and it was pet friendly, Scruffie had a wonderful day

THIS BANK BECAME WHAT IS NOW   ANZ  BANK  !!!!    why would I stand in front of it ????

From Herberton we drove on to Ravenshoe & out to Innot Hot Springs.  How I would have loved to have stayed & soaked in some of the natural springs.  Unfortunately Scruffie was a little too eager to get to the water & happened to choose the hottest of hot pools & thankfully he has since recovered from both his scare & also some scalding to his paws.  Never out of the wars at present......

The natural underground water issues at a temperature of 78C (though temperatures vary). Up until 1900, the mineral water was bottled and sent to Europe - mules hauled the water over the Cardwell Range to Townsville for bottling at the Innot Cordial Factory. 

COOKTOWN BOTANICAL GARDENS

One of the highlights of Cooktown was Nature's PowerHouse  (which includes the Charles Tanner and Vera Scarth-Johnson Galleries) - an Environment Interpretive Centre  and also Cooktown's , historic Botanic Gardens..

  

About Nature's PowerHouse In the Charles Tanner Gallery there are exciting exhibitions on the wildlife of Cape York Peninsula   The Vera Scarth-Johnson Gallery is home to the superb collection of botanical illustrations by Vera Scarth-Johnson of local flowering plants.  This lady also contributed in a huge capacity to the restoration of the Botanical Gardens Historical Cooktown Botanic Gardens have a brilliant collection of live specimens of  plants collected by Banks and Solander when they came on the Endeavour with Captain James Cook in 1770. Exotic tropical fruit trees have also been planted  to trial these trees as food crops in Queensland.  To finish off our wonderful stay in Cooktown we spent some more time at Finch Bay & by The Endeavour River FAREWELL   TO   COOKTOWN

Have left Lakeland behind us & arrived Cooktown mid morning today.....Top temp of 25c with wind speed of 30kmph....all in all a very warm breezy day     

Did one of the fastest camp set ups we've ever done & then it was off to explore.

In 1770 Captain James Cook & his ship the Endeavour ran afoul the Great Barrier Reef & seriously damaged the hull.  To avoid sinking over 50 tonnes of stores had to be off-loaded in order to free the Endeavour from the reef.  Cook needed to find safe waters so he sailed the damaged 368 tonne vessel into the closest river he could find.  They had a stay of 48 days in the harbour & Cook later named the river "Endeavour".  It was the only river in Australia that he named.

First stop was to Grassy Hill & the Lighthouse lookout which provide panoramic views of Cooktown, Endeavour River & Coral Sea - one of the best lookouts we've ever been to

Built in England, the lighthouse was shipped to Cooktown in 1885 & was automated in 1927                       

COOKTOWN

Cook climbed the hill on several occasions to view the surrounding reefs enabling him to navigate a safe passage out after repairing his ship

ENDEAVOUR RIVER LEADING OUT TO CORAL SEA

From there we drove out to Finch Bay to search for Crocs, but luckily they must have all been down river

ENDEAVOUR RIVER NP

FINCH BAY

MOUNT COOK NP

Mick the Miner

From Fisherman's Wharf (which was one of the busiest ports in Qld during the Gold Rush) was where we began the River of Life Walkway

The Queen's Steps made for HM Queen Elizabeth II for the Cooktown visit in 1970 for the opening of The James Cook Museum

Chinese Monument commemorating the Palmer Gold Rush

Milbi Wall made by local Aboriginal artists from tiles - depicts the local history from the creation of the Endeavour River to the present day

Capt James Cook 

Endeavour River & The Musical Ship

 James Cook Monument commemorating 1770 landing & the 1803 Gun which was cast in Scotland

 Enjoying Endeavour River

 Endeavour River

 Cooktown

WWI & WWII  Monument

James Cook Museum - Originally a Convent School built in 1889

Another day's sightseeing took us through James Cook Museum, Quarantine Bay & Keatings Lagoon.

 Anchor & Cannon from The Endeavour

 Quarantine Bay

Keatings Lagoon