Sept 7 ... Forrest Beach (Ingham)

We enjoyed a leisurely morning in Ingham before heading back out to Couquette Point seeking the elusive cassowary ... all to no avail, but the views of Innisfail were exceptional.

Johnstone River

Innisfail

We then drove a little way down the coast and turned off again to explore Etty Bay. This was ANOTHER place that cassowaries had been seen "just yesterday" but there were none there today ... at least in the 30 mins we were about. But it was a lovely little place and it consisted of a few houses and a caravan park, right on the water, so we have noted it down for a future visit.

Etty Bay

Etty Bay

We had decided to give Tully our morning tea money to help with their cyclone recovery and as we drove south through the cane fields there was plenty of evidence of Cyclone Yasi all these months later.
Most of the houses had been repaired but the trees were devastated. In places as many as 50% were just blown over, or snapped off, and most of the rest were stripped bare. The mountainsides looked quite sparse and the creeks were full of logs.
There was a lot of roadworks around Tully and some delays but in general things seemed to be getting back to normal, even though it was obvious that Carwell and Tully had been very hard hit.
We could see that the bananas had come good again but lots of cane fields looked very sad.

Tully was thriving. We had an excellent morning tea at the Ulysees Cafe (blue butterflies everywhere!) and a walk around the shops. Morgan would have spent a fortune and  I was tempted by some really original clothes and other goodies ... but Garry had a lucky financial escape this time, mostly due to the carrying capacity of the van!

Cane fields near Tully

Lots of fields had only young cane.

Further south and it was Cardwell that was the most disappointing to see. Garry and I had been there 2 years ago and we remembered it as such a pretty place. The foreshore was a wide grassy and shady parkland and we had stopped under the trees for lunch. This had all gone. It was replaced with a thin belt of sand and all the tree trunks were in the water. Many of the houses were still badly damaged and quite a few were deserted. There was nothing pretty about Cardwell now.

Cardwell foreshore with Hinchinbrook Island

The foreshore "parkland" at Cardwell

After some fantastic views from the Cardwell Range, we were soon on our way to Forrest Beach, just out of Ingham. This was a recommendation from my Uncle Jim and it was beautiful. On the way in we saw huge flocks of brolgas so I had a good feeling about the place even before we arrived.

Forrest Beach is a small settlement on the coast and the park is attached to the hotel. It only has 50 sites and  and at present there are only 9 vans here. We were very fortunate to get a site right on the front looking out over the water. It is idyllic and we plan to stay as long as the weather holds. Should it get too windy it is a bit exposed but we hope to be here a week or so.

Site 13 at Forrest Beach

20 mteres to the beach!

Because it is such a small park, everyone is very friendly and so far I have been given home grown tomatoes and fresh fish. The hotel is really nice too and we have had dinner there which was very good, and Garry plans to watch the Rugby World Cup on their TV, so I guess we will be going for drinks quite regularly.

North Forrest Beach

South Forrest Beach

Our View.