Day 18 - 23/07/2013 - Cooktown - Mossman/Port Douglas

Had a good look around Cooktown, where James Cook beached his barque "Endeavour" for urgent repairs.

It was very windy and not too warm, the water didn't look inviting, especially with these sort of warning signs!

There was a sizeable Chinese population in Far North Queensland and these statues commemorate their contribution, not always appreciated at the time! They were very hard working and tended to show up the mainly British and Irish immirgants of the time.
They were also very well versed in medicine and growing vegetables etc.

Some views of Cooktown from the lookout.

Cooktown was the end of our journey north, from now on we will be heading south along the Queensland and NSW coast.

We came upon the Black Mountain, which basically looks like a heap of black coal but is actually black rock and looks quite forbidding.

 

 

 

Quite a few (read lots!) of banana plantations, the blue plastic bags are put over the bananas to make them ripen quicker on the tree.

 

There are also lots and lots of ant hills to be seen along the road.

Coming down out of the mountains to see our first overnight stop at Mossman, a few km up the road from yuppie central, Port Douglas.

We had difficulty getting a site in a caravan park (we hate booking!) and finished up with a non-powered site very close to the highway, where the trucks carrying the sugar cane to the mill stop about 10pm and start again at 4am!

These are very noisy B-doubles and we weren't too sad leaving this caravan park!