What an amazing place this is. We got really good vibes from the time we arrived. We loved the bush campsite and the space after the smaller and crowded costal parks. The railway carriages fit in so well. The tour to the lava tubes was unforgettable. The staff and the guides were brilliant – Dennis, our guide, even came and played guitar and sand songs with us around the campfire on our last night. Very special place.
Kerry’s snippets in fuchsia
Getting there
Port Douglas > Mareeba > Atherton > Ravenshoe > Innot Hot Springs > Mt Garnet > Undara (264km)
We headed towards Mossman but then turned left onto the Rex Range Road. Almost immediately we were on a windy uphill road for nearly 10kms. Some tight curves made it was a slow climd up.
Onto the tablelands we were soon in Mareeba – quite a big place. It was Anzac Day so there were diversions in place for the services. All shops were shut.
Atherton was also shut down. The road to Ravenshoe was a lot more hilly than I remembered from driving around the area previously. There is a stretch approaching Ravenshoe with lots of tight turns. But this time we had Mobi on the back, which certainly accentuated the curves. I soon had a good line of cars behind me but there were no turnouts or passing lanes.
Crossing the Barron River at Ravenshoe marked a real turning point in the landscape. Everything flattened out and all traces of rainforest quickly disappeared, replaces by gums. The earth also changed to that wonderful rich red that so characterises the inland. The weather also changed – no humidity.
Our next stop was at the Innot Hot Springs. Here, natural underground waters meets the surface 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. The spring is still known and recommended by European travellers for its healing qualities.
There is no formal entry/exit to the springs – you just walk across the sand to the creek or to a range of pools that people had excavated, some big and some small and personal. A group of kids were sitting in one pool so we tried another. I put my foot in the water and it felt normal, but then tried the other side. Ouch, this was so hot, unbearable. Such an incredible difference over a very short distance.
I dipped my toes in too – it felt so hot it was almost boiling…. Crazy really as in one small pool it was cool, then a metre to one side, really hot.
We did not take a dip – it really did not look inviting.
The road is good and it did not take us long to get to the turnoff west onto the Gulf Development Rd at Forty Mile Scrub. From there is is only 17km to the Undara turnoff and about a 15km drive in.
The Park
The Undara Experience is massive and all sites provide real bush camping. We immediately loved the feel of it, so different to the confines of the coastal parks. There are plenty of stone fireplaces around the sites.
There are heaps of van and camping sites, a range of permanent tents, some cabins and also many old railway carriages near the bar areas converted into accomodation.
The owner saw the carriages shunted to a side track gradually deteriorating. He negotiated a deal with Qld Rail and shipped them up. The bar and parts of the restaurant are also restored carriages. Great idea.
There is a pool, bar and restaurant but no driers in the laundry. There are a couple of camp kitchens and a dump point. There are not many ablutions – 1 block of 8 showers/toilets for the vans and campers. The previous weekend there was a rock and blues concert on there and the place was fully booked – I guess there would have been a lot of queuing.
We got a good long drive through site but had a bit to trouble setting up. We levelled Mobi using the Andersen levellers (the half moon sort), chocked the wheels and also the opposite wheels. I had the wheel of the jockey set side to side as there was a slight slope to the front. But when i unhitched the van (DO35 hitch) it lurched sideways on the jockey wheel and only stopped at the end of the chains – which we had left attached. We stabilised it there and scratched our heads.
So we hitched up again and re-levelled as the lurch had moved the wheels forwards on the levellers. We chocked everything again and aligned the jockey wheel more across the slope. This time we still got a lurch but only a small movement of the van. This is happening frequently and is very frustrating. Maybe we should have the flat plate on the jockey instead of the wheel. Maybe the curved Andersen levellers are the problem.
Day 0 – arrival day
After setting up we just had a look around camp. It’s a big place with lots so see.
In the evening, we went down and had a drink and dinner at the restaurant. This was pretty good – I have not had corned beef and white sauce for many years. I had a chicken schnitzel with a roast potato… Best schnitzel I’ve had for so long.
Day 1
It was quite a cool morning – we heard later that it was 9.7C. Such a change from the coast.
We were on the 8am tour of the lava tubes – there were 17 of us, including a family with 2 small kids. Dennis was our excellent guide. We got on a mini-bus for the short journey to the entry area, with our guide telling us the history of the place.
This area of Qld has a long history of volcanic activity – there are 164 known craters. But most of these volcanoes are not like what most people imagine a volcano to be – such as Vesuvius. They do not all have a conical shape with ash and lave spurting out from the round hole at the top. The type of volcano common up here is a shield volcano and is described as milk boiling over in a saucepan.
From the Undara volcano, the land sloped gently to the west and the lava moved that way finding the lowest points – the river channels. This mass of molten incredibly hot lava moved steadily west – in total for 160kms. Undara means “long way”, and this is the longest flow in the world from a single volcano.
Gradually the upper layers fo the lava began to cool and form a permanent ‘roof’ structure 5 to 15m thick. The lava below this roof kept moving pushed by the force of the volcano. Eventually it all cooled and in most places the roof collapsed. This encouraged rainforest trees to move into these areas as they trapped water. From above you can see the lines of rainforest trees marking out the route of the lava flow – this was very clear on the Kalkani rim walk we did the next day.
At Undara there are 9 lava tubes where the roof is still as strong as ever and the public can walk into them. But people can only enter with a Undara guide. There are a number of other tubes but these are not available to the public.
The Collins family who own the land on which the Lodge is built are direct descendants of the first white settlers in the area – 6 generations of the family have been involved. The Undara Experience was first opened in 1990. The family control the visitors to the tubes via the Lodge, while National Parks provide the on site infrastructure.
The Archway is the first place we visited. This is a massive open cavern and you can easily imagine the lava flowing through it. The rock is heavily scarred and this would have happened as the molten lava came up against the cooling outer layers. I hadn’t realised that lava actually melts rock.
From there we enter the adjacent tube – Ewamian Cave – which narrows as we proceed through it. But it only goes for about 100m or so. There is also a colony of bats at the far end and the are flying around ‘like a bat outta hell’ as we walk through – but they don’t hit anyone. Nor do they leave any reminders on our heads or clothes. These are micro-bats of 2 different species – one a horse-shoe faced bat and the other I cannot remember – both eat mosquitoes though. They are so tiny – about the size of a small mouse.
It is a short walk to the Stephenson lava tube, which is much larger but shorter. Here the relationship between the tubes and the rain forests is most obvious with many long tree roots making their way into the tube floor. The caves do sometimes get flooded by up to a couple of meters.
It was a great tour – a fascinating couple of hours and well worth the cost of $58pp.
In the afternoon we went on 2 of the self guided walks around the camp. First we walked up to the Bluff, a cluster of massive rocks providing good views over the lava plains and to many of the regions volcanos, and over the Lodge.
From there we went on to Atkinsons Lookout – going back down the Bluff Circuit and turning left onto the Atkinsons track. The tracks are all colour coded and marked with coloured triangles. This track crosses one ridge, crosses a creek and then proceeds up another ridge. There was water still trickling in the creek between the ridges.
It is a couple of kms to the lookout. We got to a large expanse of rock platform with massive boulders scattered around the side, and thought that was it. But we then found another track through and came to the lookout proper. The sign was covered in branches and rocks to form a teepee like structure. There were extensive views to the south.
That evening back in camp I lit a fire I had prepared in the little circle of rocks next to our site. I had collected the timber from around the area. As I did this Kerry read out from the guests guide that this is not allowed – a National Parks requirement – and we should have purchased timber from reception. Oops, too late now.
It was so nice having a fire – haven’t done that for years. Lovely too that it was cool enough to sit up close to it and gaze into the flames. There sure is something special about an open fire, especially wrapping potatoes in foil and tossing them in to cook. This is the best way to eat potatoes. Wh had a BBQ for dinner so it was a perfect meal.
Walking back from the loos I talked to one group of people who were obviously there for a good time. It was a family group with a couple of NZ friends. The man I talked to told me they had decided to try out something new for dinner, something friends had recommended. They got out the camp oven, put the roast in, dug a hole and buried it with fire coals covering it. They had left it there for about 5 hours slowly cooking away, before they got the second camp oven out to do the veggies. Oops, the roast was in the second oven and the one they had buried was empty. Plan B for dinner!
After dinner, we went down to the main camp fire. Each night between 8 and 9 one of the guides gives a talk or may even provide entertainment – a guitar and singing by all. This is free and it’s a good atmosphere sitting around the fire. Tonight we had a talk from one of the rangers on the animals in the Park. The bit on snakes was scary
Day 2
In the morning we drove out to the Kalkani Crater to walk the rim – I got the overhead photo off the web – there was no reference to copyright.
It is only 16km from Undara so we are quickly there. It is a good climb up to the rim – steeper than we expected. Walking the rim we can see down through the trees to the flat bottom of the crater and across to the other side. But it is hard to photograph from this level. Wish I has brought the drone. Actually we did bring the drone, but forgot the iPad to operate it.
We also see out across the plains and clearly see a number of other volcanos across the horizon. At one point we see the depression in the distant mountains that was the volcano from which the Undara lava tube was created.
We also see a line of rainforest trees amongst the gums, clearly marking the path of the lava flow. It looks quite weird such a powerful volcano looking nothing like one at all – just a curved shaped hill shaped like a shield (thus shield volcano name), while so many others all around us have typical conical shapes.
After this we drove back almost to the Lodge, to where we had seen that the Flat Rock – Circular View walking track crossed the road in. We reckoned that if we joined the track there we could knock a considerable distance off the walk.
The walk is around part of the 100 Mile Swamp, so named as it is 100 miles from the coast. The original travellers knew when they came across the swamp they had a 100 miles to go to get to Cardwell – which would take 1.5 months. It is hard to imagine how much time it took to re-supply the station…. 3 months round trip.
It is hot by mid morning and the 2.25kms to get to Flat Rock are thankfully completely flat. The Rock is right at the edge of the swamp, which is quite extensive and we could see lots of water at the edges. A number of ducks fly away as we approach. Nice spot. Also 2 very dead cane toads in a stagnant pool in the rock.
Then it is on to Circle View, which is more than a km away. We skirt the swamp and then head away to find a massive rock outcrop with more massive boulders scattered around. This does provide 360 degree views over the plains and back to the swamp.
Back at The Cruiser we have walked nearly 5.2kms, shaving 3.3kms off the distance it would have taken if we had started from the lodge. Hot and tired, I went to the pool as soon as we got back to camp.
That night at 8, Dennis was at the camp fire with his guitar. He was really good, mainly C&W but also with some Morrison and Credence.
It was a lovely way to finish our stay. Wonderful experience. I thought this may have been a bit corny but it was great.
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