Tully Gorge National Park

June 24, 2024

Rain has been forecast for the whole of this week. We had a small shower last night but it looks like today will be dry. Tully Gorge, our destination for the day, is supposed to be one of Australia's wettest areas with around four thousand millimeters of rain a year (that is about fifteen hundred inches for readers who have yet to metricate) or eight times what my hometown in South Africa acan expect to receive. Not quite in the league of Pumelin National Park in Chilean Patagonia which gets six thousand millimeters a year but far more than to which we are accustomed.

The ride up to Tully Gorge was really enjoyable. We had very little traffic and the sugarcane fields were soon replaced with banana plantations. As we approached the hills the bananas gave way to rain forest. Surprisingly, birding was extremely quiet and, when we did stop to look for birds, the heavy grey skies made for difficult viewing.

A lot of water comes down tge Tully River.

The campground at Tully Gorge is almost empty and very quiet. The only facilities are toilets and dogs aren't allowed so that keeps a big percentage of potential campers away. However, that works fine for us. In anticipation of the lack of amenities we had showered before leaviing the campground in Tully. There is a non-operational outdoor shower here where we were able to have a good scrub so along with this morning's shower we're able to go to be bed clean.

The Tully River at the campground. Swimming is prohibited because of the risk of a crocodile attack but they allow commercial white water rafting operators to use this site as a launch pad. Maybe the operators don't want swimmers getting in the way of their clients.

The Butterfly Trail started from a few meters away from our campsite. Not many butterflies around in the grey weather.

All in all it has been a lovely day. The biggest plus has been the total lack of traffic noise, something that really gets to us while on the Bruce. We're also fortunate that the handful of other campers here are very quiet, unlike at Big Crystal Creek.

We head back down to Tully tomorrow.

Today's ride: 44 km (27 miles)
Total: 4,456 km (2,767 miles)

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