Day 353 | Near Lava Plains Station: where's the tropical part of Tropical North Queensland
91 km | zzOz total: 9,679 km
All of a sudden I realise I’m moving into a different part of the continent.
It’s been similar for so long, kinda arid mulga and grasslands, well since Mullawa really, and now, there’s a whole lot of stuff I don’t recognise.
Near Louisa Lake a couple of nights ago the trees started to get straight and tall, I felt like I was back in South West WA, not quite Pemberton but it ain’t acacia. There’s whole new flocks of parrots I fail to recognise, those ring necks and budgies had been with me for a long time.
The vegetation is getting broader leaved, obviously higher rainfall here and most startling of all some humungous fig trees, that’s native figs, complete with tiny, inedible fruit.
I’m back climbing again, the last hour really slowed as I chugged up in granny cog looking for a decent campsite, actually any campsite, the grass at the side of the road where ummunched by cattle is thick and long. As usual the site presents itself exactly when required, a cattle grid and a track away from the road.
And that is a wedge-tailed eagle, a monster bird, in a tree.
Another world and the realisation has finally hit me: only a few more days and I’ll be appraising the Pacific Ocean, I will have biked from west to east across this continent.
Just a quick run up to Cape York, a month in fact, and Stage 2 of this zigzag will be complete.