Aussirose Travel and Photography: Mareeba

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MAREEBA

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Second time back to Mareeba. Last time my good friend Dorrise from Cairns took a small group of Virtual Tourist friends on a trip through Mareeba to Cooktown, Daintree and Cape Trib before the big VT Meet in Cairns in 2014. That was a long time ago. You can read all about it here.

This time we bypassed Cairns and hit the mountains from Innisfail along the Palmerston Highway. After a bit of research, hubby & I both agreed that this way across the mountain range would be the best. It was pretty good, with only a couple of steep bits and windy road. We struck this idiot driver that overtook us on a blind bend near the crest of a hill. Luckily nothing was coming the other way, otherwise we all would have been gonners.

In Mareeba, I had booked us into a cute caravan park out of town, however whilst driving there, I hadn't realised that the 10 minutes it took us to get there seemed like forever and upon arrival we realised that the internet was a bit iffy. As I had to work the next day, we changed our mind and headed back into town to find a caravan park more centrally located. Luckily I had not been asked for a deposit when booking. I had thought that as Mareeba wasn't out in the total whoop whoop, and it is up high, that the internet reception would be good, even if a little out of town. Shows that one should never assume. I promised myself that from now on, I would always ask about the internet reception upon booking, especially when I needed it for work.

Anyway, back in town, I chose the first Caravan Park that came up. Tropical Travellers Caravan Park is located close to the Information Centre in Mareeba. I was sad that this place did not have a pool like the one out of town and only a couple of trees that other people had camped beside. It felt very clinical with concrete surrounding the Office, had no character and no gardens. Not a good start to showing Mareeba to hubby.

There were however hot air balloons each morning, although why people would hot air balloon in Mareeba, I don't know why. At least when we did hot air ballooning many moons ago, it was in the Hunter Valley with nice scenery to look at around the vineyards.

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GOLDEN DROP WINERY

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Last time I was in Mareeba, I was very impressed with the Sparkling wine at Golden Drop, and no wonder, in that very year, 2014, it won a Gold Medal at the Perth Royal Show. The Golden Drop Winery is well known for it's mango wines and fortified wine. We both liked the lemon cello and mango cello. I bought the sparkling and also sent home a bottle each to my girls. I need to get some tequila to go with the mango cello for margaritas.

The mango trees here are looked after well. They are really healthy and shaped neatly. The friendly lady also gave us a taste of their new dry sparkling. I was very impressed, however sad to learn that they had sold out. So maybe I will order on line next year when it comes out.

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JAQUES COFFEE

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From wine to coffee.

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Jaques was every bit as good as it was last time. I will only buy a coffee if it is good, otherwise I consider the price these days not worth it, especially when I have good coffee at home. I do not like weak coffee like Dome.

Jaques is good coffee! And we paired that with freshly cooked scones. They were delish!

We were so impressed, that we decided to hang around until 10am to taste the coffee liquors.

Well, we loved the Pirates Treasure liquor which is a combination of rum and chocolate. We are looking forward to drinking from our shot glasses beside a fire or whilst soaking in mineral springs in outback Queensland.

When we arrived, there was a guy spraying the coffee trees. I took a video, see below. We had a chat and he said that he was spraying a mixture of minerals to keep the coffee trees healthy. He said that they had just finished spraying these minerals on the mango trees at the Golden Drop. So no wonder both trees looked nice and healthy. Interesting to learn.

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GRANITE GORGE

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We had a ball here last time with the cute rock wallabys and lovely picnic lunch complete with the sparkling wine that I had purchased from the Golden Drop

This time I was sad to see that they now were charging $15 per adult, but as I wanted hubby to experience what I had, I paid the $30 from my pocket money. Well that was a waste of money. They also had animals in small cages which was sad to see and the camp area didn't look well maintained at all.

We both agreed that it wasn't worth it.

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DAVIES CREEK

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This was a lovely surprise. We were told about Davies Creek and falls by a local in town. The drive out is on a dirt road so take it easy. We passed the camping area and just before the falls is a nice picnic spot.

Swimming here was awesome. Some people chose to park here and walk up to the falls which seemed to have a bigger swimming hole. This would be a better idea than driving up to the falls. We did drive up, but then hubby said it was a steep climb down and back up again with a lot of steps. I was glad to sit in the car and do my code cracker puzzles.

I highly recommend to visit here rather than Granite Gorge.