Atherton Tablelands
We absolutely loved the scenery of the Atherton Tablelands. There are rolling hills full of dairy farms surrounded by mountains. Along some of the roads rainforest remains and it is quite pretty driving through it.
Wednesday
We spent the day driving around looking at waterfalls and little towns. One town we stopped at was called Malanda and here we did a tour of the Dairy Farmers factory. We watched them make and fill 2 and 3 litre milk bottles. They make and fill 9 million 2 litre bottles and 3 million 3 litre bottles a year.
Did you know? If empty milk bottles are not filled within 3 days they shrink by 15% that is why milk bottles are made with the circular indentation on the side of them. So they can plug them up to stop them from shrinking.
The factory delivers milk all the way to Darwin.
After our tour we were taken back to the cafe where our guide made us all a milkshake.
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| Millstream Falls |
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| Curtain Fig |
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| Malanda Falls |
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| Milla Milla Falls |
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| Milla Milla creek walk |
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| Milla Milla creek walk |
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| Zilla falls walk |
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| Alanna at Zilla falls |
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| Atherton Tablelands from lookout |
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| Dinner falls |
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| Dinner Falls walk |
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| Ellinjaa Falls |
Thursday
In the morning we went to the Crystal Caves in Atherton. It was very well done. We had to wear hard hats with lights on them. After looking through the cave ( man made with lots of different crystals in the walls and ceiling) the kids cracked open a 44 million year old geode each.
Geodes start their lives as a hollow bubble inside a layer of rock. The bubble could be from air inside explosive volcanic rock. As the mineral-rich water moves on through the bubble, tiny crystals are left behind, clinging to the sides of the bubble. Millions of years pass while this in and out flow of water gradually builds crystals inside the empty space.
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| Crystal Cave tour |
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| Inside the Crystal Cave. |
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| Kids looking at Amethyst Crystals |
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| Luke cracking a Geode. |
In the afternoon we went to Gallo’s Dairy and watched the cows being milked. I was quite amazed at how quick the process was. The cows are herded into individual stalls on a huge turntable. The turntable can hold 42 cows. As it slowly moves around the farmer at the beginning puts the machine on the cows udder and by the time it has almost done a full circle the second farmer takes of the machine and the cows reverse out of the stall turn around and walk out into the paddock again. Another thing that amazed me was that the bulls got on the turntable as well and went around for the ride. (I didn’t think that bulls were kept in the same paddock as the cows.)
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| Cows waiting to be milked |
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Cows being milked on the turntable.
The cow with pink on its udder had a calf
in the morning. |
Friday
We drove to Kuranda. After looking through the shops and the Butterfly Sanctuary we caught the scenic railway down to Cairns which took about 1 ½ hours.
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Careena was very happy
when a butterfly landed on her. |
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Todd's expert photography
Ready for take off |
The train stopped at Barron Gorge falls for 10mins so all the passengers could get out and take photos .It was very beautiful but Alanna and Luke don’t know how to appreciate the spectacular views.
We had to go through 15 tunnels (all hand dug with picks and shovels). Every time we went through a tunnel Alanna and Luke pretended to be nocturnal and mucked around. When we came out of a tunnel they pretended to be asleep. (I guess they are learning things in their own way.)
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| Crossing the bridge |
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| Barron Falls |
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| On the train |
We caught the Sky rail back up to Kuranda. I was a BIT nervous. (Everyone else thought it was fun and enjoyed teasing me.) I relaxed by the end of it.
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