Our Proposed Itinerary - Try not to laugh too much!

[Hooley]

Hi all,


Long time since I posted on here and you have all been great before so I'm hoping for some more of that expert guidance.

Myself and my mate have just been putting together our trip itinerary tonight. As you ay or may not remember we have just 12 days for our trip all told so which isnt ideal but nethertheless we persist!

Here goes:

Day 1 - Cairns to Cape Trib (all easy enough, done that lots of times).
Day 2 - Cape Trib to Laura via Cooktown.
Day 3 - Laura to Musgrave Roadhouse via Kalpower Crossing
Day 4 - (feel free to laugh here) Musgrave Roadhouse to Chilli Beach via Coen. In all honesty this is the bit we are not too sure of...is it doable?
Day 5 - Chilli Beach to Weipa via Frenchmans Track (see worries over point 4).
Day 6 - Weipa to Bramwell Junction
Day 7 - Bramwell Junction to Twin/Eliot Falls
Day 8 - Twin/Eliot Falls to Bamaga
Day 9 - To the tip!
Day 10 - Tip to Punsand Bay
Day 11/12 Travel Back via the most direct route on PDR to Cairns (can you do this in two days?).

So what do you guys think? We'll be doing this in a Landcruiser so campdog may automatically say its not possible :D

Not much rest on the trip but we've got a week in a wicked camper traveling from Cairns to Airlie Beach and Townsville after this which will provide the necessary recuperation time.

Cheers for any help.

Chris

[Scorcher]

G'day Hooley,

I've done similar whirlwind trips up to the Cape myself over the years. Great if you like driving most of the time, as well as setting up/packing up every day, but doesn't give you much time to appreciate the place.

When time is short, we have always preferred to concentrate on visiting 1 or 2 spots for 3-4 days minimum, rather than try to visit every point within the Cape on the one trip. However, if this trip is just a "reccy" (?) for a future, longer trip into the Cape, the itinery would give you a good overview.

With regard to your itinery, most of it looks easily do-able (not sure of the travelling hours of the Musgrave to Chilli Beach stretch). The only comment I would make is that Day 5 & Day 6 will see you double back over a good stretch of the same road. Had you considered doing (Day 5) Chilli Beach to Bramwell Junction via Frenchmans Crossing, and perhaps include your visit to Weipa on the way back south via the Batavia short cut?

Anyway, just a suggestion to consider.

Have a good trip !

Scorcher

[Hooley]

Thanks for the reply mate.

Have you got any more info about the Batavia shortcut as we are looking at our HEMA atlas of the top end and can't see it on there.

Good suggestion about doing Weipa on the way back though and its defo something we can look into as it will allow us to spend some more time at Chilli beach and chill out a bit.

If you had just the 12 days, what would you suggest as an ideal trip?

Chris

[geoffjy]

Hi Chris,

If you want a bit extra spare time up your sleeve, you can go from Weipa to the falls in one day easily. This might give you a bit more relaxation time there if you wanted. Its only about 3 hrs max to Bramwell from Weipa. The condition of the Batavia shortcut is excellant. They have graded the road as well as widened it, and put culverts in the crossings. The only thing to be carefull of is the jump-up to the grids as the road is about 100mm below the grid itself. Definitely will do damage if hit at the right speed.

You wont have any dramas from Musgrave to Chilli Beach. The road is pretty good and you will have time to do it.

From what i have heard, Frenchman's isnt hard to traverse and only taking about 3hrs to do. Several of our forum members have done this over the last couple of weeks.

[Scorcher]

Thanks for the reply mate.

Have you got any more info about the Batavia shortcut as we are looking at our HEMA atlas of the top end and can't see it on there.

Good suggestion about doing Weipa on the way back though and its defo something we can look into as it will allow us to spend some more time at Chilli beach and chill out a bit.

If you had just the 12 days, what would you suggest as an ideal trip?

Chris

Chris,

The Batavia shortcut is most likely the track you were planning to take anyway. It starts just a few km's south of where Frenchmans Crossing hits the Telegraph Rd. This saves backtracking further south to the Weipa PDR/ Telegraph Rd intersection.

My ideal trip if I only had 12 days in The Cape??

Every trip is different for me. Some are purely sight seeing with groups of friends that are joining us for their first trip. Some are with my young girls, which can place limitations on where we go & what we do. Then there are the years where just the boy's go away, where we sit on a beach or river bank on the Western Side of the Cape, and spend day's on end just fishing, shooting, fishing & simply enjoying being away from civilisation. Each type of trip has it's own benefits.

Scorcher

[campdog]

If I was on a short trip I would leave Cairns one Arvo and drive all night.Lakeland to Laura - Musgrave - Archer River and then onto Weipa in one hit.Miss all the tourist traffic at night.Then Spend a day or so in Weipa then across to Batavia Downs and head to Bramwell and up the Tele Track.Maybe Camp overnight along the way and onto the Tip the next day.A bit of time at the top and drive back and stop off at Viriya Point.From there onto the falls and continue onto Captain Billy.Next day down the Development road and onto the frenchman track and into Chile Beach if tim permits..Then out through Iron Range National Park to Archer River.Probably camp at Foxes.
Then onto Musgrave and Lakefield National Park and onto Cooktown along Battlecamp Road.
A stay overnight at the Lions Den Hotel.
Next the Bloomfield Track and a stay overnight in the Daintree and then onto cairns.
This would give you a taste of most parts of the Cape.
My thoughts on it anyway.
Other option would be on the way up go to chile beack first on way up and out via Frenchman track and wiss Weipa and on way back across through batavia to Weipa.
John

PS -I wish I hadnt wrote this.Now I want to go again.Bugger

[batesy]

Agree with Geoff- just go Weipa to the Falls in a day. Still do the OTL though.

No point camping at Bramwell roadhouse, better to pick somewhere chilled on a creek - Canal would be my pick.

[geoffjy]

Yeah, Eliot Falls will be crowded that time of year too. Canal is less than 1km past it and generally has a lot less people there. Its also a short run back for a swim at the falls.

[Hooley]

All great advice guys, thanks!

At the moment we are looking to rule out Weipa until on the way back (if at all) to make things easier for ourselves.

My thoughts behind putting Bramwell down as a camping spot was that we would ask around others there and see who else was leaving at a similar time and tag-a-long for the OTL section. Having said that by all accounts with that time of year being the driest and my having done the Savannah way from Cairns up to Darwin via Doomadgee would you maybe say we dont need to worry and can just head onto the track on our jack?

Cheers fellas
Chris