chunder down under

As part of my new fitness regime I had a fairly energetic weekend, well on Sunday anyway. I got up and cycled down to the esplanade and went for a run, followed by a long and strenuous bike ride. All in all it took about an hour and a half and I returned home knackered. It seemed like a relatively cold day, although sunny, so in the afternoon I decided I would do the walk up to the top of Mount Whitfield. It's hardly a mountain (only barely a hill at 400m), but it is the nearest wild conservation area to Cairns opposite the airport. I'd thought about going up there last week when driving past at night and the slopes of it were on fire, lighting up the sky. The fire's had gone out by now, so I thought I'd give it a try.

It was only about 15 minutes cycling to get there, and I parked at the bottom and consulted the maps. Didn't look far at all, just warnings to beware of cassowaries. Apparently you are meant to shield yourself with a backpack in front of you as they strike forward and down (to disembowell you raptor-style). I had my backpack, so that was ok. Two bottles of water, should be enough.
I set off on the first leg, on what is known as the Red Arrow walk. This is more of a nature trail, and has various scientific notices about primordial plant life. It didn't take long to get to the first lookout, where I drank most of my first bottle of water and took photos looking down at the city.
The next section is the Blue Arrow walk. What had been an easy to follow path became more of a scramble up an ill-defined zig-zagging semi-path through the rainforest. It was harder going than I thought, I would not like to attempt this in the summer as I was drenched in sweat already. The view from the top was, well, not exactly breath-taking. I took some pictures anyway looking down into Redlynch valley, trying out the panoramic stitching function my camera.

It is a circular route so I began the descent. This was when I discovered that my earlier running and cycling must have exhausted me more than I thought as I was feeling it in my knees. It didn't help that the second part of the circle was a lot steeper and less of a path than the first, with lots of stepping over tree roots and vines. A sign saying only 8km to go didn't help, but I made it down before it got dark. Needless to say, the rest of the day was fairly lazy but at least I felt virtuous that I had done something - my flatmates had spent the day in the pub for a change.


Click to enlarge photos.