This area is rich farming country. Volcanic action of ages ago has produced perfect soil for coffee, nuts, tropical fruits as well as livestock grazing. Here we go.
We make our first stop before even leaving Mareeba. Saturday is market day and we just have to check it out. There is fruit aplenty, papas (papaya), persimmons, star fruit, and pineapple – more I am sure plus many tropical plants both edible and ornamental. The orchids are beautiful. We leave with pineapple crush and tart lime pound cake. We stroll through a huge range of wonderful crafts and art pieces but we’ve no way to get it home and nowhere to put it when we get there so it makes it a little easier to resist.
Next stop, Coffee Works, a coffee lovers heaven. It is a museum of all things coffee – roasters, grinders, brewing devices, and a fair bit of lore like why some countries serve little expresso cups and others mega mugs. Bet you are dying to know! It really has more to do with what the coffee is replacing. In counties where it replaced wine and hard liquor it was served in little cups. Where it replaced ale, it was served in larger cups. The amount of coffee is reportedly 7gms no matter how big the cup or how much water is used to brew it. What do you know? There was a kind of women’s temperance movement to outlaw coffee houses. Seems the guys were hanging out at the coffee shop ignoring their families. That movement didn’t take. An early Pope was asked to forbid consumption of coffee in its early days; but he tasted it and like it so that never happened. Besides the museum we have lots of tastings. Coffee includes 4 Australian and a dozen imported beans roasted to various finishes. I don’t even get all the way around but focus on the Australian brews. They are all wonderful. We move on to tea and chocolate tasting, again, no disappointments there. No, we are not done yet. I try expresso made with the Australian Black Mountain beans which is so perfect that I have to buy some. To finish off the experience Kent and I both try 5 different liqueurs ranging from a very stout not so sweet version to cappuccino and latte that are more like mocha milkshakes. One of the strong, not so sweet versions came home with me. There’s 500 mls of the 750 I am allowed to bring home! Add a little package of their milk chocolate (it is “free” with the expresso purchase) and we need to get out of here and on to other attractions.
Humpy nuts and produce and we walk away with locally grown and roasted macadamia nuts. They are the best I have ever tasted.
Now we need to work off a few of these calories so we begin the waterfall circuit. It is a loop drive with a number of falls down short trails through lovely forested patches that have been spared the axe mostly because they are too rugged to timber. Many are protected now as part of national or Queensland parks.
There is another odd Australian critter that I hope to see. The platypus. Along Peterson Creek in Yungaburro is a viewing area. We make our way very quietly to the viewing blind and peer through the slots down to slow flowing muddy water. Hm, that’s kinda of yucky. What’s more, no platypus! “I never see them here. Try walking the trak under the bridge. I saw a little one there.”, says a local who is just returning to his car. We are here, lets go for it. We trek under the bridge where it is even more dank and creepy. Still no platypus. We wander along side the muddy creek twisting and turning all the while eying the still surface. Nothing. Just as we get back near the bridge, we spot bubbles on the surface. We watch. More bubbles then nothing. All at once a little head and that weird looking bill pop up. He chews for a few them gracefully dives and disappears from sight. Of course, we have to stay and are thrilled to watch him feeding for 10 minutes or so. Chewing and paddling his little front flippers. Awesome.
Tonight we settle in with a great view of Lake Timaroo and a clear dark sky just filled with beautiful stars.

Our alarm clock is the raucous call of two pair of orange footed scrub fowl that are nesting around camp. It is sort of like roosters in camp. We are up early and there are two trails within walking distance so we are at the trailhead by daylight. This is Cassowary country and they say that best time to view is early. We dodge rain sprinkles and watch intently but no Cassowary to be found. So, what’s the difference between temperate rainforest and tropical. Oh, maybe 20 degrees hotter and lots more vines climbing up and down and just waiving out in thin air in search of something to grab onto.
We head back home for a late breakfast and hope that the rain eases up. It doesn’t but we decide to head out anyway to the discovery center. It is a lot like the US National Park Visitor Centers with lots of information about the rainforest and great boardwalks plus a high tower to get a close up look at each level of the rainforest. It is all very well done but the heavy rain today makes it difficult to appreciate and pretty much impossible to see any wildlife. Still, a fun walk.
Our way home takes us past an ice cream shop and we have to stop – it quit raining now! Their specialty is tropical fruit flavors locally grown. A sampler cup includes mango, sweet banana, black sota, and wattle seed. Yes, I ate banana ice cream. They are all delicious.
Passing beauty, a Ulysses butterfly. It is a magnificent iridescent blue. In the lawn at the Ice cream stop was a lone Kangaroo, our 1st confirmed siting.
Moving on, we have a couple more trails. Birding is slow except for a huge group of large bats high in the canopy. They are very noisy and constantly moving jockeying for the best roosting spot it guess. Amazing and a bit creepy. I am glad I have my hat!
We close out the night with a quiet dinner in camp. Overnight score, mouse (2) people (0). Lost another apple and a bag of corn chips

Ok Jucy, here we come. An easy cab ride and we are picking up our new campervan. It is a carbon copy of the one we had in NZ with the exception that this one has a pretty serious stinky funk. I don’t think stuff ever dries out here in northern Queensland. Time will tell how that plays out. Might need a fabreeze run. We stock up groceries and necessities and head for Daintree National park, even further into the tropical rainforest. The road is curly and narrow and the journey includes a ferry crossing across the Daintree River. Cool.
We set up camp and as expected, it is sticky hot. Pool time. We cool off a bit in the pool plus a cool shower then set up for our first night up in the penthouse tent on top of the campervan. It has lots of screens and it seem like it might be cooler. Let’s hope. It rains pretty much all night. There is a tropical cyclone off shore. No threat of severe weather but lots of rain the next couple days.
We sleep well and awake early to light rain but nothing insurmountable. While we were upstairs there have been mice in our house. Mouse (1) people (0) lost an apple and a bag of chips overnight

It is a rainy but thankfully short walk to the airport in Christchurch and we are anxiously awaiting the next step of our trip, Australia. Air New Zealand carries off a great flight to Brisbane, on time, pretty good dinner, and smooth- except the landing that was a bit bouncy. No problem, we are safely aground. Qantas didn’t do so well. We are an hour late taking off and make up nothing on the way. Bit of a bummer but again, safely on the ground plus no real hassle with coronavirus anywhere along the way.
We step off the plane and it hits us in the face – 10PM and still over 80F and so humid the air feels thick. This is going to take some getting used to.
Late arrival puts us late into the Lilybank Guesthouse. We find a note that we are in room four, through the kitchen and the lounge and down the hall to the left. The key is in the door. All true. It is a cute guesthouse with fun décor and wonderful hostess – helpful but not intrusive. We even have a resident tree frog, Gary. Original plans had us to the guesthouse by 4PM or so. It would have been a lovely place for an evening. Still, a great night and a quiet breakfast of toast, granola and yogurt and a chance to sample vegemite on toast. It is awful!

Most spectacular – Doubtful Sound
Most precious – a lone penguin waddling ashore for the evening
Most awesome – Albatross soaring just beyond our reach
Most delicious sweet – Deep south hokey pokey ice cream
Most delicious savory food – Sheffield Special pie
Most un-appreciated – Whitebait fritters
Most exhilarating – Dart River Jetboat
Most fun – swing bridges on the rain forest trails
Most in touch with the world – Walks through cool rain forest
Most appreciated – clean and well cared for place filled with courteous, friendly people
Most annoying – Sand flies

We are up early with the intent to get another day of hiking in here at Arthurs Pass. An added benefit, we catch our first NZ sunrise here in the mountains. It is very grey on the west horizon and by the time we finish breakfast it has begun to sprinkle. We ditch the hiking plan. We are heading east to the Banks Peninsula in hopes the rain is held back by the mountains between us. Kent likens the route to a drive through the rural mountains of West Virginia, sometimes steep, always curly, and with lots of those dippy spots that bounce the campervan sideways. I enjoy the view. We both enjoy a stop at The Famous Sheffield Pies, in Sheffield of course. They are known for their savory meat pies of all description. The Buttery Chicken and Sheffield Special are both about perfect; thick tasty gravy with lots of filling and a perfect flaky crust. Beatrice (our Navman GPS) sends us on a less than direct route but we end up on target, route 75 to the Banks Peninsula. At a quick stop in Little River we get advice to take the high loop (the tourist loop) around the peninsula for great views. While we are there, we also try another NZ ice cream, Killinchy Gold. The flavors are delicious, hokey pokey (Kent this time) and blueberry lemon for me but for creamy smoothness Deep South creamery has them beat.
Our destination is a campground in Akaroa, a town on a deep bay of the same name. The tourist drive does offer phenomenal views of the many-fingered bay below and the rolling pasture land that makes up most of the peninsula. Below, turquoise blue waters are dotted with sailboats and even a cruise ship. The high route with stops and a detour or two adds an hour to our drive and tests driver’s nerves and campervan brakes. Again, I very much enjoy the views. Fortunately, traffic isn’t very heavy so we don’t often have to share switchbacks with others and can pull off for lots of pictures. Beatrice offers one last bit of terrible guidance and we start down a very narrow – barely one lane- steep gravel road to the campground. Luckily, we meet a local just a few hundred yards down the hill. It is so narrow we actually have to back up to let him out. At the top of the hill the local gets out of his 4-wheel drive and asks, “Are you aware that gets very narrow and steep just below? Are you going to the Holiday park? Follow me, you need to go in the lower entrance.” We did. It was great advice. Local 1. Beatrice 0. We have a partial bay view from our site and a walking path into town. Perfect. Turns out the path is quite steep with lots of steps, flashback the waterfall walk yesterday, but we manage a lovely stroll around town and a quick stop at the grocery. We find a bottle of Oyster Bay Pinot Noir for me (oh, I will share) and antihistamine for Kent and his sand fly bites. Home again now for a quiet diner and our last night in our own little road maggot in NZ.

Three days left to explore New Zealand and the forecast is for Sunday and Monday to include heavy rain. So, slight change of plans. Our route back to Christ Church crosses the Southern Alps at Arthurs Pass and right through the Arthurs Pass National Park where there is trail access to a large alpine area. We need good weather for that so we have to blast past the remaining west coast itinerary and head for the mountains. Kent is not too heart broken about missing the Hokitika Wild foods Festival but I was hoping to visit some of the jade carvers in that village. The alpine calls louder!
We are up early. The kea provide entertainment during breakfast then we hit the road with about 225 km to cover. Much of it is on curly mountain road squeezed between mountain ridges and Tasman Sea making for great views but slower driving. A couple hours in and it is time for a rest stop in the town of Ross. I can’t resist the sweets at the little café and make it back out with a chocolate-raspberry bar, “best of the lot” according to the wonderful lady behind the counter and a ginger crunch bar, one that just looks tasty to me. They are a great treat and the stop a nice break in the drive.
Kent is pretty used to this little road maggot, as the locals so affectionately call them, and we make great time. We are at Arthurs Pass before noon. It still boggles my mind that an alpine region is as low as 5000 feet elevation because we are so far SOUTH. Looks just like the areas 10,000+ ft in Colorado. Weird but awesome. Hike one is a little off the beaten path and leads us back the valley of the Otira River where clear, frigid waters tumble across boulders down a steep narrow valley. The trak is pretty rocky and steep in some places but it is beautiful. We are well on our way back out of the river valley when a helicopter appears overhead. It circles over us then back the river valley and again over our heads. The noise is very disruptive in the quiet space but it even being here is really odd. This is not a heli tour area. Hmm. We walk on back to the campervan and he continues his circles above and around us and in neighboring valleys. Even odder, when we get to the trail head carpark we find a ranger in direct contact with the pilot. He enquires as to who we have seen on the trail and adds, “someone heard a scream further into the more rugged mountaineering area back the trail we had just been on”. Even though no one saw the mishap, they are on the search for an injured hiker who “might have fallen off the cliff of Arthur Mountain”. Stuff happens. We are off the trail safely then on our way with the helicopter still surveying the rugged terrain.
We still have a bit of energy so we check out the number one trail here, the walk to Devils Punchbowl Falls. Yikes, it is about 450 steps each way…I mean stairsteps either built of stone and earth or flights of wooden stairs. The falls are spectacular. Wind scatters the ribbons of water as they plunge down the cliff face. I say it was worth the walk even if it causes an ibuprophen night. We are settled in for the night at a DOC campground in the National Park. Kent is working on our spaghetti dinner. Yum.

Set-up: Rowi Kiwi are strictly nocturnal. The kiwi rearing room is lighted 12 hours off from the outside world, daytime at our night time so they are active when people are to observe. Only three of this year’s kiwis still remain at the center, an adult and two very shy juveniles. We are forewarned to be very still and wait for our eyes to get used to the near complete darkness.
We step through the inner door into the nearly dark, red-light lit rearing room. I can’t even see my hand in front of my face. We chill, remembering the guide’s advice to let our eyes acclimate to the very low light. Ok, now I see shapes. Another visitor points out a fuzzy ball a bit smaller than a football. It is the adult Kiwi moving around its enclosure scratching in the wood and leaf litter. We watch intently and keep an eye out for the juveniles next door. Our eyes become more accustomed to the light and I spy a long narrow beak just in the shadows of a nesting box. All at once a slightly smaller fuzzy ball scurries out in search of a snack. Wow they have huge feet. In the wild they eat grubs and worms but here it is a concoction based on beef heart mixed with veggies and minerals. The little guy is pretty hungry and visits two feeding locations. We watch intently until he eats his fill and trots back to his safe hiding spot. I sure hope that they are successful saving these unique critters.