December 30, 2008.

Before leaving Marnie’s we went to check out the area, first Shute Harbor and Airlie Beach a tourist area north of Mackay. Airlie beach is the jump off point for most of the tours to the Great Barrier Reef and is full of tourists at this time of year. They have a really great salt water pool for the people that run along in front of the beach and has different areas of different depths for all swimmers. Sorry did not take any photos.
The area around Mackay is grows mainly sugar cane and there are miles of sugar cane fields. They cane had been cut in early October and the fields are now been planted for the next year. You can still see the tracks for the sugar trains, but some of them are not used now as the cane is carried by truck into the factory. There used to be several sugar factories in the area but they have been closed and one super factory now takes all the cane.

December 31, 2008
This morning we all got up early to go up to the Finch Hatton gorge to go Forest Flying 350 meters of flying fox/cableway through the rainforest canopy up to 25m above the forest floor. Was an amazing experience, very hot and humid on the ground but a lot cooler in the forest canopy. The area that the cable goes through is an area that is inhabited with thousand of flying fox bats and there were a large colony of them in residence and we got to fly by them on the cable. We then headed to Eungella to see if we might see a platypus in the Broken River. No platypus but did seen lots of turtles. The up the very twisty narrow road to the outlook and back to the outlook at the Chateau. The view is spectacular but there was a haze over the area and we could not see all the way out to the ocean at Mackay. After a long day out in the sun we all went back home, had dinner and then all went to bed early and woke up in the New Year.
January 1, 2009.
We say good bye to Peter, Val and Andrew this morning and continue on the journey. It is very hot and humid, +36 and 48% humidity but it will get less humid as we are going inland. As it is New Years day there is not too many places open and most of the attractions are closed. We go from lush cane fields to dry ranch land and miles of flat farm land. Much like driving through the prairies of Alberta and Saskatchewan but with different trees and scrub. There are also a lot of mines on the way to Emerald, mostly being coal mines. We will be staying here until the 3rd. We meet Lane tomorrow but she is not back here until the around noon so we will have the morning to do some shopping for groceries and to have a look around. Has started to rain so things will cool off, hope it will clear off by the morning.