Mon Repos

We have decided to leave the touristy track for a while - enough traveling with a bunch of other people and having to be at a certain place at a certain time. We were seriously considering doing a tour of Fraser Island (“You MUST do Fraser Island!”) but we both felt that we’d had enough organization (yes, I did say that!) so we have found some rather eccentric things to do instead! We’re also missing Steve Irwin’s Australia Zoo (Crikey!) and all the other glitzy attractions on the Sunshine and Gold Coasts.
After the Capricorn Caves, we drove to a tiny little dot on the map called Mon Repos where there is a turtle rookery. We are here in the season to watch the mama turtles drag themselves up the beach and lay their eggs - the little guys do the scurry to the beach thing in January. John and I and about 40 of our closest friends were taken down onto the beach in total darkness to watch a loggerhead turtle do her thing. There is a research facility there, and they use the tourists to generate revenue. Apparently once the turtle has started digging, she doesn’t appear to care about having a bunch of people watch her, and it was amazing to watch. The one we saw wasn’t particularly large (and of course we’d seen it on TV - but this was a totally different experience!) It had rained hard all day, but cleared up for the evening. There wasn’t much moonlight, but the guide did a really good job of lighting the spot where she was digging and we all got to watch her lay her eggs. She had come quite a long way up the beach to get above the tide mark, so she had a long way to go back, followed by her retinue. So that was a neat experience.
The next day we drove to Noosa which was big and touristy ( I know we said we were avoiding that stuff, but we had been told that a walk along the Noosa Headland is an absolute must, so we did as we were told. It’s quite a nerve-wracking experience driving a fairly large vehicle that you’re not that familiar with, on the wrong side of the road, stick shift on the wrong side, not knowing where you are going and tons of traffic. John and I are still on speaking terms, so we are doing OK so far! We had been told that parking at Noosa Headland was almost impossible, so we visualized like crazy and as we got there, someone pulled out. There you are! The walk really was as good as they said - beautiful golden beaches, rolling waves, bikini-clad girls with Santa hats on (which John enjoyed) and a huge zen-like koala which I spotted sitting on the middle of a very wide branch. He looked a bit like Yoda and couldn’t have cared less about us.
We spent that night at Coolum Beach which is a sleepy little town on the coast. The camp ground we stayed at was right on the beach and we actually spent a morning on the beach and GOING INTO THE OCEAN! We are at last far enough south to be out of reach of the dreaded stingers. That afternoon we drove to a little town called Eumundi where the guide book told us there was a glass blowing cooperative in the local hotel. Such an intriguing juxtaposition was obviously not to be missed, so off we went. Our GPS lady had a bit of a hissy fit and took us to the train station, but we eventually found the hotel, only to be told that the glass blowing guys had been asked to move as their operation was kind of dangerous! Eumundi turned out to be very quaint (lots of hemp shops and hippy-type people around) so we wandered around for a bit and then took off for Pomona where we had something of a Twilight Zone experience. The local campground (total price $15) was run by an engaging lady called Sharon who didn’t have many teeth but did have a wonderful sense of humour. The campground was basic - I shared the shower with 3 dead beetles and someone’s discarded razor - and we were woken up at 4 a.m. by the kookaburras laughing. They are extremely loud! The reason for going to Pomona is that it is the home of the only silent movie theatre in the world that is still going ALONG WITH ORGAN ACCOMPANIMENT! How could we pass up an experience like that? The organist/owner was a delightful New Zealander who had bought the theatre about 25 years ago. He’s been running silent movies ever since (Rudolph Valentino’s Son of the Sheik has been running weekly all that time!) It’s a lovely old theatre and we were two of an audience of about a dozen. We saw a 1936 German film called The Golem - forerunner of Frankenstein complete with Herman Munster (or Elton John) boots and funny walk. Of course there was a heroine with long hair who rolled her eyes and gasped when her lover touched her (gasp!) breast. It was very funny - of course lots of the “dialogue” is given in script, but Ron did a fantastic job of capturing the mood with his organ music. He’s about 76 and absolutely loves his hobby!
Today we drove to Brisbane via Yandina where we eventually ran the glass blowers to ground. They were working on producing about 4,000 glass shapes inspired by sea life on the Great Barrier Reef which the artist wants to install underwater somewhere - very interesting! One of his helpers very kindly explained everything they were doing. We then drove on to Caboolture where the guide book told us there was a Second World War airplane museum. There was even an exact address which we gave to our GPS lady, who promptly took us to the landfill! She actually was quite close and has been very useful most of the time (thank you Andy and Zoe!!)
We’re now in Brisbane where we’ll stay for 3 days and then hope to get a few more days on the beach before we head inland to the Blue Mountains.