THE DRIVE FROM CAIRNS TO THE TIP OF CAPE YORK IS ABOUT 1000 KILOMETRES. AT ROUGHLY THE HALF-WAY POINT, YOU’LL FIND THE HISTORIC MUSGRAVE ROAD HOUSE.
It’s about half-way between Laura & Coen, not far from Princess Charlotte Bay, a few hours drive to Pormpuraaw. There’s fuel, food, somewhere to stay, and stories of life on Cape York Peninsula now and way back in the old days.
MUSGRAVE MAP
Musgrave was built in 1887, one of the repeater stations on the Overland Telegraph line. The line ran through stations at Palmerville, Fairview, Coen, Mein, Moreton, McDonnell and Paterson. Musgrave was named after the then Queensland Governor.One of the last original poles that supported the Telegraph line still stands near the phone box outside the Musgrave road house.
It’s been welcoming travellers for over 100 years. They used to come by wagon and on horse-back. These days people drive the Cape York road in air-conditioned comfort, and some arrive by plane, landing at the road house air-strip.
Things have slowed down since the wet season got going this month, but back during the dry, Musgrave had an occupancy rate the envy of hoteliers everywhere — upwards of 90%.
John McDowall puts that down to old-fashioned good value accomodation and the district’s many natural delights. Click the audio player to meet John.
One of the best things about working in radio is that I’m always learning. I spend my days asking questions, so I live in a constant flow of information, ideas and stories. It’s a great place to be, and I really enjoy sharing it with my radio listeners and with you on my blog.
I learn something new every day,some days I learn a lot. Like the day in October 2011 I did my afternoon radio show from Coen, on Cape York Peninsula.
I learned how to deal with the unusual situation of having a large bull stampede through our broadcast point, on the front verandah of the Homestead Guest House (see the November archive on this blog for that story).
And I learned about the town’s history, starting as a fort during the gold rush days in the 1870s.How small remote communities deal with the inevitable isolation of the wet season. How you make a living in a small town with a population of just a few hundred. How you manage one of the nation’s biggest local government districts. How to run a school. How to muster cattle from a helicopter. And how to drive safely on the dusty, bumpy, corrugated Cape York roads.
CLICK THE AUDIO PLAYERS TO HEAR THE PEOPLE OF COEN TALK ABOUT LIFE IN THEIR TOWN
PETER AND SOME OF GAIL
PETER & GAIL CLARK WEAR MANY HATS IN COEN
NEVILLE MULLEY RUNS COEN’S ONLY CAFE, OWNS AN ANT-BED OVEN & DRIVES FOR THE RACQ
JO ROSS IS PRINCIPAL OF COEN STATE SCHOOL
PETER SCOTT IS THE MAYOR OF COOK SHIRE, WHICH COVERS 80% OF CAPE YORK.
A HELICOPTER LANDED NEXT TO US WHILE WE WERE ON AIR. PILOT JACK HAD JUST FLOWN IN FROM MAREEBA TO DO A BIT OF CATTLE MUSTERING
YOU DON’T HAVE TO GO FAR IN FNQ BEFORE YOU’RE “OUT OF RANGE”. NO MOBILE PHONE SIGNAL, JUST STATIC ON THE CAR RADIO. THE KIDS CAN’T TWITTER, YOU CAN’T HEAR THE CRICKET ON THE ABC, AND WHAT WILL YOU DO IF THE CAR GIVES UP?
If you’re going into remote country, consider getting a two-way radio, either HF or UHF. A satellite phone is a good emergency back-up, but the call costs are way too high for more routine calls. There’s surprisingly good mobile phone coverage around some of the more remote FNQ towns, but only on one network and only for a few kms out from town.
As sparse as the current set-up is, it’s way better than ever before. It wasn’t until the late 1980s that people on Cape York got dialling telephones, about 40 years after the rest of Australia.
When you travel on Cape York Peninsula, you’ll get insights into communication remote-area style now and way back then. Mail used to come on pack horses, now much of it comes by air – small planes doing mail runs to land on bush strips and drop off the mail bags. Many telephones operate by radio link, people get their Internet by satellite, two-way radio is widely used.
Long before these things were invented, there was telegraph. A sort of 19th century text message system that relied on long stretches of cable strung from posts, along which electrical signals were sent in Morse Code. Short and long beeps, dots and dashes, were assigned to each letter of the alphabet. Messages could be sent over vast distances, as long as there was a telegraph line to send them on.
In the mid 1800s, colonial bosses in Brisbane felt the need for a means of communicating with Queensland’s remote and sparsely populated north. Surveyors explored a route to the top of Cape York and on to Thursday Island, in the Torres Strait. The Telegraph Line was built and fully operational by the mid 1870s. The present day road to the Tip largely follows the route of the Telegraph Line, although there’s nothing much left of the Line itself. It carried its last Morse message, a telegram to Thursday Island, in 1964. It was shut down in 1987 at age 100.
There were seven repeater stations along the Line, and some of those have survived. One of the key stations was at Moreton, on the banks of the Wenlock River. These days, Moreton is in the tourism business, offering accomodation, local tours and stories of the old days.
It’s a lovely spot, but like a lot of places on the Peninsula, it gets cut off during the wet season. The Wenlock River can rise up to ten metres above the road bridge. Even during the dry time, the river has some big sea creatures in it. Bull sharks and sting rays are regularly seen near the station, about 140 kms from the sea!
CLICK ON THE AUDIO PLAYER TO HEAR CATHY SHOW YOU AROUND MORETON TELEGRAPH STATION
There were telegraph facilities all over FNQ in the old days. Visit the old Cardwell station, on the road between Townsville and Cairns http://www.csc.qld.gov.au/?page_id=97
TRAVELLING AROUND FNQ, YOU MEET A LOT MOSTS. MOST AMAZING, MOST REMOTE, BIGGEST, WETTEST. BRING YOUR CAMERA AND A GOOD SUPPLY OF ADJECTIVES.
One of the must-see mosts is Bramwell Station – Australia’s most northerly cattle station. And one of the loveliest places I’ve had the good fortune to see on my travels. It’s a working cattle station, with accommodation for travellers, meals, an airstrip, and the only bar for hundreds of kilometres.
Bramwell Station is about 30km north of Moreton Telegraph Station, and 200km south of the tip of Cape York. There’s fuel nearby at Brawmell Junction. The accommodation closes during the wet season, but during the dry, it’s a popular stop on the journey to the tip. Contemplate the sunset from the Bramwell station bar, and think about the decision you have to make next day – will I do the gentler Bypass Road to the tip, or give the rough-as-guts Telegraph Track a go. It’s a big decision – this is a great place to ask for advice and think it through. And there’s plenty to see on the country around Bramwell.
Click on the audio player to meet Kaleena who runs the accommodation on Bramwell Station.
TEA TOWEL OR SNOW SHAKER? STUBBY COOLER OR FRIDGE MAGNET? THE MODERN MANIFESTATIONS OF AN ANCIENT TRADE. SOUVENIRS.
People have been making, taking, buying and selling them for thousands of years. They’re keep-sakes, reminders of where we’ve been, gifts for people who didn’t make the journey with us.
In October 2011 we pulled in to one of FNQ’s best known souvenir shops, set up in a tent on the last stretch of road to the tip of Cape York Peninsula.
It was early morning. We could easily have missed it in the glare and the dust. It was the big fat crocodile sunning itself out the front that caught my eye.
He’s the mascot for the Croc Tent. And is he the real deal?
Well here we are asking him that question. He was a little cagey, so you be the judge. Real croc or realistic replica?
THE ABC CAPE YORK TEAM INTERVIEW THE CROC
Dale and Lee-ann Mears run the Croc Tent these days. It opened in the 80s, on land that was once part of Lockerbie Station. Dale and Leanne love to have a yarn with visitors – so we were very happy to point a microphone at Dale.
AUDIO: DALE MEARES TELLS PHIL STALEY ABOUT THE CROC TENT
There are moments on long road trips when your eyes seem to be playing tricks on you. Especially on the 1000km drive south to Cairns from the top of Cape York Peninsula.
You’re rattling over the corrugations, peering through the swirling red dust. A termite mound by the road-side looks briefly to be an elephant. A fallen tree branch seems to be the world’s biggest snake. In October 2011, we were heading down the Cape York road from Musgrave, eight straight days of driving and we were getting weary.
Up ahead, we see figures moving on the road. We slow down, expecting a stray cow, a giant wallaby, maybe just a dust devil. But as we get closer, we see a bloke and a donkey, walking south at a steady clip. We pulled up to say g’day to Norton Judd, and Esther the donkey.
Norton Judd with Esther & Phil Staley
Norton has been on the road a long time. He’s 71 now, and after a few years of retirement in Melbourne he decided to walk the Bicentennial Trail. He left Healesville in Victoria in June 2009, and walked to Cooktown FNQ. Along that 5000+ kilometre journey, he met Esther, a 10 year old jenny and decided she’s the ideal travelling companion.
Having reached Cooktown, Norton decided to go a “little bit further” to visit friends at Musgrave. We met him on his way back to Cooktown. Listen to Norton talk about his life on the road. ]
On a windy Saturday morning in October 2011, three blokes and a cassowary earned themselves a small entry in the Australian radio history book. Phil Staley, Aussie Bob Apolloni, C 1 Cassowary & me made the first live radio broadcast from the tip of Cape York Peninsula.
Now I know it’s not up there with the first moon landing or Hillary and Tenzing’s climb to the top of Everest. But it’s a good feeling to have done something that’s a first, to have stretched the technology to take our ABC listeners somewhere truly special..
We had thought we’d have to hump six big bags of broadcast gear up over the rocks to the Tip. Or worse, a satellite dish. But in the end we did it on an I-Phone, using an app that turns voice into data, sends it via 3G over the Internet back to our radio station in Cairns.
So there we were, looking out at Torres Strait and describing the magnificent view on Sharon Molloy’s breakfast program on ABC Far North.
Live on the wireless at the tip of Cape York
AUDIO: LISTEN TO OUR RADIO BROADCAST FROM THE TIP OF CAPE YORK PENINSULA
The view from the Tip
This was the last of a week-long series of live radio shows from Cape York communities. Laura, Coen, Lockhart River, New Mapoon, all of them firsts for the ABC. We had no way of knowing if we could broadcast from the Tip till we got there, so it was a magical feeling to reach our destination and get our signal out.
But this was always about the journey, rather than the destination. And it was a challenging, magical trip. Fortune smiled on us all the way. And a lot of very kind people gave us help, advice and encouragement.
A road trip through Cape York Peninsula should be on your must do list. It’s not easy, or cheap, but you’ll remember it all your days as one of the best things you ever did.
The local indigenous name for the Tip is Pajinka. The nearest town is Bamaga, in the Northern Peninsula Area. It’s about 40km by road to the Tip, and the dirt road is pretty good, especially after the bone-rattling stretches further south. Watch out for wild pigs, and scrub turkeys inclined to play chicken with passing cars. Along the way you’ll see the Croc Tent, run by a friendly couple who sell souvenirs and love a chat.
When you get to the end of the road, you climb up over the rocks, following the white paint markers that lead you over the hill and down to the very northern tip of mainland Australia. You don’t need to be an athlete to do the walk. Take water and take your time. The view is more than worth the sweat you’ll work up.
In October 2011 I took the trusty ABC 4WD from Cairns to the tip of Cape York Peninsula. The roads can be tough going, especially when it rains, and the dreaded corrugations will shake the fillings out of your teeth. It was at the end of the dry season, so it was a hot and dusty journey.
But it’s one of the great road journeys, and while you need to plan and prepare for it, even a novice four-wheel-driver can do it. You’ve got to drive to conditions, and watch your speed. It’s about 1000km from Cairns to the tip. Take your time and enjoy it.
There’s plenty of good maps and road information available online and in guide books. But keep in mind that road conditions change quickly and information can be out-dated. Your best bet is to ask local folk as you go along. Cook Shire Council posts road conditions here http://www.cooktownandcapeyork.com/roads
When the first car made it to the top of Cape York in 1928, there weren’t many roads in the region. Two blokes from New Zealand drove a Baby Austin from Cairns to the tip, floating the car across crocodile-infested rivers on a raft. It was an epic journey, commemorated in a display at the Quinkan Cultural Centre in Laura, featuring pictures taken as they slowly made their way north, following the telegraph line.
There’s another reminder of that journey in Laura. Harold Taverner runs the town’s only store, and he’s the proud owner of a model Baby Austin Seven.
AUDIO HAROLD TAVERNER TALKS ABOUT HIS BABY AUSTIN & LIVING IN LAURA
The Baby Austin outside the Laura Store
AUDIO THE QUINKAN CENTRE’S SHALLYN BLOOMFIELD TALKS ABOUT THE 1928 DRIVE UP CAPE YORK
The Mojowire 