Caves and Turtles

We’re heading for Bundaberg famed for its rum, ginger beer and, what’s attracting me there, turtles, but its too far for us to go in one day without a monster drive so we opt for a stop near Rockhampton at the Capricorn Caves. A natural cave formation that exists largely above ground we arrive just 5 minutes too late to hop on a tour, so we book ourselves on one for nine the next morning and relax up at the camp site where kangaroos are hopping happily about and tree frogs and cane toads peer out at you from all the drains. Even a shrub turkey pays us a visit while we’re having tea hoping for some leftovers.

I rise early next morning and go out for a run, much to the amazement of the kangaroos who view me with a very startled expression as I puff on by. Rob is feeling even rougher today, he thinks the old woman from the café the other day may be a witch who has cursed him, either that or he is coming down with the “black lung” (ref. Zoolander!). Fortunately the cave walk is really gentle and we get to take it all in, including a couple of swooping bats within a couple of hours and are back on the road.

Bundaberg is host to one of the favoured breeding sites of three types of turtle, most predominantly the loggerhead. This time of year is their breeding cycle so the huge females who are 30plus years of age haul themselves up onto the beach to lay their eggs. As they only do this once every 4 years we feel privileged to have the opportunity to witness it and we’re lucky enough to get places on the tours which are run by the conservation teams in an effort to restrict the number of people onto the beach at this important time. We have to wait for nightfall then we’re ushered into a mini stadium where the process of observing the turtles is explained. We’re to go out in 3 groups (at 60-70 people this seems inordinately large), keep our torches off and not to make a sound. They have teams of 2-3 people out on the beach patrolling it in search of the turtles, when they spot a turtle they wait until it is right up the beach and digging it’s nest before they radio in and we go out to witness it laying its eggs. Apparently by that stage the mother is unlikely to be put off by a huge crowd of people watching and if we approach from behind we can shine our torches and it won’t be put off… all seems a bit unlikely but we patiently wait our turn and around 9:30pm we get the call to say our turtle is up the beach. We’re shown along by a screechy voiced guide who makes us halt as she mistakes a pile of rocks for a turtle coming out of the sea (she works here, surely the pile of rocks is in the same place every night?) If her voice didn’t alert the turtle to danger, then the flash lights of people’s cameras probably did. The poor turtle takes flight back to the safety of the sea with everyone crowding and straining to take a look, to add to its ordeal the rangers have grabbed it and are manhandling it to take measurements off it for their records. You could be forgiven for thinking that the poor thing is crying as it looks around and struggles to break free in obvious distress. Finally it is released and drags itself back down the beach to the sea where it will swim around for another couple of days before plucking the courage up to try again.

The guide cheerfully says that the turtle was probably put off by some stones where it was trying to make a nest and ushers us back to the centre to wait for another poor turtle to haul itself out of the water to lay its eggs. Rob and I are disgusted and feel terribly guilty to have been any part of the whole debacle, we leave a note in the guestbook to that affect then depart back to the campsite much upset by the whole experience.

The following morning Rob’s illness is still progressing but we’re thankfully nearing “home”, just one more night away which we’ll spend on the sunshine coast. We cruise down the coast from Noosa looking for a prospective place to stay for the night and settle on Coolum, a surfers paradise with great beaches and surf, plus a string of shops for me to finish my Christmas shopping while rob relaxes on the beach. Off his food now completely he stays in the van in the evening while I fix myself something up and he puts up with the banter from the next caravanners telling him off for leaving me to do all the work. They are that bad he won’t even let me do the dishes for fear he might get accosted. That night we are given the pleasure of hearing the local carol concert, at least it might have been a pleasure if it hadn’t gone on all night, by which I mean at 1am we were rewarded with an almighty firework display and then a DJ took over the stage and played cheesy pop until 4 or 5am, all at full volume. Just what you need when you’re trying to sleep. This wasn’t at the campsite by the way, it was at the next park, it was just played so loud it my as well have been on the next plot to us. You could hear cries of dismay coming from all over the camp each time he played yet another record…

Refreshed by a rather small drink from the juice bar and a muffin from Mc D’s we head off and are back at the dropzone by afternoon, to a big sigh of relief from Rob and a warm welcome from Macca and Suzie.