In a recent post I wrote about the signs that rain could be on the way, i.e. the 'visits' from ants and the green frog. Well it did rain last Sunday...quite a bit in some areas but by Monday, Brisbane was once again sunny and very hot.
I loved those novelty clocks on display in the café!
All the talk of rain though, had reminded me of our recent trip to Far North Queensland. We had lovely fine weather during our short stay back in November, but the area has had lots of rain in recent weeks. Three towns in FNQ vie for the wettest town in Queensland; Innisfail, Babinda and Tully. The higher rainfall is the result of monsoonal rains and cyclones.
My cousin took us to Tully for a look around. It is a town 'built on the sugar industry'. And in a park there is a tribute to the early days of sugar...my dad started cutting cane in 1926 so I reckon the display with horses being used to cart the cut cane would have been like when my dad was a canecutter.
Many of the sugar mills in north Queensland have closed but the mill chimneys at Tully dominate the skyline and it is very obvious that it is still a working mill!
A big tourist attraction in Tully is the 7.9 metre ( 25.9ft) Golden Gumboot, which was erected in 2003. This height represents the highest rainfall recorded in Tully and this was way back in 1950.
A couple of interesting points;- the floods that Tully experienced in 1967 and 1973 were caused by rainfall greater than 8 metres and Babinda has had even higher rainfall levels than Tully in the last 40 years.
So here are our photos of this tourist attraction...
Little me standing beside it to give an idea of its height...
A closer view of the frog details too...
My cousin has some favourite shops in Tully and we went to a few...a wonderful toy shop, a kitchen wares shop, a fish shop and a popular teashop/café/florist. Many of the stores had art deco frontages...just like Innisfail! I also took photos inside the café.
