Cairns & Atherton Tablelands - Lots of work, finally.

Lake Eacham. 

After a lot of searching, applications and talking to people I finally got a bit of work cleaning at the Malanda Dairy Factory, you've probably seen there products in the shops, dairy farmers milk, dare ice coffee etc. 

It's a pretty cruise job, but plenty to do, 6 hours a night Mon to Fri for 4 weeks. There's a nice coffee machine in the lunch room, a hot shower in the locker room and all the free milk you can drink. 

Since milk doesn't completely agree with me I made it into yogurt, simply warm to 35-45deg add culture and put it in a warm spot, for me it's next to my fridge vent, next day nice warm yogurt.  Make smoothies or just drink it, so good, and free. 

The Dairy factory at Malanda is about 1.5hrs from my camp at Dans place near Koah,

So I figured I will just pack up and stay near work during the week, explore the new area during the day work at night, and camp for free where ever I like the look of. found two good spots, a small side track into the rain forest in Curtain Fig National Park, just long enough to hide my truck, had to clear a few branches but it made a good camp for a few days. Another spot was near Lake Eacham, a side road had been closed for a bridge to be fixed, but it was never even started, so I Had about 3km of deserted tar sealed road in the thick rain forest all to myself, this is what all roads will look like after the 'apocalypse'.  So close to Lake Eacham, a volcanic crater lake, deep, clear, blue and the warmest place to swim on the tablelands. I spent several days exploring it's shores and swmmimg. 

After a nice week of working nights and exploring days I got another job on a kumara farm,(sweet potato ) so worked nights at dairy factory 6 hours then get up early and work on Kumara farm 8:00-17:00 then back to cleaning dairy factory 18:00-24:00, find a camp along the rd between the two jobs and do it all again. Hard work! But I've got work finally. 

After only 2days picking, sorting and packing Kumara I had the weekend off, and several boxes of free Kumara to eat and give away to everyone I meet. 

After working Friday night's I would stay along the road, on my way back to Koah and check out the weekly Saturday morning markets, at a different spot on the tablelands every week, amazing markets with so much local produce, cheap, home grown or farm seconds, and a grass fed Wagyu butcher selling directly from his farm, very cheap meat, everything I need. 

Curtain fig.

On my way to find a camp on Friday night after midnight in my dazed state a run over a rabbit, it was nice and healthy looking so I chucked him in the back, wen I got back to my main camp at Koah I skinned the rabbit and he made a good stew, some nice kumara and fresh herbs, perfect. Could only use half the rabbit because of the mud grip tracks left on it, so I gave that to Simon giant Mastiff dog across the road, we are best mates now LOL

Then following Monday afternoon I had a nice drive back to work at the dairy factory,  through the tablelands, Mareeba, Atherton, Yougaburra to Malanda, green rolling hills, red soil, patches of forest and lots of cows, reminds me a lot  of NewZealand.
That afternoon an air con man called me, I had seen one if his work Utes when I went into Bridgestone Tyres a few months back to replace the tyre that  I blew up at Cape York, and asked the fella driving if they needed any air con guys he told me to go to the office, which I did, the boss wasn't there but the receptionist told me to email my resume in. I had also done that to a dozen other air con companies more recently after calling every one goggle could find in Cairns looking for a job.
 Any way Cairns Evercool  company ,wanted me to come in for an interview on Tuesday, so did my night shift cleaning and got up when it was still dark in the morning after a few hours sleep and drove 1.5 hours down the Gillies range to Cairns for a 7:00am appointment, there was no interview, instead he put me to work straight away, best way to find out about each other I guess. Worked all day at several different locations across Cairns with Rob the fridgee guy from Inisvale.We worked till 16:30 then 1.5 hours drive back up the range to Malanda work 6 hours at dairy factory finishing at 24:00 midnight, drove back towards Cairns and found a camp in the rain forest on the Gillies Range. Had to do it all again for the rest of the week barely time to even think, 8 hours air cons in Cairns,  6 hours cleaning in Malanda Dairy Factory, 3 hours driving that's 17 hours plus time to make food less that 4 hours sleep, so tired and the Gillies Range is a very dangerous road.

Lots of work: -15 hours driving-30 hours cleaning-40 hours air cons

That's 85 work hours. Doesn't leave much time for making food, and sleeping, but finally have some money. Good thing I cooked a 2.5kg Wagyu beef  rolled roast last Sunday, fed me most of the week. 

At the end of the second day doing air cons the boss said he had an away job for me, it's in Bamaga, at Cape York, I said yes I'm keen, I just got back from there, only thing is they need us to start asap so we can finish it before Christmas short notice, so I told the cleaning boss at the Dairy Factory I had to finish this week, but had to do the marathon  work week to get both jobs done, maybe I can rest in Bamaga. 

Rainforest camp in curtain fig national park. 

Lake Eacham

'the jumping tree' lake Eacham. 

My view well deserved sleep in on a Saturday morning. 

Rainforest camp near lake Eacham,

Abandoned road.