Atherton Tablelands

Kirrama Range Road, Blencoe Falls, Murray Falls

Kirrama Range Road

Following on from our Goshen Station camping post, I thought I’d better hurry up and finish that trip off with a little post about the beautiful Blencoe Falls and the Kirrama Range Road – remembering that I am still playing catchup and we did this trip in July 2016!

As we camped at Goshen Station for a week, we decided to take a day trip out to Blencoe Falls from there.  It was only a short 40 minute drive to the falls and a fantastic day out.  We took a picnic lunch, did a walk, checked out the camp grounds and had a swim.  It is a beautiful spot at Blencoe Falls but quite crowded when we were there (it was school holidays).  The waterfall lookout and viewing platform boasts spectacular views – definitely deserves the title of being one of the most stunning (and least known) waterfalls in Australia!  There are views of the waterfall and the Herbert River Gorge – there are lots of Hoop Pines and it felt like we were in Canada somewhere!

Lexi and I did the short (took us about an hour) walk from the viewing platform to the campgrounds.  It was an easy walk with some beautiful scenery along the way.  Continue reading

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Goshen Station Camping

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One of the best camps we have ever done hasn’t yet been recorded here on the blog, so time to rectify that!

Campsite No 5 at Goshen Station is awesome.  We spent a week here in July, 2016 and loved it.  It was the perfect cure for the hangovers we were sporting from a busy week and awesome night hosting the Boots for Change dinner on the farm the weekend before, complete with guest Paul West from River Cottage.

Goshen Station is a working cattle station where the first series of Australian Survivor was filmed in 2001.

It is about 5.5 hours from Cairns (90 kms past Mount Garnet) west of Blencoe Falls.  We took the Mt Garnett (Gunnawarra Road) way in and then went out via the Kirrama Range Road – a fantastic round trip. Continue reading

Categories: Atherton Tablelands, Qld Camping, Tropical North Queensland | Tags: , | 1 Comment

Boots for Change Dinner

IMG_0156_2Helloooooooooo Everybody!

There is an update coming tomorrow about what we have been up to here at Fealy Family HQ over the last 8 or so months (eeeeek) since we last posted, but today I want to share a post that has been desperate to hit the blog for months now!

Here goes …………………………………….. Continue reading

Categories: Atherton Tablelands, Blue Sky Produce, Every Family Needs A Farmer | 2 Comments

Lake Tinaroo – Barrabadeen Campground

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It’s a lovely overcast afternoon here at Blue Sky – as close as we are going to get to a rainy day in Mareeba, so perfect blogging weather!  Those of you who follow us on instagram and facebook will know that on the ANZAC Day long weekend we had a terrific time camping with all the extended family at Camp Barrabadeen, Lake Tinaroo.  Camping at Lake Tinaroo was on our ‘hitlist’ for this year so it is awesome to have ticked another little adventure off.  Camp Barrabadeen is owned by the Scout Organisation and we have camped here many times with the kids as part of their scouting activities so we knew it was a top spot.  Hot showers, toilets, firepits, pretty level and shady sites right on the water, ability to hire canoes and you can launch your boat from right in front of the campsites – it doesn’t get much better than that!  It is a little expensive – $10 per person per night – kids under 6 free, but the money does go to a good cause! Continue reading

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Emerald Creek Falls

IMG_1509Guess What?  We ticked another item off our ‘Must Do’ list yesterday!  Emerald Creek Falls walk and swim ‘owned’ as the kids would say, meaning we did it and it was awesome :-).  Can’t believe it has taken us so long to get there and definitely going again soon – swimming in the waterhole under the falls was beautiful.

Emerald Creek Falls can be found just outside Mareeba in the Dinden West Forest Reserve.  You turn off the Kennedy Highway onto the signposted Tinaroo Creek Road, follow Tinaroo Creek Road for about 3 kms and then turn left into Cobra Road.  From Cobra road it is all dirt and quite corrugated and steep in parts, but regular vehicles can still get out there just by taking it steady.  It is unsuitable for caravans and trailers and unfortunately there is no camping.  However, the day use area has wood fired bbq’s and picnic tables and there are some nice spots along the picnic area to swim with the kids. Continue reading

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Australian Butterfly Sanctuary – Kuranda

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You guys are all going to fall down in shock, but guess what?  We had a little day out on the weekend, ticking one of the ‘must do’s’ off the list of things to explore in 2016 AND I am even going to blog about it only a few days after our visit – not weeks or months later – wahoooo says I, giving myself a pat on the back 🙂 🙂

So, due to the fact that everything Mr Blue Sky Produce Matt touched last week, broke down – including (and this is no exaggeration) – two tractors, the mower, two quad bikes and the dishwasher – we found ourselves on Sunday with a very unexpected day off mid mango season!  As we live up here in the country – most shops still do that thing of closing by 12pm on a Saturday, so there was no going into town for the required parts to fix all the broken down farm machinery.  Mr Blue Sky Produce was in a lovely mood (not!) so you can imagine just how happy he was when I suggested a family day out to the Australian Butterfly Sanctuary in Kuranda on Sunday. Continue reading

Categories: Atherton Tablelands, Tropical North Queensland | Tags: , , , | 5 Comments

Tropical North QLD Must Do’s in 2016

I don’t have my normal New Year’s Resolution Post to share this year, but I did like this one if you need a bit of help.  I just don’t seem to have my ‘organisation’ mode kicking in just yet, but I do have a few lists (you all know I love a good list) happening so I’d thought I’d share those on the blog for now.  First though, here’s a collage of our #2015bestnine photos from our adventures last year which we shared over on our instagram account – it was interesting to see a good mix of our family life make the top nine photos!

If you want to see your or even someone else’s #2015bestnine just head to http://2015bestnine.com/ and pop in the instagram username – too easy and a bit of fun!  Oh and you can search the hashtag #2015bestnine to see a heap of terrific photo collages from 2015!IMG_1122

Continue reading

Categories: About Us, Atherton Tablelands, Tropical North Queensland | Tags: , | 3 Comments

The City Slider

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Usually if we can manage it, in the school holidays we try to do one outing or activity that costs money – something a bit different or exciting for the kids (ok – and us too!).  Last weekend ‘The City Slider’ came to Kurunda – just a 30 minute drive down the road for us, and the lure of a 325 metre water slide in the middle of town was just too much for us to miss so we bought tickets to go along!  The City Slider is a two lane slide, 6m wide, 325m long and has a layer of 40mm foam underneath it for a soft landing and recycles as much water as possible.   Continue reading

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7 Things to Do these School Holidays on the Atherton Tablelands

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This time last year I wrote this post with some ideas for things to do on the Atherton Tablelands in the school holidays.  There is so much great stuff to do up here in our neck of the woods that I decided it was high time I put a few more of my favourite school holidays activities out there into cyber space!  With still a week of school holidays left – there is still plenty of time to get out and about and have some school holiday fun.

So, here’s 7 more things to do these school holidays on the Atherton Tablelands – Fealy Family style of course! Continue reading

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The Worlds Greatest Farmer – Joel Salatin

Welcome to Farming Friday on the Fealy Family blog!  I’m going to kick off the first of our farming posts this year by sharing some information about a tour happening next week, which I am a little bit excited about!

As most of you know, we are currently in our second year of our “Farm Apprenticeship” here at Blue Sky Produce.  We have learnt a lot in twelve months, probably the most of which is that there is still a lot we don’t know!  The nature of farming is very hands on, with little time to get away from ‘the tools’ but we are very conscious of the fact, that to be the best farmers we can be, we need to be open-minded and take up as many opportunities as we can to learn as much as we can about farming and the issues facing the wider agricultural industry.  So, when we saw the advertisement for the Joel Salatin Tour organised by local community based, family business RegenAg, we knew we had to make an effort to try to get along to some of the events being offered. Continue reading

Categories: About Us, Atherton Tablelands, Blue Sky Produce, Every Family Needs A Farmer, Tropical North Queensland | Tags: , , , | 2 Comments
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