Why this ride
Dense vegetation, changing elevation and a high scenic return per kilometre. It also links naturally to Wet Tropics of Queensland.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Palmerston Highway
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 85 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 1 h 10
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
Access context
Check state road reports, fire, flood, fuel range and unsealed-road suitability. Specific flag: rain; wildlife.
Seasonal context
May-Oct
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Innisfail
Innisfail is a sugar town, and you can tell from the smell: sweet, slightly burnt, drifting over the cane fields when the mill is crushing. It sits at the mouth of the Johnstone River in the wettest part of Australia, where banana and cane farms run up to the foot of the rainforest, and rainfall is measured in metres rather than millimetres.
Read the complete Innisfail write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Innisfail sits at 0 km, early in the day. Next is Ravenshoe.
2. Ravenshoe
Ravenshoe is the highest town in Queensland, at about nine hundred and thirty metres, and you feel it the moment you climb out of the tropical coast: the air thins and cools, the cane fields give way to cattle pasture and tall eucalypt forest, and in winter there is a morning chill that surprises people who have come from Cairns in shorts. The town sits on the volcanic soils of the Atherton Tableland, red and rich, with remnants of rainforest on the edges. It began as a timber settlement, and was named after the novel Ravenshoe by Henry Kingsley, which a local timber getter was fond of, according to the story.
Read the complete Ravenshoe write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Ravenshoe comes up 85 km in.