CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. 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.
A 317 km round trip from Cardwell - roughly 5 h 07 in the saddle. It goes by way of Component around Mission Beach, Component around Cowley, Component around Russell River and back through Component around Cowley. Rivers set the line for much of the day.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 71 km this is Atherton Tablelands Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
North Queensland has the oldest rainforest on the planet, and it stands beside the Great Barrier Reef, with the two meeting in a few places where the trees come down to the sea. Edmund Kennedy National Park lies on the coast near Cardwell, between the Bruce Highway and the Coral Sea, and it protects a lowland strip of tropical rainforest, mangroves and swamps. It is named after the explorer Edmund Kennedy, who landed in the nearby Rockingham Bay in 1848 on an expedition to Cape York, and died after months of hardship, speared by Aboriginal men near the northern tip. Only three of his party of thirteen survived, thanks in part to Jackey Jackey, an Aboriginal guide who stayed with him.
Read the complete Component around Edmund Kennedy write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Edmund Kennedy is where the day begins. Next is Component around Mission Beach.
The cassowary crossing signs around Mission Beach are not a joke, and the bird they warn you about is not a small one. This stretch of coast between Tully and Innisfail is one of the last strongholds of the southern cassowary, a dinosaur-looking creature with a blue head and a horned casque, and the rainforest that runs right down to the sand here is part of the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage area. Few places on earth put ancient forest and a palm-fringed beach this close together.
Read the complete Component around Mission Beach write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Mission Beach comes up about 42 km into the recorded legs. Next is Component around Cowley.
The Wet Tropics of Queensland are a long, narrow strip of rainforest between Townsville and Cooktown, and they hold the oldest continuously surviving tropical rainforest on earth, some of it unchanged for well over a hundred million years. The World Heritage listing, from 1988, covers not one block but a patchwork of national parks and other protected land, which is why the label calls this a component around Cowley. Here, the mountains run down almost to the sea, and on the flat, fertile coastal plain around Innisfail, sugar cane and banana plantations stand beside beaches, mangroves and remnants of forest.
Read the complete Component around Cowley write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 84 km into the recorded legs you reach Component around Cowley. Next is Component around Russell River.
Rain is the first fact of life along the Russell River. The river drains the eastern slopes of the Bellenden Ker Range, south of Cairns in far north Queensland, and these mountains, including Bartle Frere, at 1,622 metres the highest peak in the state, catch the moist trade winds off the Coral Sea and wring out some of the heaviest rainfall in Australia. The result is a dense, steaming tropical rainforest that tumbles down the mountains to the coastal plain, part of the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage Area, listed in 1988. It is one of the oldest continuously surviving rainforests on earth.
Read the complete Component around Russell River write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Russell River, about halfway. Next is back through Component around Cowley.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Component around Cowley write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Component around Cowley sits at 183 km, about halfway. Next is back through Component around Mission Beach.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Component around Mission Beach write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Component around Mission Beach comes up about 274 km into the recorded legs. Next is Component around Edmund Kennedy.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Component around Edmund Kennedy write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Edmund Kennedy closes the day.
Component around Edmund Kennedy → Component around Mission Beach is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Component around Mission Beach → Component around Cowley is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Component around Cowley → Component around Russell River is 71 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Component around Russell River → back through Component around Cowley is 77 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Component around Cowley → back through Component around Mission Beach is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Component around Mission Beach → Component around Edmund Kennedy is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.