Daintree

We spent 3 days in Daintree National Park, and much of the time we were looking to spot a Cassowary, a flightless bird almost extinct and now protected. There are signs everywhere to beware of them crossing roads, and clear instructions not to feed them (or any animals in the wild). Our first visit was to Mossman Gorge which is an absolutely world class visitor centre with high level walks through dense rainforest. The centre has been so well thought through and designed with such attention to detail that even I could find nothing to criticise. The paper cutlery holders have informative text about the local indigenous people and the training programme they run for hospitality students. The crockery is white and square (ordinary nowadays) but the water glasses have square bases to match – how happy was I about that!  The shop and art gallery also had well designed and well made products.
The middle photo above is a display in the cafe, and that’s a model cassowary in the front. It wasn’t until we went to the Discovery Centre the next day that we discovered how big cassowaries actually are! See photo on right. We read the instructions of what to do if you meet a cassowary – never turn you back on it, back away and put something big between yourself and the bird! Having also seen a video of one attacking a man, we decided to abandon our search.