Cape Tribulation has an abundance of wild Cassowary, everywhere. Seriously. There are huge road caution signs every few hundred meters to remind you of this, in case you forget. Be wary of the Cassowary. They are supposedly endangered.
So I had to laugh when I saw this, over one of the speed bumps near Coconut Beach.
Heh !
Speaking of Cassowary, should you need a toilet stop on the end of the Cape, be aware. Sticky taped to the entrance to the Ladies is a rather large laminated sign that says something along the lines of: “BEWARE – CASSOWARY”
It went on to say that whilst Cassowaries roam this area, one lone, extra large Cassowary has been known to terrorise tourists who are using the facilities. Apparently, extra large in size, he will knock you down and attack. If you see him, the sign dictates, you are to back away. . . slowly, keeping your face towards him and make very loud vocal noises whilst waving your hands. Continue to do this whilst walking backwards.
Now, this brings an interesting image to mind, considering there are salt and freshwater estuaries everywhere – this is crocodile territory . One would have to be careful that whilst avoiding becoming a Cassowary victim one did not become a croc snack instead by falling ass-backwards into an estuary (still waving and groaning) at the Cassowary.
The sign goes on to say, should the hapless traveller be fortunate enough to have a mobile phone in his or her pocket, then a special number is offered for the Daintree Ranger to be contacted as he will come quickly (remembering this is the FNQ - efFing Nothing Quickly) and hopefully put an end to the Cassowary who has a bounty on it’s head.
I can imagine laying on my back, avoiding being pecked by the cassowary or eaten by the crocs, trying to remember the phone number on the laminated sign and trying to hail the ranger.
This story is true, I swear. I would have photographed the sign except:
1. It was fugging raining so hard that I was drenched just going to the toilet therefore was not going back to the car to get the camera
And
2. It was fugging raining so hard that although I DID run down to the Cape Trib and have a look at ‘where the forest meets the reef’ (and rather speccy it was, too- my reasons for wanting to see this are detailed later) it was way, way, way too wet to even think about photographs. Truly. The drops were the size of tea cups and so thick you could not see more than 3 feet in front of you).
And there was no way I wanted to run into that Cassowary.
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