Anny Chih

A view from the mountains at Eungella

I was very apprehensive during the days leading up to my birthday on September 24th.  A lot of it had to do with superstitious reasons (I could write a novel just about the superstitious stuff surrounding my 24th), but it also had to do with being alone on my birthday for the very first time. I’ve always had family and friends to celebrate with, and now that the most important birthday of my life was coming up, I was and would be alone.

I decided that if I wasn’t going to have my family and close friends around, I wanted to be alone and take a little retreat into the wilderness for the day. I left Airlie Beach on the 23rd for Eungella National Park (pronounced “young gella”).

Driving up the mountains of Eungella reminded me of driving up to Kuranda. The roads wind this way and that and there are a few really tight corners to go around. The forests become fuller the farther you go up, and when you get to the little town of Eungella and look down, it feels… eery. It was as if I was stuck in time for a moment in a place you couldn’t get a hold of me (and you couldn’t really — I was out of cell phone coverage ). Eungella is above the clouds so when you look down, all you see is fog and mist.

I didn’t just pick Eungella to get away from everything though, I had a mission: to see a platypus in the wild. A lot of people go to Broken River (just past the small town of Eungella) to spot a platypus, but when I went I didn’t get the right feeling from it. My original plan was to go there and treat myself to a nice stay at a hotel on my birthday, but because it just didn’t feel right, I left to find a platypus at Finch Hatton Gorge instead. I ended up staying at the roughest (and cheapest) caravan park on my birthday: Platypus Bush Camp.

Platypus Bush Camp

Yummy birthday breakfast

I started my birthday off with a nice big breakfast at the only restaurant in Finch Hatton (which also serves as a convenience store). Then I checked-in at Platypus Bush Camp ($10 for a night) and went for a short hike up to Araluen Falls and Wheel of Fire Falls. They’re very small waterfalls and I don’t understand how Wheel of Fire got it’s name — there’s nothing wheel-y or fire-y about the place. Heck, the fall isn’t even a proper waterfall — it’s just a trickle down some rocks. It was a nice hike just the same though. I had worn my swimmers because there are swimming holes at each fall, but it was too cold to take a full dip.

After my hike where I saw the biggest goanas I’ve ever come across, several different butterflies (including a small Blue Ulysses), and a snake, I went for a dip at the swimming hole at camp and was about to have a rest in my Wicked Campervan.

Dee at Platypus Bush Camp

As I was getting ready for a nap though, the owner of Platypus Bush Camp (a hippy named Wazza) came up to the van and literally stuck his head inside and started touching the curtains and talking about random stuff. Not cool. He seemed harmless enough, but damn! Haven’t you ever heard of personal space? People need 3 feet of space to feel comfortable around a stranger and sticking your head into someone’s campervan while they’re inside and can’t get out because you’re blocking the entrance is VERY uncomfortable. Especially when they’re in pjs! This happened twice that day. The second time, I was writing postcards inside the van and he stuck his head in and picked up the postcards to look at them. So much for being alone.

After that, I decided to get an early start on my platypus stalking and sat quietly out at the platypus lookout area for over two hours. Just when it started to get dark, one came out from under the tree roots across the water and started dipping in and out. It was really hard to spot him because he’s dark and so is the water after sunset, but you could tell where he was from the ripples he’d make swimming across the water. “Hooray!” I thought, “I can finally cross this off my to-do list!”

My birthday cake

I walked back to the campervan and started putting the candles on my birthday cake. There were so many candles on this tiny cake that the icing melted and dripped into the table. It made quite the mess. But I had to have all twenty-four candles — it’s tradition. I made my wish, blew them out, talked with Auchey (a really nice French girl WWOOFing at the camp) over cake, and went to get ready for bed.

The place was pitch dark by then and I could barely see anything without my little hand-crank torch. There are no lights in the bathroom or even leading up to it, which made peeing a little awkward. On my way back to the campervan, Wazza almost gave me a heart attack because he appeared out of nowhere and said something like “I was wondering where you were. I didn’t see you around for a while.” I don’t know why, but I really don’t like it when people feel the need or expect to know where I am all the time. I feel like a claustrophobic person in a tiny closet, and I just want to run. I don’t remember what I said (something about looking for a platypus I think), but I hurried back to the campervan and shut the door so he wouldn’t be able to stick his head in. And that closed the chapter on 23.

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Thank you to everyone who left me voicemail messages, texts, tweets, Facebook messages etc for my birthday! I listened and read them all when I got to a place with phone and internet reception the next day. <3