Tully

29th Aug
     An early start leaving Innisfail at 8.15 am for a short drive to the info centre at Tully to pick up our tickets for a tour of the Tully sugar mill. We drove into the town & found a park which wasn't easy with the van on behind. Allan had cut cane here all those years ago but didn't find any familiar landmarks.

Tully had some huge floods after Allan was there & they have this gumboot as a reminder to that time. It isn't a very big town & like many struggling to survive. About three hundred workers at the sugar mill which is very close to the main street. We arrived at the shed for an induction talk & to don our hard hats,safety glasses etc. There were about a dozen on the tour & the leader was a lady who was an excellent guide & very interesting.

First stop was to look at the sugar cane arriving by train & we had seen many of these cages being filled on previous days as the cane season is in full season.

Each of the cages was turned upside down by this machine & the cane stalks emptied on to a conveyor where it was crushed & the fibre was separated from the liquid & then dried & used as fuel for the boilers. This supply's enough power to run the factory & the surplus goes into the national grid.

The liquid molasses is put into high speed centrifugal cylinders with very fine mesh inside which traps the raw sugar.

All the raw sugar is exported & transported by trucks to the loading complex we had seen while staying Innisfail. 

We saw a truck being loaded which was a simple operation for the driver as lights indicated when he should move the truck forward to fill the next compartment. Allan especially enjoyed the tour bringing back memories of cutting the cane by hand after it had been burnt first & was a very hard & dirty job!

We drove on to Cardwell for a lunch stop & thought it looked a very nice place but we had booked two nights at Ingham so continued on. Love Bev & Allan.