"Today we will have sunny skies with light offshore winds and temperatures topping at 24 degrees Celsius. Today's forecast is brought to you by the Mission Beach Chamber of Commerce, and has bears no relation to actual meteorologic conditions."
Mission Beach is a tourist haven, where the skies are not cloudy all day. Or so they would like you to believe. Just a few kilometers up the road, Tully claims the title of "Wettest Town in Australia." It boasts 150 rainy days a year with about four and a half meters of precipitation. That works out to an average of nearly one inch per day! The record, in 1950, was 7.9 meters, about 26 feet. It is commemorated by the 7.9 meter tall "Golden Gumboot" statue, in the center of town.
It has been raining off and on for a couple of days, despite the sunny forecasts. Undaunted, we still managed to take some long walks in the rainforest, searching for a few recalcitrant bird species, but we found mostly leeches, or rather they found us. They don't hurt, in fact you seldom feel a thing, but they do leave a bloody mess when they finally drop off. Just like Humphrey Bogart, I hate leeches!
"Now for tomorrow's forecast."
