If you have come to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine then let us walk together,” said Lilla Watson, the esteemed Murri visual artist, activist and academic. It is a sentiment that echoes over the tops of the ancient trees in the World Heritage Listed Daintree Rainforest and across the waterways of the vast network of rivers and tributaries that circle this unique part of Australia.
In the far north of Queensland, Daintree Eco Lodge & Spa sits on a small tract of land perched at the edge of the dense, 900,000-hectare Daintree Rainforest. From the enclosed balcony of a treetop bayan (bungalow), you are surrounded by the sounds of the 135 bird species found on the property, and the lapping of a small creek running down from the waterfall high above the lodge. The aroma – dense, pungent and laden with the fragrance of ylang ylang – envelops you in a heavy blanket of moisture, which this wet part of the country maintains year round. It is a feeling like no other, and from the moment you arrive at the lodge, nature starts to have its way with you.
The affable hosts, Terry and Cathy Maloney, realise they are in a position of privilege, but they are not ones to flaunt it. When the Maloneys arrived in northern Queensland, the property had already been developed into a 30-acre ecologically sustainable lodge by a German couple, Hans and Jan Eyman. Under the Maloneys’ keen guidance, the lodge has developed into a lush resort with 15 elevated bayans, an award-winning day spa run by their daughter Kelda, and the Julaymba Restaurant, which serves a unique menu of bush tucker, such as red claw yabbies with lemon myrtle and pepperberry, and barramundi with native bush herbs.
creating a community
As we sit on the balcony of the lodge’s onsite restaurant overlooking a murky pool that harbours barramundi and eels, Cathy and Terry start to talk about the early days. Within six months of purchasing the lodge in 1995, the couple got a sense they weren’t the only ones who felt at home on the property. “It was three or four months after moving in that we found markers in the forest,” recalls Terry.
Both believe passionately in the principle of ecotourism, but for them it is not about ticking boxes. Ecology, at base, is about maintaining the balance of life (plant through to human) in a specific ecosystem. In the Daintree, this is as much about nurturing the diverse fauna and wildlife as it is about learning from and supporting the local Kuku Yalnaji people who are believed to have inhabited the rainforest for around 9000 years.
Terry laughingly recalls his blundering attempts to make contact with the local aboriginal elders once they realised the bent tree limbs (the “markers”) had been made by the Kuku Yalnaji. Initially rebuffed, years later Terry and Cathy have formed deep friendships with many in the community. Furthermore, they “consult on all developments” and ensure local Kuku Yalnaji are on staff at all times.
Juan Walker has worked for the Maloneys for 12 years. He is the son of one of the Maloney’s staunchest early-day adversaries and is testament to the Eco Lodge’s commitment to nurturing the talented youth of the Daintree. Walker now owns his own company, Walkabout Cultural Adventures, but still acts as a guide for the lodge. During the hour-and-a-half drive from Cairns (the closest airport) up the pristine coastline, Walker illuminated the history of the area with sparkling clarity. We discussed everything from the sugar cane industry to pearl diving to hunting (“when the umbrella trees flower it’s time to hunt lorikeets”); Steve Irwin (opinions are mixed); and the myths attached to certain landmarks we pass. An odd-shaped island that looks like a crocodile head is the only landmark on which he doesn’t elaborate: “it’s men’s business”.
learning to let go
Walker is a natural storyteller and it is easy to appreciate how essential oral history is for his people, and how devastating the looming loss of their language could be.
Linda Burchill, one of Walker’s fellow guides, has been working for the lodge for only a few months but the knowledge she shares is no less substantial. Burchill, who is the mother of two of the lodge’s “champions” – Leon, a film actor who left the Daintree to study at NIDA in Sydney, and Tahlia, who is studying at Queensland University – is a quiet, reserved woman, but quick to laugh. Under her watchful eye, one of the best-kept secrets in the Daintree is revealed: a small crystal-clear waterfall at the back of the property. It is this that necessitated the forest markers that the Maloneys discovered when they first arrived. It is an important site for the Kuku Yalnaji, a place of “women’s business” and the lynch pin in the Eco Lodge’s holistic approach to hospitality. The Maloneys encourage every woman guest to hike up to the waterfall (men are asked to hang back), and it is a rare privilege to be able to enter the cold, revitalising pool to stand under the barrage of water. Most guests, Cathy says, “need to take a minute to think about themselves” before they can let nature wash over them. Many are so programmed to the strains of urban life that fear is one of the first reactions when surrounded by the bush, says Terry. But encouraging their guests to simply let go and appreciate the healing wonders of nature is the lodge’s modus operandi.
Its award-winning day spa is integral to this. The treatments are a unique hybrid of Kuku Yalnaji traditions and Western massage practices. The day spa taps into the rich abundance of the forest, utilising endemic clays and plant extracts (ylang ylang, juniper berry, lemon myrtle, aniseed myrtle, eucalyptus, native mint and wild rosella, among others) in the spa’s Daintree Essentials skincare range. It is intended that guests make a seamless transition from the spa to the forest, experiencing the same sensory overload within each environment. Terry jokes that some guests embrace the concept so completely that they turn up to dinner in their spa robes. In the true spirit of Daintree hospitality, it is not frowned upon; in fact it proves that the Maloney’s are doing their job well and the urban armoury is starting to shed.
As Terry and Cathy do their evening rounds, chatting candidly with guests dining in the relaxing outdoor restaurant, accompanied by the sound of gurgling frogs, their motto, “people arrive as guests and leave as friends”, is easy to believe. The ancient world of the Daintree has its way with all but the most hardened urbanite, helped along no less by the staff at the delightful Daintree Eco Lodge & Spa.
Book three nights at the Daintree Eco Lodge & Spa and MiNDFOOD readers will receive the third night free, plus a complimentary Baral Mardjanda – aboriginal guided rainforest walk – for two. (Offer is available for parties of two.) +61 (0) 7 4098 6100; daintree-ecolodge.com.au
