At 537,000ha, Lakefield
National Park on Cape York Peninsula is Queensland’s second largest
park. The park is drained by large rivers and contains spectacular wetlands
and is home to waterbirds, barramundi and estuarine and freshwater crocodiles.
Rivers become a series of waterholes in the dry season but the wet season
transforms the park into a vast inaccessible wetland.
Lakefield has a rich and
varied landscape with river estuaries, mangroves and mudflats to the north
around Princess Charlotte Bay, extensive grasslands and eucalypt and paperbark
woodlands on the river floodplains, and sandstone hills and escarpments to
the south. Patches of the unusual Corypha utan palm grow in the grasslands
on the marine plain. Gallery rainforest fringes parts of the Normanby and
Kennedy Rivers. The park is a wildlife refuge and home to several rare or
threatened animals including the golden-shouldered parrot, star finch, red
goshawk, Lakeland Downs mouse and spectacled hare-wallaby.
Location
Lakefield is 7–8
hours north of Cairns along the Peninsula Developmental Road. Turn right to
Lakefield 2km north of Laura
Further
Information
Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service PO Box 15187 City East Q 4002