Silky Oaks Lodge, in the Daintree Rainforest, is teeming with life. Photo / Supplied
Sarah Motherwell sees the emblematic ulysses butterfly in Queensland's rainforest.
Day three in the Daintree Rainforest - I think I'm losing my mind.
I'm the only one who sees this damn butterfly.
We are sipping welcome drinks at the Silky Oaks Lodge Treehouse Restaurant, high above the Mossman River, when I first spot it.
It's quick - a flash of blue in the corner of my eye. But by the time I call out to my fellow vacationers it has gone.
Later that day we take a helicopter to a secluded swimming hole in the middle of the rainforest.
The beauty of the isolated rapids flowing through the trees is breathtaking, although I can tell everyone is keeping one eye on the helicopter, which we are told attracts the elusive insect because of its blue sign.
After an evening soaring above the sugarcane fields and crystal blue coastline, I devour a perfectly cooked three-course meal and plan an early rise. Staff have spotted the resident platypus in a nearby billabong and my only chance to see it is at dawn.
Silky Oaks Lodge, unassumingly placed in the world's oldest surviving tropical rainforest, is teeming with life. During my stay I cross paths with a curious bandicoot, hear the happy chirps of frogs and admire the colourful flowers that pierce the lush, green landscape.
But the bonus of staying at this luxury lodge is that after a day of snorkelling with turtles or hiking through Mossman Gorge, you can relax with a massage at the hotel's Healing Waters Spa.
The dawn awakening fails to result in any aquatic mammal meeting but I am happy to watch an azure kingfisher plunge into the billabong for breakfast.
After a morning yoga class I wander along the pebbled path back to my room to pack. And that's when I see it.
The flash of blue, again, taunting me from the corner of my eye. A ulysses butterfly, fluttering through the rays of the sun that dash through the treetops.
There is no one else around to see it and it lasts for only a moment, but that is the true beauty of staying at a hotel in the middle of the Daintree Rainforest. You never quite know if your next perfect moment is just around the corner.
The writer was a guest of Silky Oaks Lodge.
- AAP
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