Babinda is a rural town and

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localities (Australia), in which a locality is a geographic subdivis ...

in the Cairns Region,

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , establishe ...

, Australia. In the , the locality of Babinda had a population of 1,253 people.

Geography

Babinda is located south of

Cairns Cairns (, ) is a city in Queensland, Australia, on the tropical north east coast of Far North Queensland. The population in June 2019 was 153,952, having grown on average 1.02% annually over the preceding five years. The city is the 5th-most-p ...

. The town is noted for its proximity to Queensland's two highest mountains Mount Bartle Frere (

's highest peak) and

Mount Bellenden Ker Mount Bellenden Ker is the second-highest mountain in Queensland, Australia, with a height of . It is named after the botanist John Bellenden Ker Gawler. Located south of Cairns near Babinda, it is adjacent to Mount Bartle Frere, the stat ...

. Babinda and Tully annually compete for the

Golden Gumboot The Golden Gumboot is a competition between the Far North Queensland towns of Tully, Innisfail, and Babinda in Australia for the wettest town of Australia. These towns are located in the Wet Tropics and on land that was previously covered ...

, an award for Australia's wettest town. Babinda is usually the winner, recording an annual average rainfall of over each year.

History

Babinda takes its name from the local

Indigenous Australian Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...

language for ''mountain''. Other sources, however, claim it is a Yidinji word for ''water'', possibly referring to the high rainfall of the area. Babinda State School opened on 4 November 1914. Babinda Post Office opened by 1915 (a ''Babinda Creek''

receiving office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letters and parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post offices may offer additional se ...

had been open since 1891). The Babinda Sugar Mill opened on 15 September 1915. It closed on 23 February 2011. Babinda Presbyterian church was officially opened on 5 November 1916 by Reverend S. Mitchell. On Sunday 18 March 1917

Bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ...

John Heavey John Alphonsus Heavey (1868-1948) was a Roman Catholic bishop in Queensland, Australia. He was the Vicar Apostolic of Cooktown and the Roman Catholic Bishop of Cairns. Early life Heavey was born on 13 November 1868 in Roundwood, County W ...

laid the foundation for Babinda's Catholic Church. Heavey returned on Sunday 15 July to dedicate the church. On 10 March 1918 a cyclone badly damaged the town with some reports saying that no building was left standing. An entire train at the railway station was blown over. Both the Presbyterian and Catholic churches were "blown to pieces". On Sunday 16 March 1919 the new Presbyterian Church was officially opened by the Reverend Fixter. On Sunday 9 July 1922 Heavey officially opened and blessed the rebuilt Catholic church. WW1-Babinda

The Babinda War Memorial was unveiled by the chairman of the

Cairns Shire Council The Shire of Mulgrave was a local government area surrounding the City of Cairns in the Far North region of Queensland. The shire, administered from Cairns, covered an area of ; it existed as a local government entity from 1879 until 1995, wh ...

Seymour Warner on 25 April 1927. The Babinda Parish of the Roman Catholic Apostolic Vicariate of Cooktown (now the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns) was established in 1934. The Babinda Public Library building opened in 1955. In March 2006, Babinda was struck by Cyclone Larry, damaging up to 80% of buildings. In the , the locality of Babinda had a population of 1,167 people. Of these, 49.7% were male and 50.3% were female. The majority of residents (79.7%) were of Australian birth, with other common census responses being

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

(2.7%) and New Zealand (2.0%). The age distribution of Babinda residents was skewed slightly higher than the greater Australian population. 70.1% of residents were over 25 years in 2006, compared to the Australian average of 66.5%; and 29.9% were younger than 25 years, compared to the Australian average of 33.5%. At the 2011 census, the town recorded a population of 1,068. In the , the locality of Babinda had a population of 1,253 people.

Heritage listings

Babinda has a number of

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and man-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In many i ...

sites, including: * 65-85 Munro Street: Babinda State Hotel * 109 Munro Street: Babinda Air Raid Shelter

Media

The local newspapers are '' The Cairns Post'' or the '' Wet Tropic Times''.

Education

St Rita's School is a Catholic primary (Prep-6) school for boys and girls at 7-13 Church Street (). In 2018, the school had an enrolment of 22 students with 7 teachers (5 full-time equivalent) and 6 non-teaching staff (3 full-time equivalent). Babinda State School is a government primary and secondary (Prep-12) school for boys and girls at Boulders Road (corner of Pollard Road, ). In 2018, the school had an enrolment of 257 students with 30 teachers (27 full-time equivalent) and 22 non-teaching staff (13 full-time equivalent). It includes a

special education Special education (known as special-needs education, aided education, exceptional education, alternative provision, exceptional student education, special ed., SDC, or SPED) is the practice of educating students in a way that accommodates th ...

program. Babinda Kindergarten is on Church Street and Babinda Early Learning is on Pollard Road.

Amenities

The Cairns Regional Council operates a public library in Babinda at 24 Munro Street. The Babinda branch of the Queensland Country Women's Association meets at the QCWA Hall in School Road. St Rita's Catholic Church is at 15 Church Street. It is within the Babinda Parish of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns and is administered from Innisfail. The Babinda Munro Picture Theatre operates Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.

Events

There are many different community events in Babinda. The annual Harvest Festival is celebrated in October and features some unusual events including the Sugar Bowl competition, the Gumboot Toss and the Umbrella Toss (reflecting Babinda's connection to the sugar industry and its wet weather). The festival has been running since the 1960s but did not occur in 2006 due to Cyclone Larry.

Attractions

The Boulders and Devil's Pool are popular tourist attractions. A picnic area is located nearby, beside Babinda Creek. Babinda Rotary Park is on Howard Kennedy Drive (). It provides free camping for up to 3 days.

Transportation

Babinda is situated on the

Bruce Highway The Bruce Highway is a major highway in Queensland, Australia. Commencing in the state capital, Brisbane, it passes through areas close to the eastern coast on its way to Cairns in Far North Queensland. The route is part of the Australian Nat ...

. The town has a railway station for access to the long-distance train services, currently only the Spirit of Queensland for which an advance booking must be made for the train to stop in Babinda.Spirit of Queensland timetable
Traveltrain 15 October 2018

Climate

Babinda has a

tropical rainforest climate A tropical rainforest climate, humid tropical climate or equatorial climate is a tropical climate sub-type usually found within 10 to 15 degrees latitude of the equator. There are some other areas at higher latitudes, such as the coast of southe ...

('' Af'') with humid and persistently wet weather. It is well known and recognised as the wettest town in Australia, with an annual average rainfall of 4279.4 mm. Monthly totals over 1000 mm are not uncommon, and sometimes, usually between January and April, whole months will go by without a single sunny day. The wet season lasts from December to May, while the 'dry season' occurs from June to November. During the wet season, heavy

monsoon A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annual latitudinal oscil ...

al downpours occur almost daily and occasionally even heavier rain from tropical lows or

cyclones In meteorology, a cyclone () is a large air mass that rotates around a strong center of low atmospheric pressure, counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere as viewed from above (opposite to an an ...

occurs. Rainfall still totals well over 100mm a month during the dry season; however, it is usually in the form of coastal showers, which can range from 1 or 2 millimeters, to brief downpours of 100mm or more.

Thunderstorm A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorms are some ...

s with dangerous

lightning Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electrically charged regions, both in the atmosphere or with one on the ground, temporarily neutralize themselves, causing the instantaneous release of an average ...

and damaging winds can be a threat from October to December; however, this threat decreases when the monsoon begins to take over in January.

References

External links

* *
Watch historical footage of Babinda, Cairns and Far North Queensland
from the

National Film and Sound Archive The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA), known as ScreenSound Australia from 1999 to 2004, is Australia's audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national co ...

of Australia's collection * *
Babinda Munro Theatre
Sponsored by the Babinda pharmacy showing the latest films. {{authority control Populated places in Far North Queensland Towns in Queensland Suburbs of Cairns Localities in Queensland