Wednesday...30 July 2014

Another perfect day in the outer reaches of Qld.
The other day in Blackall we had an early morning fog and later in the morning as we were travelling along in bright sunshine we came to what looked like a wall of brown cloud and when we got under it, it turned out to be fog too! I have never driven into fog in broad daylight. It was eerie!
Now you will be pleased to know that there is still no shortage of fools riding push bikes around Australia. We continue to pass them on an average of one or two a day. The other day we also passed someone walking along the road pulling a little cart!
Himself wandered off to the Charleville Observatory the other night and had a good look at the night sky. According to the handout he bought home, every time you look at a star in a telescope, you are looking back in time. If something is 2000 light years away it means you are looking at light that left that star 2000 years ago! Must have been very bright when it left for us to still be able to see it all this much later.

Sunday...27 July 2014

Up super early, god I hate free camps, they can be so noisy first thing in the mornings.  This is caused by the fact that everyone goes to bed early so that they can save fuel in the generator or so that they can save on their available 12v power which means they also get up super early after an extremely long nights sleep.
There are the bright and breezy early risers who cheerfully, (and loudly), wish everyone good morning, there are the rattle clunk and bang mob who must be the grumpy type as they get out there and rattle and bang everything they can find as they go about their pack up, with absolutely no consideration to the other campers who may be still asleep, (a case of if they are up so can everyone else be!) and then there are the stealth merchants, the ones who take off at the crack of dawn, but usually they own the noisy vehicles so their quiet departure is sure to wake a few of the hardier sleepers.
We belong to the normal mob, the ones who see no need to rush off early enough to take breakfast out the road to the kangaroos to see them through their busy day of scaring the living daylights out of tourists! We leave camp around 8.30 am when we are reasonably sure the kangaroos are done partying and have gone home to rest before they begin again come sundown. This way we have a fairly pleasant days travel without the constant stop start required along kangaroo alley!
Today it was harder and harder not to feel sorry for the dreaded kangaroo. This part of the country is in severe drought and the kangaroos are drawn to the roads to lick the night dew off the bitumen and to feed on the little amount of green feed that grows on the side of the road, and then along comes the three and four trailer road trains who are not going to stop, in fact they simply cannot stop in a hurry.
But I digress. We came down from Blackall to Charleville. And oh the welcome, they were pleased to see us and we were pleased they had remembered us. We promptly put our names down for dinner tonight and lucky us, it was roast lamb with all the trimmings and hot damper with jam and cream for dessert. Home cooking and entertainment. Wonderful. They have a resident country singer and he is quite good.

Saturday...26 July 2014

So we set off again yesterday and from Charters Towers we headed to Hughenden, home of the Muttasorus dinosaur, but sadly by the time we got there the caravan park was full so we continued toward Winton and free camped at a gravel dump in the very small township of Stamford. We had the place to ourselves as even the roadhouse had closed. Very quiet night, bit on the warm side but otherwise a good nights camping.
This morning we motored down to Winton and on to Longreach. From there we went to Ilfracombe (famous for its main street which has a mile of very old tractors and other equipment). We ordered takeaways at the local hotel and spent the waiting time looking at their collection of hats donated by mostly stockmen and such. The pub at Daly Waters has its roof lined by bras and foreign currency, the pub in Ilfracome has its roof lined by akubras and $5 notes. The notes are collected over the year in donations and then used for the maintenance of the mile of tractors!
From Ilfracombe we turned onto the Isisford road. Not a very long drive but it was ruined for us by the 40 km of roadworks that actually meant driving in the tabledrain for nearly 25 km. Very rough detour tracks!
We had planned to stay at the well known Isisford free camp on the banks of the Barcoo river but two things put us off. There were over 600 people camping there and none of them seemed to be aware of the stench of something dead and decaying at or very near the camp. We slowed down and wound the window down while we worked out the layout and instantly the choking stench hit our noses and you know the campers were all just sitting there and none of them seemed to be able to smell it or care if they could!!!
Although it was getting late in the day we chose to continue to Blackall for the night.
Just out of Isisford is Isis Downs Station. This place is famous for its shearing shed and at one time the shed was open to the public but sadly it is closed now. Himself would give his eye teeth to get a look at that shed but alas it was not to be so he had to settle for stopping at the station gate and taking pictures.

Our luck was out again when we got to Blackall, the caravan park was full, so we are camped in the Blackall Council camp ground just on the edge of town. Its a free camp you have to pay for! Still it is somewhere for us to lay our weary heads before we continue our trek tomorrow.

Sunday...20 July 2014

Have just been doing some research into the lyrics of the song Three Rivers Hotel. 
The Three Rivers Hotel, made famous by Slim Dusty in a song by the same name, is located at Greenvale. 
This is not the actual hotel where the song was penned by Stan Coster. The hotel reference is actually to the "Mess Hall" at the construction camp where Stan Coster penned the song. Stan worked as Grader operator for Thiess Brothers on the construction of the railway line. The origin of the name "Three Rivers Hotel" is not because the "hotel" was ever at the junction of the three rivers - Burdekin, Star and Clarke as stated on some web sites. The lyrics mention the camp at the Star River. This was one of 6 camps that existed on the length of the Greenvale line. 
During 1974 North Queensland was severely drenched by a very active wet season and work on the railway line ceased for days, even weeks, on end. The workers in the camps had nothing better to do than spend the day in the camp "boozer". Each camp had a boozer which was a basic demountable building with outdoor covered seating. During one of these wet days the water started to enter the confines of the boozer and immediately some of the men started digging some improvised drainage around the boozer to channel away the water. As they built the channels, some wags named them after the 3 main rivers (Burdekin, Star and Clarke). These were joined up roughly as they do in real life and the boozer was then named "the Three Rivers Hotel". 
One of the drinkers that day was Stan Coster who penned the song on the spot and performed it for the drinkers - the rest is history. The three rivers referred to in the song do not join up but the Star and the Clarke join the Burdekin at completely separate locations and therefore there could be no hotel on the "junction" of the three rivers the song refers to. 
So there you go, it would seem I did not have dinner at a famous location after all. Oh well, it was still a good night out and it is nice to see the Greenvale 'local' keeping the spirit of the song alive.

Friday...18 July 2014

From Townsville to Greenvale we're building a line
Through the ranges and gorges to the great nickel mine
The long days are dusty and hotter than hell
And that's why we all worship Three Rivers Hotel
(Sung by Slim Dusty, Lyrics by Stan Coster)

Last night we had dinner at the Three Rivers Hotel. We met up with a lively mob of road workers who had just knocked off for the day and were washing the dust out of their throats. Much merriment and laughter listening to their descriptions of the traffic blunders they have seen on the job.
Out the back of the hotel is a sausage tree, it is one of only two known to be in this area.

The nuts look a bit like sausages. Fascinating to see.

Very pleased we stopped in Greenvale even if they do not have internet, mobile reception or television! What they are missing in technology they more than make up for in the warmth of the welcome.
And by the way, the nickel mine closed in 1993 and the town nearly became a ghost town but there are about 150 locals still keeping it going.

Monday...14 July 2014

So the Rodeo has been and gone, the town was very busy. No idea how it all went, we chose to stay home this time but Himself went out to the local Turf Club to check out the entrants in the big dog show that was on at the same time. He came home happy after this outing.
We went to the markets on Saturday morning and came back loaded down with fresh pumpkin, sweet potato, tomatoes, bananas and mandarins. Himself bought some LED running lights for the ute and another solid strip LED that we are going to put a hook on for lighting up the annexe when we want to cook out there after sunset. Most folk do their outside cooking during the day but occasionally after an extra late happy hour we will feel like a steak and that is best cooked outside!
Today we went "over the hill". This is quite an adventure. Well for me it is. It scares the living daylights out of me. I swear that road is no wider than a goat track even if big trucks do use it. And they have not widened it since I last travelled on it. Cairns is only 62 km away but to get there the road goes up and over the Great Dividing Range and includes 13 km of non stop winding roads and hairpin bends. For most of the time the speed limit is 60 km or less. We were in line behind two big trucks, a couple of caravans and assorted other cars and today we had the added bonus of roadworks! In that 13 km if you have time to look up, you will see the famous Skyrail that runs from Cairns to Kuranda. It crosses the road twice on its way to the top of the mountain.

On the other side is a fairly large shopping centre with all the usual variety and chain stores. I got a haircut and found a couple of nice tops to add to my growing collection. We also got another aerobic stepper as the current one which is used as an extra step for the caravan is slowly wearing out after four years of constant use. Tomorrow is recovery day!

Wednesday...9 July 2014

Still in Mareeba, just sitting in the sun, slowly getting a tan.
Would love to say it is hot and sunny all the time but the truth is the nights and early mornings are a bit chilly and we get seriously heavy overnight dews. When I get up in the morning the car looks like it has been raining overnight there is so much water on it, but by nine o'clock it is all gone and we are left with a grotty car from a combination of accumulated dust and overnight dew. When the dew evaporates off the awning it looks like smoke. Once the day gets going we have clear blue skies and around 27 degrees. Then I fetch my ebook and sit in the sun soaking up the warmth along with most other occupants of the park.
The town is getting ready for the annual Mareeba Rodeo and Show which is on this coming weekend. It is the big event for the year here and everyone goes all out for it. The shops have Rodeo week specials and the council has decorated the main street and there will be a street parade on opening night. Most exciting.

Sunday...6 July 2014

 37000 pageviews - 609 posts.

Wow this blogging can be addictive. It would seem that I have made 609 entries since we began our travels and people have read it 37,000 times. Go me!  A big high five to my readers for sticking with me.

It is a bit chilly this morning but the sun is shining brightly, the awning looks like it is on fire as the heavy dew from last night evaporates off it. The sky above is completely cloudless and being Sunday, it will not be long before the distinctive hiss of hot air balloons can be heard as they pass over our caravan park on the way back to the landing zone after an early morning flight full of tourists.
After breakfast we will set off to the local Sunday markets for some fresh local produce. The markets here are very popular and worth the time to visit, there are heaps of stalls of varying degrees of interest.

Friday...4 July 2014

Yesterday was moving day again. Townsville to Mareeba.

Nearly six hours non stop driving. Seriously. No toilet breaks and we even ate lunch as we drove, I packed a corned beef and relish sandwich (as a back up in case there was limited opportunities to buy lunch along the way), which we ended up eating while we waited at one of the many roadwork stops. I have on occasion been known to be less than generous with my opinion of some of the roads in Queensland, but I have to hand it to them, they are throwing huge amounts of money at the Bruce Highway which is their part of the National Highway #1. It is probably why some of the other roads are less than perfect, all the money is being spent on that one road. On our travels yesterday we were stopped seven times and the distance was only 390 km. Some of the delays were long enough that Himself turned the engine off and we wound down the windows to admire the fresh air and whatever scenery we had available to us.

It was necessary to cross the Great Dividing Range again and regular readers of this blog will no doubt remember my apparently hilarious descriptions of previous trips over this particular patch of hilly terrain. Yesterday the joke was on me again. This time, not only did we have to climb tortuous hills, but on one of them I thought we would end up sliding back down it as we were stuck behind a rather large motor home bus which was towing a car trailer and doing all of 5 km/hour. 

Now like I said earlier, the joke really was on me as we had steep hill climbs, slow traffic AND absolutely bucketing tropical rain! So heavy at times the wipers were useless and one simply guessed where the road was! So I chewed my nails to the elbow (again!), recited several Hail Mary's and made up a few more, and there we were, slip sliding our way over the Range in the pouring rain on a goat track. A great days drive...NOT.

However there is always a rainbow after such heavy rain and for us the pot of gold was arriving in beautiful sunny Mareeba and just now as I have been writing this entry, some friends have pulled into the same caravan park, so we will have a very happy Happy Hour tonight.