THE INLAND RUN - TOOGOOLAWAH TO BOWEN

9^th April, 2013

We decide to continue on our merry way and leave the sky divers to their seemingly risky pastime.  They’ve certainly been very entertaining!  Heading west up over the Great Dividing Range we pass through small country towns where the local pub seems to be the only commercial establishment in operation – that is if there is a pub at all.  At Kaimkillenbun (try saying that name when you have had one too many for the road) we stopped to have a pub lunch at the bar of the ‘Bun Hotel’.  The steak sandwich with a side of chips was yummy and the proverbial ‘dog on the veranda’ kept us amused as we ate.

The 'dog on the veranda' at the Bun Hotel

This beautiful kelpie dog checked out all the trucks and cars as they drove past and the bar patrons emptied their lunch leftovers into his food bowl.  Nothing happened inside or outside that pub without the dog’s complete attention and we know he was just dying for a flock of sheep or something he could round up to go wandering by.

Just checking out the passing parade

We continued west stopping overnight at a waterhole near Chinchilla and the next day turned north at Miles.  Apart from the usual cattle stations there are different crops being grown such as corn and sorghum.  After all the rain and floods over the past year the countryside is green and grass grows as high as the cattle in some paddocks.  We have never seen this part of Australia so bursting with life.  Waterholes are full to overflowing and birdlife is abundant.  It’s a far cry from the usual dusty red parched land we usually see.  At Isla Gorge we stop to take in the view

Wok takes in the view at Isla Gorge

before continuing on to a freecamp beside the Dawson River at Theodore.  There are a few other rigs camped at this park on the southern edge of town and there is a donation box for the use of the toilets and hot showers.  Theodore is situated in the middle of a cotton growing area and although it is not a large town it does have a medical centre, school, IGA Supermarket, police station, service station, pub and several small businesses.  With the town centre an easy walk from the camping area it makes an ideal place to while away a couple of days.

Swimming hole on the Dawson River at Theodore

Wok also tried his hand at fishing and caught three catfish (not the eel tailed catfish which we think is nice eating but some other type that we are not too sure about) so it was a catch and release exercise for Wok and provided him with a bit of fun.  Free entertainment was also provided when a large carpet snake (we estimate about 6 feet in length) decided to set up home underneath a motor home camped nearby.  To say the occupants of the motor home breathed a sigh of relief when the snake finally slithered back into the long grass beside the waterway would be an understatement.  We continued our trek north trying to avoid the busier inland roads where semi-trailers and road trains rule.  There are lots of mining trucks and we pass railway trains loaded with coal and ore headed for the coastal ports.  Our handy dandy camp book shows a freecamp spot on the banks of Lake Elphinstone off the Suttor Development Road and as we are passing by the lake on our way to Bowen we decide to drop in and have a look.  Imagine our surprise when we turn left off the main road to head the four kilometres to the camp spot and are stopped by a police woman with a breathalyser.  We could count on one hand the number of vehicles we have passed in the last hour and are 25 klms from the nearest town.  What the …..!!  Never let it be said that our police force neglects its duties in these remote areas!!  After blowing zero in the breathalyser Wok is waved on and a few minutes later we arrive at the camp area at Lake Elphinstone.  What a lovely spot!  School holidays are just about over and there are only a few campers left - mostly grey nomads.  We find a nice spot near the water’s edge and set up camp. 

Camp spot at Lake Elphinstone

There are plenty of waterbirds around … black swans, water hens, cormorants and a variety of ducks.  There is even a domestic duck that has just hatched out six ducklings and has set up a nest in the hollowed out base of a gum tree near our camp.

Mother duck and ducklings in gum tree nest

The couple that are camped closest to the tree have turned into personal security guards for the duck and the ducklings and spend their day chasing the crows, butcher birds and wild ducks away from the mother duck.

Mother duck takes her brood for a morning constitutional

Hopefully they will grow quickly before a predator can make a meal of them.   

Aren't they cute .....

Even though we are camped beside the water there aren’t any mosquitoes and only the odd fly so sitting outside under the awning is comfortable.  For over 12 months we have been carting around a portable barbeque that we have never used.  This seems to be an ideal spot for the barbie’s debut and Wok is happy with its performance and his grilling skills.  Maybe the barbie will make more appearances in the future.

Steak, egg and onion .... looking good Wok!

It is so peaceful here that we decide to stay for a few days.  There are toilets and showers (hot if you fire up the jerry built furnace with wood to get it going) and nothing to pay.  Bargain!  It’s just the place to sit back and unwind for a few days.

Lake Elphinstone

Ahhhh  ……  the serenity !!!!

FRIENDS, FAMILY and HAVING FUN

7^th April, 2013

Two months have flown by since our last blog and it only seems like yesterday that we were camped beside the Murray River.  We spent four days at our first camp and then travelled downstream to another freecamp near the town of Finley.

Camped beside the Murray River near Finley

We spent two days at this camp site and each morning and afternoon large flocks of corellas (parrots) flew along the river.

Corellas flying down river

Thank goodness their night time resting place wasn’t in the trees near us as we would never have been able to sleep.  They are very noisy birds and continually talk (or screech) to each other as they are flying.  If we could understand ‘corella talk’ their conversations might be very interesting.  The super hot days seem to have left us now and the temperature is in the low 30’s – still quite warm but bearable.  We leave the Murray River behind and head north through inland New South Wales passing through the towns of Forbes and Parkes.  Of course when travelling country roads and highways one must expect to run into the odd domesticated animal and be prepared for drovers with their herds of cattle

Move along there little moo cow ...

 and flocks of sheep.

Come on guys ... you're following one another like sheep

North of Parkes we stopped for a look at the Parkes Radio Telescope.

Parkes Radio Telescope towers over the visitor centre

Some of you may remember the Australian movie ‘The Dish’ which tells the story of the important role the radio telescope played in the Apollo Missions.  The facility has been upgraded since then and still plays an important role in space communications.  It is quite fascinating to see the dish change positions and it can go from being horizontal to vertical in a matter of minutes.

The dish on the move to 'vertical'

We left the highway and travelled twenty kilometres to the southern end of Goobang National Park.  After a slow drive up and down gullies and across washouts on a very narrow rough dirt track we arrived at the campground.  We had not seen a sign of any other vehicles since leaving the highway so were not surprised to find that apart from a couple of very timid wallabies and some emus we had the whole place to ourselves.  No-one else would be crazy enough to try and get in here!  Famous last words!  Two hours later we could hear the sound of a vehicle coming along the track and to our surprise three 4 Wheel Drives with caravans pulled into the campground.  They were all from Queensland and like us thought this camping area sounded easily accessible from the ‘handy dandy’ Camps 6 Book we possessed.  Of course once one leaves the main road and starts down the track there is nowhere to turn around so one is obligated to keep on going.  Once they were set up we joined them for ‘happy hour’.  They were headed south to do a couple of weeks exploring Tasmania and we swapped information about camping spots along the way.  In the morning Wok was doing his usual check around the van before leaving and spotted a crack in a weld on the chassis.  This was exactly the same problem we had with the chassis in the Northern Territory – only on the opposite side.  Very carefully we left the campground and Wok drove as gently as he could until we reached Dubbo about 70 kilometres away.  After checking at a couple of likely looking places we finally were directed to a guy who could do a quick weld of the chassis.

The van inside the workshop

This would at least hold us together until we returned to the Sunshine Coast and get a better look underneath the van.  From Dubbo we turned east and made our way towards the coast.  At Scone we camped overnight at Lake Glenbawn

Our site at Lake Glenbawn

and the next day visited Cheryl (a childhood friend of Wok’s) in Scone and then continued on to Newcastle where we met up with Ken and Margaret Smith at Stockton Tourist Park.

Ken, Wok and Margaret in our office at Stockton Tourist Park

Ken and Margaret have been our friends for what seems like forever and although they live in Brisbane they had come down to Newcastle for five weeks to look after Ken’s mother (who is 99 years old and still living at home) while his sister and husband had a well needed holiday.  They were staying at the park in their caravan and checking in on Ken’s mum each day (as his sister does) and catching up with relatives and friends while they were there.  While in the caravan park Margaret celebrated her 70^th birthday and this was the reason we had decided to return to our home town instead of staying south for a further couple of months. 

Margaret, Sharon (their daughter) and Ken

The caravan park at Stockton is situated on the beach on the northern side of the entrance to the Hunter River.  On the southern side of the river entrance is the city of Newcastle and from the caravan park we can see the many freighters that come and go to this busy coastal port.

Freighter heading out the Hunter River - Nobbies in the background

We also have a wonderful view of Newcastle from the breakwater

On the breakwater watching cruise ship leave the harbour - Newcastle in background

and wave to the passengers on a cruise ship as she heads out through the heads accompanied by two tug boats.

Cruise Ship 'Rhapsody of the Seas' exits the heads - Tug Boats returning

Over the next two weeks we catch up with our son Trent and visit or get visited by family and friends.  We have never eaten out so much in years and it will take months to take off all those extra kilos we seem to have put on.  It was great to see everyone again – many of whom we had not seen in several years.  We had planned on travelling back to the Sunshine Coast via the Pacific Highway but a couple of days before we planned on heading out a rain depression formed off the east coast and floods were once again punishing the coastal towns.  Many communities that had only just started to get back on their feet after the late January floods were once again inundated.  The coastal highway between Newcastle and the Queensland border was cut in three places and all traffic was being diverted to the inland New England highway.  We decided to travel even further west to avoid the nightmare traffic conditions being created on this highway and use some of the lesser travelled country roads to get us north to Queensland.  At lunchtime on the first day we stopped at a rest area near Merriwa and took a stroll to see Battery Rocks.

Wok checks out Battery Rocks

Although these rock formations look as though they were man made, they are in fact a natural phenomenon.  It looks as though someone has just clumped a whole lot of giant grey stone toothpicks all together and pushed them into the ground at an angle …. very interesting.  Turning north we passed through Coonabarabran and it was hard not to miss the many billboards and signs dedicated to our solar system.

One of the many 'space' billboards near Coonabarabran

The reason for this of course is the Siding Springs Observatory located in a National Park west of the town.  We had camped in the park and visited the observatory many years ago when our kids were little but two months ago a raging bushfire engulfed a fair whack of the park and the observatory was lucky to survive.  We decided to keep heading north and postpone a second visit to the observatory and park until a later date.  We camped out at different spots along the way and it wasn’t until we reached Cecil Plains west of Toowoomba that the rain finally found us.  We camped beside a weir on the Condamine River where the water rose about a metre overnight so in the morning we made a beeline for our daughter’s home on the Sunshine Coast before we got stranded by the floodwater in-between towns.  We arrived in time to go out to dinner with the family to celebrate our grandson Josh’s 17^th birthday.

Talia wants some of that HUGE ice-cream dessert of Josh's

Over the following weeks we received many quick visits in the van by the family – well we were sort of parked right in the middle of their driveway -

Not sure what Josh, Tina and Ranger (the dog) are looking
 at outside our van but it did make for a fun photo.

and got the chassis checked out re welding repairs.  Wok did some maintenance, we had our usual doctor check ups and flu shots etc. etc. etc.  Of course we also managed to fit in a couple of Josh’s Futsal (indoor soccer) games and watched his team win the finals as well as Shakiah’s first calisthenics competition for the year where she managed to place third in her first solo performance.  Being a grandparent sure can be fun!  Easter has come and gone and we are now back on the road.  Our first stop wasn’t a long drive away – Toogoolawah Drop Zone.  We had come to the Rambler’s Parachute Club to see an old workmate of Wok’s – John Blane (aka Blano).  The facilities at the drop zone are adequate and they have a camping area for permanents as well as a paddock for tourists to camp in.  There are some electrical outlets available so we have set up near one of these.  At $12 per night or $55 per week these powered sites are a bargain.

Our campsite at Toogoolawah Drop Zone

Not only do we have a nice quiet farm type environment we also have free entertainment.  We can watch the skydivers exit the jump plane from our site and marvel at the aerial manoeuvres as they scream in for a landing.

Blano on his first jump of the day ....

Just to prove that this is not a sport for the faint-hearted Blano received a dislocated shoulder on his second jump of the day when another parachutist barged into him when exiting the jump plane.  He managed to open his parachute despite his damaged shoulder but had to make a dicey landing as he only had one arm to operate the chute.  Needless to say a visit to the local hospital to get his shoulder put back in was in order and is now OK but he won’t be making any more jumps for a while.  Well guess it is time to relax and have 'happy hour' and watch the last sky dive of the day along with the mob of kangaroos and bevy of bunny rabbits that have take up positions along the edge of the drop zone.

Kangaroos watching all the action at the drop zone

Ahhh!  This is the life …..