4 - North from Canberra 8th - 24/4/2019

Entry 4                  North from Canberra 8 – 24/4/2019

We experienced a good day when departing Canberra. We commenced our days driving at about 9.10 am, travelling further than we had anticipated, clocking up a bit over 450 kilometres, a big day for us, spending the night at a free camping location in Gilgandra where we restocked our fridge. Admittedly we were in bed by 7.30 pm. Then we were mobile the next morning at about 6.50 am arriving at our planned destination of Pilliga Hot Artesian Bore Bath by 9.30 am where we set camp and were immersing our bodies into the Artesian waters by 9.45 am for our first calming dip for the day.

Some of the scenery on our drive

Within a few hours we were feeling quite relaxed with our bodies appreciating the soul calming properties provided by the hot artesian waters with its mineral infusion qualities and the added bonus of many conversations with other likeminded people sharing the pool, staying for three nights. After a departure morning dip, we resumed our northern travels heading towards one of this year planned destinations, still a couple of thousand kilometres north of our present location.

A large mob of pelicans all taking it in turn to use the take off runway

We chose to travel north along a route a few hundred kilometres inland from the eastern coast of Australia travelling along one of those less travelled routes at a more leisurely pace not having to constantly monitor for other traffic around us where we got to enjoy viewing the country side along our way. About 120 kilometres north we stopped for the night at a free camp (with hot showers) on the outskirts of the small town of Collarenebri where we stretched our legs walking around the town with the main street consisting mostly of closed shop front business. We spotted what looked like some old times wharf remnants on The Barwon River running alongside of the town.

As the afternoon progressed the camping area felt like it was being swamped with people arriving, erecting something like around a dozen plus tents whom all appeared to know one another. A truck with a couple of horses and a horse drawn gypsy type wagon with “The Old Time Gospel,” written across the wagon’s sides, also pulled up. It wasn’t long before someone was playing a banjo accompanied by lots of chatter. We were standing outside chatting with our neighbours when an elderly man approached us from the new arrivals and started explaining they were on their annual pilgrimage promoting the gospel and were about to join the horses and cart walking around the town. Steve quickly spoke over the male’s voice distracting him from whatever sermon we were about to incur with a few off-beat questions along the line, their set up looked like something out of the movie, “Paint Your Wagon,” and was anyone going to be singing the Lee Marvin song, “I was born under a wondering star?” The conversation instantly changed to a few different movies and our visitor wondered off with a smile on his face without completing whatever he was planning to preach.

Within a few minutes we were on our way where we drove down the main street not seeing a soul and wondering if the gypsies were going to find someone to preach their gospel to.

As we were travelling along a non-main route, we did incur about 100 kilometres of dirt road.

The roads were a graded clay surface, a surface we would not be travelling along if there had been any indication of rain, as we weren’t prepared to risk the heartache of getting stranded on a boggy road. We still travelled at a slow rate of speed, at times up to around 50 kph and still managed to leave a large dust cloud trail behind us.

Just wouldn't be the same, driving in outback Australia without a Kangaroo jumping out in front of you.

I thought the passenger was taking the photo’s?

Ah the next photo explains the reversed picture.

We were travelling along some new routes for us with a planned stop at Mungindi only to find their camp ground closed for repairs, so we continued up the road a bit, stopping for the night at Thallon. Another day spent clocking up around 121 kilometres. Thallon camping area had a great setting with the painted silo art displaying sheep of the district in the back ground and we experienced a mob of live sheep wandering around our caravan enhancing a great setting.

Leaving Thallon, we managed to cut back on our travelling distance stopping at the Nindigully Pub located about 30 kilometres up the road. Nindigully is a pub in the bush with a large free camping area located on the banks of the Moonie River. Though we still had to be on the alert for road hazards on our drive to Nindigully.

Our camp on left of picture

Interestingly on our first night at Nindigully there were two other Bushtracker caravans of a similar vintage to ours. None knew one another but we all managed to get together at the pub for happy hour with a constant flow of conversation, continuing into the evening still at the pub where we all ordered pizza for tea. One of those four-hour plus happy hours.

For us Nindigully was a great setting with up to 30 different traveller rigs arriving each day, most departing the following morning. We spent three nights relaxing at Nindigully moving on to St George where we restocked our provisions, staying for two nights at the small township of Surat, a location we were hoping might be quiet for the initial start of Easter long weekend. Surat had a lovely walking path alongside a river which we enjoyed all to ourselves in a lovely bush setting. We spent time in the town’s museum enjoying our time spent in the towns free camp.

First you skirt the wool

 

Then you press the wool

It was Easter Friday leaving Surat. The roads were much quieter with noticeably fewer heavy transport vehicles about and a light traffic flow of holiday people moving around. Stopping at the Injune information centre for a break while browsing through some of the available information on local attractions, a couple of nearby national parks caught our attention, Lonesome and Nuga Nuga National Parks. Both were nearby our northern travelling route, located on the eastern side of Carnarvon Highway in the vicinity of the very popular Carnarvon National Park (on the western side of the Carnarvon Highway.) Lonesome lookout provided rewarding views of the below, Arcadia Valley. The campground was deserted looking very lonesome and we decided to continue north through Arcadia Valley to Lake Nuga Nuga which involved around 50 kilometres of dirt roads / tracks.

The tow tug and caravan were covered in a layer of fine dust by the time we arrived at Lake Nuga Nuga which was quickly disregarded with a most magnificent setting taking all of our attention.

Where did the Echidna go?

In the morning we watched the Easter full moon setting on the western side of the lake with the sun rising from the eastern side.

With the morning still young we took a two hour walk around, viewing our nearby area of the lake. The bird chatter around us was quite loud and there were the constant mobs of kangaroo’s scattering around us. It was a delightful setting and we thought it prudent to stay a second night.

Trees were supporting plenty of bird nests

Late morning the clouds started to build up. The temperature was hovering about 30 C. Steve was under the caravan repairing a broken hand brake cable that we had found dragging on arrival at the camp ground. He saw Mary’s legs running about where she was shutting all the car doors. Unbeknown to Steve it had started to rain. After several showers of rain over a short period of time, we decided to err on the side of caution and depart, not wishing to get stranded at Lake Nuga Nuga on this occasion anyhow. By 12.30 pm we were all packed, caravan repairs were complete and we were on our way watching the rain in the distance.

Luckily, we didn’t strike any substantial rain till we were motoring along the main bitumized highway. When we stopped for the night, we saw our dusty rig had changed to a muddy looking rig. Ironically down a side road from our camp location was a truck washdown area which we utilized the following morning.

A clean rig does look nice.

Springsure was our stop for that night with a beautiful back drop setting. Both the main mountain peaks were lit up by spot lights into the night, extending a special setting into the hours of darkness.

A couple of days later we took some time out for a look around Charters Towers. We had a work out walking up Tower Hill for views of the local setting.

Another great roadside stopover a bit north of Charters Tower was at a location called Fletcher Creek. We arrived mid afternoon on Easter Monday, after the exodus of a large volume of Easter campers.

We had a requirement to travel a quantity of kilometres, to progress to our next targeted location to fulfil time lines. This entry, number 4 could easily have been a one liner, showing we left Canberra, travelling around 3,000 kilometres to our next destination just over a two-week period. It could have been a dull boring drive. We chose to constantly research our proposed route, on a near daily ritual and be, not afraid to zig zag a bit, exploring some other locations not far from our direct route. We did enjoy plenty of special scenery, helping to break up the monotony of driving chores. During this period, we chose to concentrate on driving over the Easter long weekend, avoiding the crush of people that do impact those special locations one would normally camp at.

There were the hundreds of Queensland power poles all leaning towards the east. It was rather peculiar and even the country side was a lush green, very different to the parched country side we had been viewing over the last few years.

We arrived at our planned destination of Atherton Tablelands, inland from the coastal town of Cairns, North Queensland. An area we were hoping to explore for a period of time.