Mon, 24th to Thurs, 27th October - Calliope River

We had a pleasant stay at Emu Park, but we left on Monday and drove 30kms through Rockhampton and a further 100kms on to a free camp at Calliope (pronounced Cal-i-o-pee) River.  Calliope River is located about 25kms inland from Gladstone.  There were still warnings this far south and inland about crocodiles.  It was a beautiful day and we leisurely set up camp.  More travellers arrived during the afternoon and we ended up with a motorhome in front of us ... it was the motorhome that Rick helped out of the sand bog back at Carmila Beach.

On the Tuesday morning the motorhome in front of us moved to the other side of the river as they felt there would be less mosquitos over there ... fortunately we hadn't had a problem with them ourselves.  After brekky we walked across the closed bridge over the river to the Calliope Historical Village and spent a couple of hours wandering around.  We had lunch there before heading back to the van for a quiet afternoon of reading.  I fished for a while later in the afternoon with no luck.  We had been advised not to eat anything we caught anyway as there is a disease called Red Spot in a lot of the fish around the Gladstone area.

On Wednesday (day 250 of our trip) we drove a short distance (6kms) into the township of Calliope ... we didn't realise how close it was and how big it was.  We found the toilet dump point easily and drove around for a bit of a look.  We left Calliope and headed 25kms into Gladstone to see what was there.  Gladstone is a large 'go-ahead' town and very industrial.  We had a look around at the Marina which is the departure point for Heron and outer reef islands and then drove to the Auckland Hill Lookout.  Gladstone's major export is coal, but includes Calcite, scrap metal, Magnesia, Grain, Containers and general cargo.  Calcite is a high quality limestone which when crushed is a pure white product.  It is stockpiled ready to ship to Geelong, Victoria where it is used as a filter in plastics, paper glossing and toothpaste. We looked around for somewhere nice to have lunch on the waterfront, however we didn't find anything enticing so we settled for a shopping centre hot-dog.  We shopped (again) and then headed back to van on the river.  On the way back we spotted a rather quirky letterbox and couldn't resist taking a photo.  I fished for a while on our return and managed to land a nice 30cm Bream.  Sadly, it appeared that he had the dreaded 'Red-Spot' disease, so he was quickly sent to Fish Heaven.  Very soon after that I landed a larger Cat Fish ... a bit of fun for the afternoon. Thursday was spent very quietly ... just reading and relaxing in the sun.

The view of the Calliope River from our van

Looking back toward our van from the other side of the river

The closed bridge across the river to the Historical Village

Water rushing down toward the ocean

The Historical Village run totally by volunteers

There were four of these cute little guys in one of the historical buildings

Panorama of the Gladstone wharf area showing a heap of Calcite in the foreground

Ned's guarding the mail in the letterbox

Thurs, 20th to Sun, 23rd October - Emu Park

Thursday was Mum's birthday, so we gave her a call as we were driving out of Carmila Beach.  Phone reception wasn't good so we made it a quick one. We drove about 200kms to Yeppoon where we did our 'never-ending' food shopping.  We then continued on a further 30kms to Emu Park which is a quieter little township located on the beach.  We checked into the caravan park just as it started raining and spent the afternoon catching up with some chores.  We had a lovely site ... just a grassy park area between the back of our van and the beach.

Friday was another overcast and cool day.  We drove back into Yeppoon via Rosslyn Bay which is where cruises depart for Great Keppel Island.  We spent quite a bit of time with the local JP having some documents signed before visiting the Telstra shop.  My LG phone had decided to start switching itself off at random times, so it was time to update.  We took on a new iPhone 4S, hoping that we would be able to figure out how to use it, haha!!  After lunch, we headed back to the park and Rick spent the afternoon washing our very dirty vehicle.  Saturday was overcast again, although a bit warmer.  Rick washed the van and I went for a walk to the nearby shopping centre to have a look.  We spent a quiet afternoon watching the V8 car races.  When the races finished, we went for a bit of a drive around to look at the sights.  We discovered that Emu Park is a bit bigger than we first thought.

On Sunday morning I learned from the lady cleaning the amenities that some kids had come into the park during the night and stolen a lot of things - mainly grog and cigarettes.  They also pinched a ball of wool from one van and ran around the park wrapping it around everything they could.  The lady in the van next to us disturbed them trying to take one of her little children's trikes from their annexe.  We were lucky not to lose anything and we didn't hear anything during the night.  Once again, Rick sat and watched the car races for most of Sunday afternoon while I spent some time learning how to use the iPhone.  When the races finished, we went for another short drive around.  On a hill not very far from the park is what they call the 'Singing Ship'.  It is in honour of Captain Cook who discovered Keppel Bay in May, 1770.  The 'ship' features several tubes which sing with the movement of the wind through them.

Our site with the park and beach in the background

Looking down over part of Emu Park from a new estate

The 'Singing Ship'

View across to the islands from the 'Singing Ship'

Tues, 18th to Wed, 19th October - Carmila Beach

Tuesday was overcast and quite a bit cooler.  We drove 40kms to McKay and drove around looking for a suitable caravan park.  The parks were all full and didn't seem very nice, so after looking at three different ones we decided to keep going.  McKay appeared to be a very busy and 'go-ahead' place.  On the southern side of the town we stopped at a caravan accessory shop and purchased two more LED reading light globes.  LEDs use much less power than normal globes which is important when you are relying on your batteries.

We continued on, looking for a nice place to have some lunch.  No such luck ... the best we could find was a small shopping centre in a place called Salina.  We ordered hot dogs from a lady in her mid sixties who had no idea on how to make them.  It soon became evident that she was heating the hot dog frankfurts in a lovely yellow 1 litre ice cream tub!!  We explained nicely to her that it wasn't the best thing to do and she looked quite amazed.  Oh well, the hotdogs weren't bad after all.

We had our lunch and continued on to a free camp at Carmila Beach.  By the time we arrived it was windy and quite wet and only 22 degrees.  We managed to find a spot overlooking the water that wasn't too sandy and spent a couple of hours playing games while the rain eased up.  A short time later a smallish Winnebago pulled in not far from us and became bogged in the sand.  Rick found some small iron sheets and helped free the older fellow and his wife who then parked behind us.  We all settled down and not long after a small campervan became bogged in exactly the same spot as the Winnebaga.  This time the older fellow from the Winnebago also helped Rick to rescue the young couple of backpackers.

It remained windy all night, but we slept well and woke on Wednesday to another overcast and windy day.  We spent all day reading and playing games as our fuel consumption is horrendous when towing in the wind.  We figured we would wait out the awful weather.  

The tide out at Carmila Beach

Our camp site with the ocean in the background

Mon,17th October - Seaforth

We left Bowen behind and headed towards Airlie Beach ... a place we both wanted to visit. We were back into cane country and followed one of the big cane hauling trucks for a while. We arrived at Airlie Beach and were immediately caught in a major traffic jam.  There were roadworks and 'stop/go' people on the main road leading into Airlie Beach.  We ended up driving through the town and back out again as it looked way too busy and 'touristy' for our liking.  You can usually tell pretty quickly whether a town will be easy to get around in with a big van and whether you will enjoy the atmosphere.  We were glad we didn't try to stay as we heard the next day that a huge cruise liner with 2000 people on board was due to dock there.

We drove another 50ks or so in the intermittent rain to a place called St Helens Beach.  We investigated the Council van park there and decided that it wasn't very nice.  We continued to Seaforth, roughly 40kms north of McKay.  We checked out the Council van park on the beach there and it was much nicer, offering water and grassy areas as well as clean and tidy amenities.  We stayed hooked up to the vehicle as we were only going to spend one night here.  A bit later the wind blew up and became very unpleasant.  As we were located under a couple of big gum trees, we decided to move to another area in the park in case a dead limb came down on top of us.  We hadn't been there very long and the heavy rain started.  We were in a lower area of the park and the water came about 4" up the wheels of the vehicles, before easing off again ... thank goodness! 

We got talking to the caretaker of the park who explained the enclosure on the beach was for swimming.  He told a story of a couple of enterprising young fellows who cut a hole in the side of the enclosure and replaced it with a gate that they could open and close.  During high tide they would burley the inside of the enclosure and leave the gate open.  Later they would swim out and close the gate and wait for the tide to go out so they could collect whatever fish were silly enough to swim in after the burley.  Apparently it wasn't long though before the guys were caught and fined for their efforts.

Cane hauling truck with cane mill in the distance

Looking down onto the Airlie Beach Marina while waiting in the traffic jam

Our camp at Seaforth (note the high water mark on the yellow wheel chock)

A lone fisherman on the beach

The swimming enclosure

 

Sat, 15th to Sun, 16th October - Bowen

We drove about 100kms from Funny Dunny to Bowen, another quite large town and booked into a Big 4 park right on the beachfront for two nights.  While setting up Mr(s) Wrecker managed to break the small safety catch on the shower screen.  Luckily for her, Mr Wrecker was able to restore it just like new after purchasing a new catch.

We drove around a bit to get our bearings and look at a couple of beaches, then bought ourselves a kilo of prawns for lunch.  It was really windy and extremely hot, so we didn't venture out a great deal and Rick had a swim in the pool.  Besides, everything closed up at midday.

You may remember that Bowen was the location where the movie 'Australia' was filmed.  There isn't anything left on the site that was set up to resemble Darwin.

On Sunday it was awfully hot and humid again, but at least the wind had died down a bit.  There were markets on the parkland next door to the van park, so we went and had a look.  We didn't stay long as it was way too hot.

After lunch we went for another drive and ended up at Flagstaff Hill lookout.  We left there and went out to the Visitors Centre, but found there wasn't really a great deal to do around Bowen.  We decided to give the local museum a miss as we've seen so many recently.

Our tight little site at the Queens Beach Big 4 Park

Horseshoe Bay is one of the nicest beaches we have seen so far in Queensland

Looking down onto Bowen from Flagstaff Hill

Looking in the other direction toward some of the islands in the area

Fri, 14th October - Funny Dunny

We left Charters Towers on Friday and took a longer and more scenic route back to Townsville via the Herveys Range Development Road.  We didn't stay in Townsville this time, but continued on down the coast.

We drove into Ayr and caught up with grocery shopping and also bought a new camp chair and small table.  A but further south of Ayr we turned off the highway for 15kms to head toward the coast and into a $5/night camp called 'Funny Dunny'.  We're not sure where the name came from as the dunny wasn't very funny at all ... in fact it was 'orrible.  Fortunately, we have our own on board.  At least it was a bit cooler than at Charters Towers, but still quite muggy all the same.  We walked the short distance to the beach and found it was a bit disappointing, as a lot of the beaches in Queensland have been.  We returned to the van and played a few games.

Fires on the hills just south of Townsville

Our camsite at 'Funny Dunny'

Looking down the beach

Wed 12th to Thurs 14th October - Charters Towers

On Wednesday we travelled 130kms to Charters Towers.  We would need to return to Townsville before heading south again but felt that the visit to Charters Towers would make the back-track worthwhile.  It was a 38 degree day when we arrived so we set up quickly and turned the air-conditioner on as soon as possible.

Charters Towers is an old gold mining town with a current population of 9,000.  In its heyday it had 30,000 people, 11 crushing mills, 65 hotels and one of the very first regional Stock Exchanges in Australia.  The peak goldrush era ended in 1900 and had totally finished by the end of WWII.

Once we were set up and had cooled down a bit, we went for a drive to the Towers Hill lookout.  Due to many fires around the area, visibility was poor, but we could make out the main township in the distance.  There are some 30 odd WWII bunkers located around Towers Hill that were used for storing fuel, etc.

We left the lookout and headed for the main street (Gill Street).  There are beautiful old buildings all along Gill street.  The original Post Office was built within 6 months of gold being discovered by an Aboriginal horse boy named Jupiter, in December 1871.  The current building was established in 1892, with the clock tower being erected in 1898.  Target has taken over one of the old buildings that has a walkway between the front of the shop and its totally separate glass display cabinets. Between these cabinets and the street is the main footpath.  Sadly, Target doesn't seem to make use of these display cabinets and their elaborate shelving. Charters Towers had its own stock exchange that opened in 1890 and it had three calls a day during the peak goldrush era.  It was originally built as the Royal Arcade in 1888 and today houses shops and a museum.

On Thursday (after a very good night's sleep) we toured the Venus Gold Battery which is the largest surviving battery relic in Australia and oldest surviving battery in Queensland.  Constructed in 1872, it was a public or custom mill in the heyday and became a State Battery in 1919 to provide ore crushing facilities for small miners long after other mills had closed.  It ceased commercial operations in 1973 after a century of service. When we went back inside the Battery, we were greeted with two showers of water on which a movie was shown.  After lunch we drove out to the Burdekin Weir which is the town's water supply.  The Burdekin River is the 4th largest in Australia by volume flow.  The water is pumped from the weir to the reservoir on Towers Hill.  We then went back to the van and the comfort of the air conditioner as it was another 38 degree day.

The view of Charters Towers from the Towers Hill Lookout.

A couple of the bunkers on the drive back down from the lookout

The Post Office building

The front of the building Target has taken over

The Charters Towers Stock Exchange building

Looking down the main street (Gill Street)

The Venus Gold Battery

The weighbridge in the foreground and the mill at rear

Buckets for moving ore up to the next level

Note the heavy belts

The rear of the battery showing the original chimney and Rick talking to our Tour Guide

Water dripping from two tubes with a movie being projected onto the droplets

This was where the gold was melted down and assayed

Burdekin Weir

Take note of the flood level markers

Looking down the Burdekin River (note the lean on the trees)

Wed, 5th to Tues, 11th October - Townsville

Once again we packed up and got away at about 9am, heading 150kms south to Townsville.  The first town we came to was Tully where the sugar mill was in full swing.  We had some drizzly rain on this part of our journey ... the first we had seen for quite a while.  We called into the small township of Cardwell along the way and were surprised to see that cyclone damage was still evident this far away from Mission Beach - Yasi must have been a huge storm.  Cardwell is quite close to Hinchinbrook Island, which due to the inclement weather, was shrouded in mist. We called into another little spot called Balgal beach which was just a short distance north of Townsville.  There is a free camp there that is located right on the beach and adjacent to a river mouth.  We decided that it might be a nice place to go to for a couple of days once we leave Townsville.  The river looked like it might be a good fishing spot ... provided there weren't too many crocs! We continued on to the Rowes Bay Caravan Park located on the waterfront in Townsville and checked in.  Once settled, we went for a drive along the beach toward the city area, where we found a fish and chip shop for lunch.

On Thursday Rick was ready to be picked up by the airport shuttle bus at 4:50am for his trip to Sydney.  Thursday and Friday were quiet days for me, spent walking, reading and catching up with some van cleaning.  Rick returned to the van at 10:30pm on Friday night after a nice couple of days catching up with his family. 

Saturday morning was spent looking around quite a few camping stores.  Our fold-up chairs have seen better days and need replacing, but we didn't find anything suitable.  We will keep looking.  Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday was spent watching the 'Big Race' on TV.

On Monday we decided to go for a drive up to the lookout at the very top of Castle Hill.  It was very hot and we were astounded to see many people of all ages either walking or running the 2.9kms up and down.  The views from the top were spectacular.  We left Castle Hill and had some lunch before going to the Reef HQ Aquarium in the centre of town.  We spent approximately two hours wandering around the various exhibits.  The 2.5 million litre Coral Reef Exhibit is the world's largest living coral aquarium and well worth a visit.  There is an underwater viewing tunnel that allows some very close up views of Leopard Sharks, huge Groupers and Rays among other things. On the way back to the caravan park we drove around some of the unusual and large homes that 'hang' on the sides of the cliffs.  There are lots of properties for sale and some at quite reasonable prices.

Tuesday was our last day in Townsville.  We found the water filter shop to purchase some replacement cartridges for our water filters before heading back into town to the Maritime Museum.  We spent about two hours wandering around the various displays before doing some shopping (again) and then heading back to the park.  Rick spent some time washing the car and the van and at 6:15pm we met Steve and Linda, (who live in Townsville) for dinner at the Pier Restaurant on the marina. 

The sugar mill working overtime at Tully

Hinchinbrook Island off the coast of Cardwell

Looking toward Castle Hill from the Townsville CBD

The waterfront opposite the Rowes Bay Caravan Park

Homes perched on the hill just a short walk from the Caravan Park

Looking towards Castle Hill from the Marina area

Looking over the city towards the marina area

One of the lookout walkways (Rick can be seen in a white shirt standing on the edge)

To the left of the pic is Rowes Bay which is where we stayed

The view from the opposite side of Castle Hill

This property and the block (if you could call it that) next door both for sale

Mon, 3rd to Tues, 4th October - Mission Beach

On Monday morning Rick had a message from his Mum to say that his Uncle Bill had passed away at 2:30am.  Uncle Bill had been in hospital for a while and his passing was still a shock even though it had been expected at any time.  We decided that Rick should attend the private family get-together in Sydney to celebrate his life, once a date and time had been set.

We had already decided to head 50kms south to Mission Beach again, so we packed up and got away at about 9am.  Our friends (Steve and Linda from Townsville) who we met in WA earlier on our trip were also going to Mission Beach for a week. We booked into the Mission Beach Council Caravan Park across the road from where we had stayed previously.  This park was half the price (only $20/night) and was actually right on the water.  After setting up, we once again caught up with the shopping and later in the afternoon Steve called in to say hello and have a beer.

On Tuesday we heard that the family get-together for Uncle Bill would be at 11.30am on Friday morning.  Rick then spent approx 2 hours on line trying to find suitable flights for himself to Sydney - either from Cairns or Townsville.  All Cairns flights were fully booked (last week of the NSW school holidays), but he eventually managed to get flights out of Townsville, due to leave at 6am on Thursday morning and return late on Friday night.  This meant we had to leave the following morning to head for Townsville ... approx. 150kms.

We caught up with Linda in the main street later in the day, before heading back to the van for a bit of a relax and a swim.

Our campsite at Mission Beach