Naughty Tomtom

July 14 – Monday

Another airport! There are only a couple of caravan parks in Mackay, and the other one was full.

There are an incredible number of caravans on the road – Les is starting to worry about RSI. (Protocol dictates that caravan towing drivers wave to each other when passing.) There don’t seem to be as many large trucks as further south, but we are now coming across the local trucks carrying harvested sugar cane.

The road from Rockhampton to Mackay was very flat with not much to look at most of the way except for grass and Brahman cattle. Closer to Sarina, the sugar cane started, and there is soooo much of it. We were lucky enough to see two brolgas feeding beside in the grass beside the road and later spotted another two flying overhead. The caravan park has plenty of rainbow lorikeets, different to the wild ducks at Rockhampton! At least the lorikeets don’t want to come into the caravan.

After setting up and booking ahead for the next few nights, we found another European traveller, Jeannette, who lives in Mackay. As we didn’t have her telephone number, we just rocked up and surprised her.

Tomtom had an off morning today and we had to send her back to bed to consider her actions! She absolutely refused to direct us north to Mackay and kept insisting we turn around and head south. Not sure what her problem was, but a Bex, a cup of tea and a good lay down did wonders. Perhaps it was the heat – about 20 overnight and up to 28 today, also quite humid.