26 August – Tuesday
Less than four months to Christmas – thought you might like to know that.
Early departure this morning for the 500 km drive to Emerald. Discovered last night that the caravan park is home to all the galahs and lorikeets in Charters Towers! The cloud cover soon cleared to a fine, clear and hot day, 27 degrees. The road was long, straight, bumpy and fairly flat all day. The longest straight without a bend was 15 km. We had about 50 km when the road reduced in size to one lane of bitumen, but fortunately there wasn’t much traffic headed north. Today we turned the two way radio on for the full day and did use it a couple of times.
We were lucky enough to spot a dingo crossing the road early in the morning – first time we have seen one in the wild. There were also plenty of kangaroos on the side of the road, being part of the food chain. We also saw a few bustards, which are very large birds who think no one can see them if they stand still. They are wrong!
Just before our lunch stop at Clermont, we passed a couple of large open-cut coal mines – Blair Athol and Clermont Coal Mine. Clermont isn’t exactly a large town (two hotels) but it did have a nice park with a lagoon and plenty of parking for vehicles towing caravans. The lagoon was home to lots of very friendly geese and ducks and someone managed to bring an extremely large goose poo into the caravan on his shoe and then track it over the floor.
The country was mainly cattle stations until we reached Clermont and we even saw some stockmen mustering a large mob of cattle next to the road. Stockmen are now hi-tech – helicopters instead of horses! There is also a large sorghum growing industry in the area and the paddocks are measured in square kilometres, not hectares. We followed one paddock for five km, and that was only one side of it.
We haven’t had much of a look at Emerald yet – that is tomorrow’s plan – as the caravan park is about 20 km out of town on the shore of Lake Maraboon. Lots of lovely birds here, including some very friendly rainbow lorikeets who hand around for a biscuit. The owners, Andy and Geoff, are also very friendly – one really the type of couple one expects to find in an outback caravan park! We did miss the singalong last night but have been assured that bingo will go ahead tomorrow afternoon.
Less than four months to Christmas – thought you might like to know that.
Early departure this morning for the 500 km drive to Emerald. Discovered last night that the caravan park is home to all the galahs and lorikeets in Charters Towers! The cloud cover soon cleared to a fine, clear and hot day, 27 degrees. The road was long, straight, bumpy and fairly flat all day. The longest straight without a bend was 15 km. We had about 50 km when the road reduced in size to one lane of bitumen, but fortunately there wasn’t much traffic headed north. Today we turned the two way radio on for the full day and did use it a couple of times.
We were lucky enough to spot a dingo crossing the road early in the morning – first time we have seen one in the wild. There were also plenty of kangaroos on the side of the road, being part of the food chain. We also saw a few bustards, which are very large birds who think no one can see them if they stand still. They are wrong!
Just before our lunch stop at Clermont, we passed a couple of large open-cut coal mines – Blair Athol and Clermont Coal Mine. Clermont isn’t exactly a large town (two hotels) but it did have a nice park with a lagoon and plenty of parking for vehicles towing caravans. The lagoon was home to lots of very friendly geese and ducks and someone managed to bring an extremely large goose poo into the caravan on his shoe and then track it over the floor.
The country was mainly cattle stations until we reached Clermont and we even saw some stockmen mustering a large mob of cattle next to the road. Stockmen are now hi-tech – helicopters instead of horses! There is also a large sorghum growing industry in the area and the paddocks are measured in square kilometres, not hectares. We followed one paddock for five km, and that was only one side of it.
We haven’t had much of a look at Emerald yet – that is tomorrow’s plan – as the caravan park is about 20 km out of town on the shore of Lake Maraboon. Lots of lovely birds here, including some very friendly rainbow lorikeets who hand around for a biscuit. The owners, Andy and Geoff, are also very friendly – one really the type of couple one expects to find in an outback caravan park! We did miss the singalong last night but have been assured that bingo will go ahead tomorrow afternoon.
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