Sunshine

Tuesday, 26 June 2012

Welcome to sunny Queensland – at last the sun has come out, as have the thongs and sun hats! Cat has started shedding madly.

Today we “did” the sights of Bowen, starting with the Big Mango. Bowen is famous for the Kensington mango and we didn’t take much persuading to tuck into some mango sorbet. With Bowen closed for the annual show, there wasn’t much traffic except for caravans and motor homes. We drove to the lookout at the top of Flagstaff Hill, with its views out to Gloucester Island and back towards Bowen. We were treated to the sight of two sea eagles floating directly over head – magic.

Bowen was used as a location for the movie “Australia” and tonnes of red dirt was brought into the town to make it look more like Darwin in the early 1940’s. The site that was used is now just a large, open paddock. We also stopped at the Catalina Flying Boat Base, which was the major base for these planes during WW2. A glass panel display actually gives the impression that these planes are actually flying in to land. The hard stand, put down by the Americans, is still there, with a couple of plane silhouettes painted on it to give some idea of the size.

This afternoon we discovered Horseshoe Bay, just around from where our caravan park is. This is the most beautiful little cove with sandy beach and large rocks – the area reminded us of Magnetic Island. We spent a very pleasant half hour sitting on the sand before heading off to Queens Beach. The road came to an end at a creek bank and we were surprised to see two jabiru standing in the water – more magic as one very seldom sees these birds in the wild. There were a number of fisherman on the banks, even one standing in the middle of the creek – all of them ignoring the signs warning of crocodiles.

There are a large number of caravan parks in Bowen, some definitely look better than others. It appears to be a place that people return to every year to spend the winter.