Charleville

Friday, 8 June 2018

Who cares about State of Origin!

Charleville Railway Station

No Cat, so had to take the photo ourselves!

Walking the boundary fence

Old woolshed

Out on the boards ...

Time for a wash, perhaps???

The skies remained clear as we left Cunnamulla on Wednesday for the trip further north to Charleville.  The road was a bit bumpy in sections but very little traffic and there were fewer emus and kangaroos to be seen on this section of the highway.  The extremely dry conditions may have some bearing on this.  We were at Charleville by 11.00am and after a very long, chatty and friendly reception at the Evening Star Caravan Park, settled onto our large drive-thru site.  We then quickly discovered that television reception was non-existent!  Although telephone reception has definitely improved since our last visit, which was a bonus.

We treated ourselves to lunch at one of the local coffee shops before checking out the local supermarket.  Charleville is well supplied, although fresh fruit and vegetables are a little more expensive than the large cities.

The caravan park have a campfire every night, with damper supplied, and Wednesday night also happened to be the final night for an entertainer after a few weeks at the park.  We were “entertained” with three and a half hours of monotonous country and western singing (which could be heard quite plainly even inside the caravan) before the State of Origin game was screened in the camp kitchen.  The majority of tourists would be from Victoria and South Australia, with a few from NSW – not much cheering to be heard.

On Thursday, we “did” the town, wandering up and down the two streets before visiting the Information Centre which is in the process of moving from the airport to the railway terminal.  We were surprised to discover that there is still a regular twice weekly passenger service between Brisbane and Charleville.  After lunch, we went for a walk around part of the cattle station (a minute part, actually) behind the caravan park; we are most definitely in red dirt country here!  Apart from the scrub, the dirt and a few birds, there wasn’t really a lot to be seen but it was still a nice walk.  We detoured to the old wool/shearing shed for a look before returning to the caravan.

Today, after washing and a good clean before we hit the road again for another three days, we had intended to walk around the local park area with its large variety of trees and the Vortex rainmaking machines.  However, the park was all dug up and closed off while new pathways were constructed.  So, with nothing else to do, we did the grocery shopping and enjoyed the warm weather.  Our vitamin D levels are certainly increasing.

Our travels plans needed to be re-arranged this week after we discovered that there were no sites available at Carnarvon Gorge.  After a quick look at the map, we will now be travelling via Barcaldine to Emerald and then north to Charters Towers before arriving two days early in Cairns.