We had a great time in Melbourne with our family then flew back to the Sunshine Coast and we have been on the road again for a couple of weeks. Before leaving the coast we heard about massive rains coming to the north and north west of us so we went west, deciding to leave Sapphire and Clermont for another trip. Up to 400 mm of rain fell and many roads were closed so we made the right decision. We did have to spend a day cooped up in the caravan in Dalby but we received only about 30 mm.

Next stop was Judd’s Lagoon, near the tiny town of Yuleba, 60 east of Roma. This was one of the best camp sites we have stayed at so a one-night visit turned into 4 nights. Camp fires beside the lagoon and walking during the day were good fun.

By now we heard that the road to Carnarvon Gorge was closed so that will have to wait until next trip. Continuing west we spent a couple of nights at the nice little town called Mitchell, where everything is named after our grandson. 

At Charleville we spent a night at the Bush Caravan Park 3 km out of town, enjoying a very good camp oven dinner and an interesting 2-hour town tour. Then we took the 200 km road to Adavale, sealed for about 80 km and the remainder quite rough, corrugated dirt road. There is water and green grass everywhere, from the rain about a month ago and again a week ago but the road was mostly dry.  Adavale was formed in 1880 as a centre for agriculture and opal mining and it was a changing station for Cobb & Co coaches. At its height Adavale had 6 hotels, 3 banks, a school with 67 students, a hospital and several stores. Now there are 15 inhabitants with 8 houses, a pub, a community hall with a camp ground and a few dogs, horses and 8 geese roaming free – and the pub was closed for a week.

Another 100 km of mainly rough road brought us to Quilpie. Had we arrived yesterday we could have gone across the Channel Country as we had planned but the road to the west was closed due to the Cooper Creek being in flood so we have to change plans again. The frequent changes to plans haven’t worried us; it means that we are seeing places that we hadn’t planned on seeing. Instead of crossing the Channel Country and Plenty Highway to Alice Springs we could go home via Innamincka or Birdsville but we would be racing to stay ahead of the high rivers so instead we will head south west to Tibooburra.

That’s all for now. Hope everyone is safe and well.

Love from Ted and Jo

It should be called 2016 Not The Top End Trip.  We had intended doing the Gibb River Road and Savannah Way but they will have to wait for another opportunity. Outback Queensland is very interesting so it’s a pretty good consolation prize. 
The highlight at Winton, instead of being the scenery was the busker/bush poet who entertained us after a roast dinner at the caravan park. He was the best we have ever heard, very clever, even with costume changes and multi-accents.  Next stop was Longreach where we had been before so we didn’t do the usual tourist things.  A highlight here was brolgas wandering through the caravan park as though they owned it; beautiful, graceful birds who were not afraid of people.  We did have to buy new car batteries here because our 6-year old original batteries eventually died.

From Longreach we took a short drive on a narrow, single-lane road to Isisford, with lots of water still in low areas everywhere and side roads still being muddy from last week’s rain.  We camped at Oma Waterhole on the Barcoo River, about 16 km from Isisford, where we had a couple of fine, sunny days and cold nights. The river was still in flood but down about 3 metres from its peak so there was lots of grey clay mud – reminded us of Renmark river banks. 

Another one lane road brought us to the tiny town of Jericho where we camped at Redbank Waterhole, about 4 metres from the warter’s edge. Although quite a few vans were here this is a very good camp and we’ll return for a few days after we come back from Melbourne. 
The trip to Maroochydore was to be about 1,000 km which we did in 3 days – 550 km to Lawgi rest area, south-east of Emerald, 350 km to Kilkivan bush camp and caravan park (another very good bush park with grass, shady trees, birds, and a beaut roast dinner), and finally 100 km yesterday to Maroochydore.  We spent a few hours at the beach with Bevan, Jo, Rufus and Harvey.  When we decided to use this as our base for a Melbourne flight we had not realised that they would be here so that was a bonus.  We are looking forward to tomorrow when we’ll fly south to the cold weather to spend time with all the grand children. 
That’s all for now. Hope everyone remains safe and well. From Ted and Jo