Longreach back to Emerald

Thankfully we all awoke feeling well this morning - Shan was a bit exhausted from not eating for the previous 24 hours but aside from that he was going well.

The wind last night surpassed the speed of the previous two nights, though at least there was a break between gusts which meant it got quiet enough to get some sleep.

We got on the road at a reasonable time this morning and the road was pretty much the same as when we drove on it on the way to Longreach.  Shan counted one crest which had 20 dead kangaroos over a stretch of about 40m!

We pulled into Barcledine and made sandwiches for breakfast and saw a cute little puppy, which made us think of our Jacky Bear at home, we are missing him.  Just think, lucky we left him tied up outside with a bucket of water and a bag of Meaty Bites!

Pfft, how spoilt is he!  He won't want to come back to our place after the royal treatment he is getting at Nanny Bessy's, and Nanny Goldie and Pa are walking him everyday too…..a dogs life. (Photos courtesy of Beth).

Now what do they say about dogs being like their owners????

This is the first time I have managed to get a sneaky shot of Shan sleeping in the car, payback is a bi**h baby! lol.

We are staying back at Lake Maraboon Tourist Park, and Elvis is playing again tonight - he must have quite a following at Emerald and with the travellers.

Finn had a swim in the pool when we got here, and it was no warmer than the one at Longreach.

We went for a short walk so Finn could ride his new bike and get more used to it so we can get him off the training wheels (or stabilisers as he calls them - thanks to Pepper Pig!).  Finn was reluctant to ride down a big hill so the other kid in the family took over! 

We went down to the waters edge, and the water was pretty chilly, so suffice to say no one went for a dip - though Shan did admit he was tempted to push me in (probably as payback for me tricking into jumping into the cold water the other day).

We are back at camp now and about to get dinner sorted, it seems so quiet and peaceful here without the wind!

We are off to Lake Nuga Nuga tomorrow so not sure if we will have service, so you may have to wait for the next  instalment! 

Till then

The Wanderin' Watson's

Longreach Attraction!

Well last night was eventful - it was SOOOO Windy - gusts 60+kms per hour, and then poor Shan got wind of another kind - the runs!

He was up and down all night - but rallied for the Cobb & Co. mail run this morning.  I tell you what McKinnon & Co. put on quite a show.  The stage coach ride itself was awesome, but what added to it was the characters that run the whole thing.  It is a dad and his two sons - aged in their 20's, they run the rides etc during the tourist season, and then head back to the land for the rest of the year.  The dad started the business to prop up their farming so they could feed the cattle in drought time, and it has gone bunter from there.

After the show we dropped Shan back at camp as he was exhausted (fingers crossed it is a food thing and not a viral thing that Finn and I end up with…..).

Finn and I went to the Stockmans Hall of Fame and then came back to camp - I had to wash my hair after the gallop in the stage coach (you end up covered head to toe in god knows what!).

We then went back to the Station Store for the old fashioned tent show.  It turns out it was ran by the same family who do the stage coach rides.

Their animals are so well trained, and the guys are a laugh a minute!  It is a must do if you are ever in town.

Finn was mostly taken by the fart  noises, snakes chasing people out of the out house, and the dog tricks (typical boy).



We got back, checked on the patient, did chores (which in a camper are few and far between), Finn braved the cold pool again (I was wise enough to stay out today!).

We then came back to see if Shan was up for dinner - he decided to stay at camp while Finn and I went to the Woolshed restaurant which is in the park.  Shan told Finn  that as he was my 'date' he had to pull my chair out and look after me.

He took his job seriously, though he was worried that he didn't have enough 'important stuff' to talk about over dinner.  I told him everything he says is important…..he then had an in-depth discussion on Nerf Guns! lol.

When we got to dinner he actually pulled out my chair and pushed it in for me - what a gentleman!.

Anyway enough babble for today - till tomorrow

The Wanderin Watsons (x 2 as one stayed put!)

p.s. Better photos to follow when our technical difficulties subside!

Winton today!

This morning we awoke, thankful that we didn't end up as tumbleweed ourselves!

The wind kept up all night!

We got up and got organised pretty quickly and headed off for Winton, well the Australian Age of Dinosaurs to be exact.

Yet again the road was very long and straight with a substantial scattering of road kill.  We found that it was very fitting to play the James Blundell and James Reyne hit of 'Way out West', of course we had to sing a long - Finn simply rolled his eyes (do you blame him).

There were plenty more Road Trains - and heaps of Tumbleweed - which just makes me simile (yes I am strange!).

We saw a lot of Emu on the trip to Winton - or is the plural Emus?  And what is a group of them called?  A flock, a gaggle, a murder?  Hmm - remind me to look it up when I finish blogging!

Once you leave the Highway and head towards the Age of Dino's (as Finn preferred), it was  a very cool dirt road drive followed by the 'Jump-up' - I was curious as to what this meant after reading about it on Trip Adviser. It is just a dirt road that goes up to a plateau which is home to Age of Dino's.

I would have heaps of photos to show you but we are having technical difficulties at this time……

Anyway - we did the tour, and saw the laboratory where they clean the bones that have been found - to me it looked like they were cleaning rock (which is why I wasn't the one doing it!).

We were able to touch the fossils of shells that were over 100,000,000 years old! WOW

We had told Finn to listen and put up his hand if he wanted to ask any questions, of course as soon as the guide asked if anyone had questions his hand shot up!

His first question was:  'how did the dinosaurs die'?  I was even surprised by the answer - I thought it was simply because of the ice age - however the tour guide said that it is believed that it was because of  a meteorite! See you learn something new everyday!

After the Lab tour we had the tour of the 'reception' area, apparently the part we saw so many other museums etc want to have one but they can't - the Age of Dinosours has fossils of dinosaurs that have not been found anywhere else (EVER), and that is why they can have this kind of 'special' room (there are more technical terms but I can't remember….old age).

We all found it AMAZING!  I would highly recommend going there to anyone, the fact that they are kind of remote up on a plateau makes you feel like you are in another world!.

After that we headed back to Longreach, went for a walk and had a swim (in a sub zero pool, funny story….yesterday Shan went for a run and when he came back I told him to jump in cos it was 'lovely', well strangely for the first time ever, he did what I told him and jumped in, I have NEVER seen anyone look so shocked, lol it was FREEZING).

Oh I nearly forgot to tell you about the tow vehicle next door….Mr Bunnings (aka Uncle Tony), I wish you hadn't replaced your vehicle so soon, I have found you a replacement!  (strangely this is one of the few photos we can actually upload at the moment)…..

Anyway off to bed now, we have to be up early tomorrow as we are going on a Cobb and Co. Mail Run Gallop!  on the actual run that they did back in the day!  The ticket is even an exact replica of the one that you would have received way back then!

Till tomorrow

The Wanderin' Watsons

Emerald to Longreach!

Today was a many for 'First's', but lets start at the beginning!

We left from Lake Maraboon relatively early, we were glad to pack up quickly as the weather looked dicey!

We started on the road and an hour or two in Finn needed a 'rest stop', we pulled up and when we got out of the car boy did we get a shock!

It was freezing - the temp gauge in the car said it was 15C - that was at 9 am in the morning!

The drive from there it got COLDER - it got down to 12C at one stage - I thought it would be warm in the West in September!

Thankfully it did start warming up.  Though when we stopped Barcaldine for lunch it was still fresh.

One thing we did see there was the first road train of the trip!  How those guys drive them I do not know!



While we were at Barcaldine we pulled out the kitchen from our camper and made toasted sangas on the side of the road - this in itself drew quite a few people to  us to have a chat about our camper (I reckon it was the smell of the hot toasted sandwiches rather than the company though).  The groups of people we were chatting to had either come from where we were headed or were heading to where we had come from - so it was really nice just sharing stories etc.  That is one thing for travelling this way - you meet some lovely like minded people (Mad's one couple had a Daschound! - and it didn't like kids lol)!

It was only a one hour drive from Barcaldine to Longreach, but the road was very looonnnnggg and straight - with a tonne of road-kill.  Seriously I have never seen so many dead roos before!

It was an amazing sight, as we neared Longreach you could see the massive Boeing 747 (I think that is what it is - haven't been to the museum yet), from miles away!

We are staying at the Longreach Tourist Park, and as I was checking in Shan and Finn saw a tumbleweed just cruising by, I got to see it too when I got to the car.  I know this will sound strange, but I really like tumbleweed!  It just cruises along, not a worry in the world!

Not long after we set up a family arrived in their 'pop-top van' across from us.  It was a mum, dad and two daughters.  One of the girls put the dad to shame - from the minute the car stopped and the van was backed in she was putting down the stabilisers, pulling out the awning, unpacking the car and then helping dad to set up the plumbing and cooking gear……..all the while the younger sister flitted about on what we can only assume was a 'very important business call', talking about the colour of the dirt here and saying 'oh yeah the van is easy - you just pop it up and it is done' - it would be easy if you didn't do anything lol!  It really cracked us up!

Anyway, for a place that is supposed to be dry as dry, we had a shower in the afternoon - which was actually quite spectacular, rainbows etc.

Then came the WIND - and not just from Shannon, it really blew up!  Normally we don't need any guy-ropes, but we decided to err on the safe side.  Thank goodness we did! It was really blowy!  Once we went to bed we could hear other campers around us 'battening down the hatches' etc!

Anyway I will save more for tomorrow when we are going to Winton to the Age of Dinosours Natural Museum of History!

Till then
the Windy Wanderin' Watsons

Western Trip - Yeppoon to Emerald (well Lake Maraboon to be exact)

Yay!

So we left Yeppoon relatively early and hit the road!

The road pretty much follows the rail the whole way out.  On our trip we were intending to check out Bidgegang Weir (which a mate had told us about), we went through Dingo and went to go out there because Shan had heard there were HUGE Saratoga, but it turned out it was going to be a 160 km round trip, so we decided to leave the exploring for another time.

We trucked on and stopped at Bluff for some road-side lunch - who says camping isn't convenient!

It turns out that Bluff only got electricity in 1956! whoa! how did they use the internet without electricity???  From what I believe that was a good 15 years prior to Orbost, and who says QLD is backwards LOL!

Anywho……From there we went through Blackwater and Shan had heard about Bedford Weir, it was only 17 Kms or so off the highway so we decided to check it out - WOW!

The Weir is beautiful - plus it is stocked with Saratoga and Barramundi!.  You can free camp there for 7 days - it is a must do on our next trip or potentially on the way home on this trip!

From Blackwater it was upward and onward - well westward and um…westward!

We got to Emerald and stocked up on supplies - there is a very tidy supermarket on the Eastern side of town.

We had booked a site at Lake Maraboon, the drive there saw us cross the dam wall (Fairbairn Dam), there were spots to stop at on the way across which was really lovely.  The dam itself was only at 45.3%, the amazing thing about it though was the water colour, I'm sure the photos won't do it justice, but it was an amazing turquoise blue, imagine tropical salt water!





The park itself was great, though I tell you it is a small world!  One site over from us was a mate of my dad's, and I went to school with their daughter when I was 11!  Small world!

There was an Elvis sighting at the park the night we were there, I kid you NOT!  There was actually an Elvis show there at the restaurant the night we stayed - you know you have hit the big time when you are doing caravan park tours!

Anyway the next post will be from Longreach!  Till then…

The Wanderin' Watsons

Western Trip - Home to Yeppoon!

We're back on the road! Woo Hoo!

The first leg of this trip has been travelling from home to Yeppoon (east of Rockhampton), Shan had some work to do so we decided to tack the rest of our trip on after that.

The plan for this trip is to travel from Yeppoon west.  Neither one of us have ever been to Longreach and beyond so that is the plan this trip.

Anyway, we arrived in Yeppoon safely and soundly - however exhausted from our 8 or so hours driving.  Finn was great travelling as usual.

We stayed where we usually stay in Yeppoon - The Coastal Motel - we decided not to stay in the camper until the trip started for real - as in once Shan was no longer 'on the clock' for work.

We had two nights there and it was lovely as usual.  Shan and Finn went out for their morning mocha-chino-frappe blah blah, while I (sleepy head) had a lay-in.  Here are some pics of their lovely morning….

Once Shan went to work Finn and I decided to go for a dip, the pool at the Motel is really lovely - though I was a sook and only got in very quickly as it was really cold.

Late in the afternoon we went to the Rockhampton Cultural Centre, the centre is very tour based, and unfortunately we were there an hour before the tour started - so we paid (a discounted rate was applied by the tour guide) and went through the exhibits on our own, Finn's attention span was lacking so we were glad that we didn't do the full hour and a half tour - though we definitely will do that next time as it appears to be amazing.  We rate the place just from what we saw so can only imagine it has way more to offer if you do the full tour.

The Cultural Centre was very tiring - Finn and Ruggy had a snooze

It was nice dining out while we were in Yeppoon - but we were really looking forward to hitting the road and starting our latest adventure!

Until the next post

The Wanderin' Watsons

Southern Trip Day 12, 13 & 14 - Jervis Bay to Doonan (Home)

Day 12 - the Day of the Dead Wombat
We left a rainy Jervis Bay this morning, and went a back way up to Oberon as per Scott's suggestion.  Initially we were a bit bummed that we had to go on a main highway for all of 5 minutes, but after that we were on back roads again.  We did get caught up behind a bikie gang - Wild Hogs on Postie Bikes!  There was one bloke we reckon had been working on his bike for a while as he was a good 5kms an hour faster than the others!

It was funny at first to see them all going on a road trip - but our amusement soon turned to frustration when they spread out so far apart that we couldnt pass them easilly, and they were going a good 30 kms below the speed limit!

Nevertheless once we got past them it was a truly beautiful drive on our way to Goulburn!  We even scouted out a few great free camp sites for next time - see pic below.

We also noticed a rapid downward spiral in temperature (according to our vehicles external temperature gauge), the higher up and further west we went the colder it got!

By the time we got to Oberon we nearly froze when we had a rest to make lunch and get fuel.

On this leg of the trip we saw numerous dead wombats, which was a sad sight (especially as they are way up in my top favourite animals).  Some of these wombats were seriously HUGE, it sends chills up my spine to think of hitting one of these things at high speed!

In addition to the wombat sightings we also saw many horny cattle - and I don't mean they had horns, I mean they were quite amorous, I'm not talking one or two sightings, I'm talking at least 5 instances of cows trying to mount each other.

The plan on this trip was fairly free flowing, it wasn't until the last minute we decided to swing towards Dubbo again.  It was at this time we turned to our trusted Camps Australia Wide app and found what we have decided to be one of our all time favourite camps - Ponto Falls, north west of Wellington and south of Dubbo. 

We did have a stand off with a resident cow as we drove in - We WON, he moooooved aside (pardon the pun).

The Cow we had a stand off with......

We camped by an amazing creek full of snags, high up on a bank - surrounded by cockatoos, it truly was your ideal 'Western New South Wales' destination.

Ponto Falls Camping Area

Ponto Falls Camping Area

Ponto Falls Camping Area

Shortly after dinner the rain came in - and it didn't stop, it brought along it's friend WIND.  We survived the night and had our first experience of packing up in the rain, which was just as easy as it always is and before we knew it we were on the road again and on our way.

Day 13 - WTF? Was that a Bison?
After leaving Ponto Falls we headed back towards Dubbo and then in a North Easterly direction - cant remember the name of the roads because as we prefer it we were off the beat'n'track!

We had a loose plan that was based purely around the weather, which from looking at it was a wet front moving from southern NSW all the way past the QLD border.  At the end of the day we were going to get wet no matter where we went, so we decided to head for Pindari Dam (near Inverell) as if we were going to get wet we wanted to at least enjoy our surroundings.

We saw so many different animals on our drive, wild pig (dead), fox (alive), rabbits (alive), Kangaroos (dead and alive), emu (alive), and Bison (alive)...................YES THAT IS WHAT I SAID, Bison!

 

We can only assume because of the proximity of the Dubbo Zoo that they had something to do with the zoo.  Funnily enough when we went to the Dubbo Zoo the Bison were quite far away, and both Shan and I said how we wish we could have a closer look - well we did!

Once our excitement at seeing real live Bison died down we continued on our merry way.

When we got to Pindari Dam we were blown away by the amount of structure in it.  We have fished a lot of dams with standing timber - but this was a whole other ballgame.  The water levels were down to 16% (figure courtesy of my Water Storage App), and we were able to camp down near the water, as opposed to up in the designated camping area.

The Camps app said the camping area was small, well it was so we have made a mental note to only stay at Pindari if the water levels are below say 25%.

The coolest part of staying there was seeing the wild goats.  There were some big Billy's and little kids running around.  It blew us away the array of colours in each goat herd.

Day 14: Homeward Bound
We packed up relatively quickly (as usual) and hit the road for our final trek home.

We continue to try to find alternative routes, which kind of make it more of an adventure than following the main highways.

We saw the usual sighting, emus, kangaroos etc, but no Bison.

The drive was quite cruisy the whole way home and we made good time.  We decided that rather than travel home via Warrwick we would go via Toowoomba as it is more scenic, and given it was our last day we wanted to enjoy the drive.

When we got home we were so excited to see our own little Bison - Jack the Staffy!  He was very happy to see us, although we think he was a bit too spoilt by his Nanny Bessy (Beth), as he was reluctant to come home to stay the night!

Anyway we are home safe and sound and this journey has come to an end.

We have vowed to get away at least once or twice a month as we have enjoyed our trip so much.

Our next little adventure is to go to the Caravan and Camping show in Brisbane on Sunday - cant wait!

Cheers

The Wanderin Watsons

P.S. Just wanted to share a saying we heard on our trip, rather than say 'safe travels', you can say 'shiny side up'  haha, we thought that was a corker!

P.P.S  Now I am surprised I haven't vented about this sooner, because it has been an ongoing frustration....you see you get some happy travelers who will flick you a wave when they see a car and camper or caravan coming at them, so we decided we would do the same back to our fellow travelers.

Now we are not sure if we were deliberately snubbed because we have a camper as opposed to a caravan but we would have only got 3 or so waves in return out of about 50 we put out there!  Come on folks - you are on holidays - get into the spirit and flick a fellow traveler a wave!  I tell you we were very tempted to flick something else when we got snubbed!

Anyway enough venting! 

None the less we are now considering getting one of these bad boys - maybe then we we will get more waves????

http://www.australianoffroad.com.au/models/Quantum/highlights_Quantum

Southern Trip Day 11 - Jervis Bay

Well the plan for today was somewhat thwarted by a sleepless night.

You see we were going to go out in the kayak in St Georges Basin, however poor Finn had a rough night so our day started with a trip to the Doctor.

Finn is on the mend, slowly, with the aid of antibiotics.  Finn happily showed the lovely female doctor his muscles and she asked 'have you been working out?'.

After our Doctors visit we went to see Shan's sister, Linda and two of her three boys, Kial and Corey.

It was great to see them all, as well as meet Corey's lovely girlfriend.  Sadly Finn wasnt his usual bubbly self so we cut our visit short and went home for a nanna nap - ah  bless, daytime sleeps are the bomb!

This arvo Sharon and I went out to get ingredients for our home made pizzas.

It was a great evening catching up with Aunty Jen, Uncle Bert, Craig, Shane and Dylan, in addition to the Morison clan.  The pizzas were a hit, some could even say they  were 'on fire', as at one point they literally were - note to self (and Shaz) don't put baking paper under the grill!

Anyway we are headed on our journey towards home tomorrow so I will have to call it a night.

The Wanderin Watsons

Southern Trip Day 10 - Jervis Bay

This morning after breakfast and after the kids went to school, Scott took Shan, Finn and I for a drive out to the Booderee National Park and went to check out the 'Old' Lighthouse.  The national park is actually part of the ACT even though it is whack bang on the South Coast of NSW.  Reason being is because of the Naval base which is situated there.

You see every other Capital City has a 'port' which clearly wouldn't work for ACT itself (as its land locked), so it has been deemed ACT for port purposes.

So enough babble about that.....

The 'Old' Lighthouse was apparently built in the wrong spot after much deliberation.  Even though the lighthouse was built still ships continued to crash.  It was then decided that a lighthouse on the other side of Jervis Bay, at Point Perpendicular, would be a better location.

On the way up to the old lighthouse there is a photo which shows the area in its heyday, which was really trippy.

There was also a sign which advised of the many grim misadventures of the people who occupied the area.  For instance a lighthouse keeper was kicked by a horse and perished, a guy was shark fishing and ended up being eaten by one, just to name a couple!

We were wondering why historians would let the lighthouse end up so dilapidated, and not try to restore it.  It wasn't until we were walking back down and re-read the sign we saw that once the new lighthouse was erected, the old lighthouse still distracted ships so they decided to use explosives to reduce the size of it, causing it to be the rubble it is today.

It was really interesting.  Oh we also saw whales cruising past which was cool.

After the lighthouse we went to Murray's Beach which was really pretty.

After Murray's beach we went to Hyams Beach which boasts the 'whitest' sand in the world!

When we came home Scott started to prepare our dinner..........Paella!  Talk about a work of art, and it was delicious!

Tomorrow we are catching up with Shan's Sister, and the boys, then the rest of the Hatton clan are coming over for pizza around the fire!

Till tomorrow.......

Wanderin Watson's