Airlie Beach Qld, Week 1 July 24-31 2016

Airlie Beach Week 1

Leaving Townsville at a respectable hour, we drove out of town and onto the very lamentable Bruce Highway for 3 1/2 hours of bashing and crashing our way down the goat track to Airlie Beach. We finally made it to Bowen, and as we were still stuck behind something or other travelling at 85, we considered taking luncheon, but then at the critical moment, they all turned into town, so we kept on going. Apart from a rogue ratbag truck driver who attempted to run us and another van off the road, it was ‘uneventful’.

Finally we are here The Big 4 Adventure Whitsunday Resort at Cannonvale. As Cannonvale and Airlie Beach are almost the same place, we'll just call it Airlie Beach. Judy is finally in her favourite caravan park and we have been for a swim and been to the food shops and had a wine and all is right with the world.

But what to do? There are the magnificent Whitsunday Islands of course, and Whitehaven Beach, but we've been to them all and frankly, are a bit reluctant to stump up the serious amounts of money to go out on any of the cruises.

Apart from swimming in the pool and lolling about doing not much, we have managed to:

Wander around Airlie Beach itself, checking out all the tourist tack that is available, drinking coffee and eating an excellent open ham sandwich at one of the cafes. Outside one shop is a birdcage with Gouldian finches in it, which I am told are quite rare. The shop-lady said that they were all set free by a do-gooder last year, and only one returned. If they had asked, they would have found out that they are indeed rare and these ones are part of a captive breeding program, not just locked up for the owners pleasure.

Gouldian Finch. Airlie Beach Qld

High up on the ridge overlooking Airlie Beach is one lone house. It belongs to the fellow who started the Hogs Breath Restaurant chain in 1989, right here in Airlie Beach.

Hogs Breath House. Airlie Beach Qld

Further around from Airlie is Shute Harbour, a once bustling port teeming with tourists and holiday makers heading for any of the many Whitsunday Islands. Now its as dead as a dodo due the opening of the brand new Port of Airlie right back in town. On the way there you cross a creek and Eagle-eye spotted this Jabiru. Jabiru is so much nicer than black-necked stork, don't you think?

Jabiru or black-necked stork. Shute Harbour Qld

Another day we took ourselves up to Proserpine via Brandy Creek, where I checked out the bush walks in the National Park. One is 850m return, which I think means 1700m, but its not obvious, except that they claim 1 1/2 hours for the trip. That might have something to do with the very steep long set of stairs at the start that drop down into the valley. I'll save it for another day. The other walks are 8km and 30km, these I might pass on. As we then arrived in Proserpine quite late, we missed out on finding lunch or coffee or anything much. But the next day we went out the 45km or so to Dingo Beach, Hydeaway Bay and Cape Gloucester. We had a nice lunch at Cape Gloucester resort and wandered round the beach for a bit. This resort and the one next door, Montes, are supposed to be where all the local come to have fun, and given the number of people around, they are probably right.

Cape Gloucester resort. 

Brian doing the big chill. Cape Gloucester resort. 

Judy studying the menu. Cape Gloucester resort. 

Cape Gloucester resort. 

Cape Gloucester resort. 

Cape Gloucester resort. 

Unknown bug. Cape Gloucester resort. 

We drove back, had a quick look at Montes  and then returned to Cannonvale.

One evening we decided to go to Banjos, the bistro down the road, where they have a 2-for-1 night. Two chicken schnitzels for $15, thats not so bad. Don't ask how much the drinks cost! We rang up to book and they said they were full. Undaunted we turned up at 7 or something and found a seat outside in the dark. As you can imagine the place was indeed packed and as I waited in the line to order, I kept my eye on an old couple who looked like they were finished and just hanging around. I was getting closer and closer to the till. The lady got up and went top the loo. I was 3 away from the register. Finally she came back and I was next in line. Damn. They stood up. I ran out the door, slammed a phone on the table, ran around to where Judy was in the dark, grabbed her bag off the table and bolted back to 'my' table. I dumped the bag and rejoined the line as if nothing had just happened. One just has to be decisive and quick to act sometimes. And sometimes it pays off, we bagged the best table on the place!

Our next site neighbour is a permanent van/house thing and the old fellow has this bright and shiny trike-bike. I was taking the rubbish out when I spied this bird hanging upside down on the tow-bar looking at itself in the chrome. By the time I got back and grabbed a camera, the bird had moved, but I took some snaps anyhow.

Indian ring-necked parakeet. Cannonball Qld

Indian ring-necked parakeet. Cannonball Qld

After I finished the Airlie Beach Parkrun, which is two laps around the boardwalk next to the marina, we went into town to check out the markets, which are smaller than I remember but as predictable as usual.

Markets. Airlie Beach Qld

Selfie stick etiquette!. Markets. Airlie Beach Qld

Bad hat day. Markets. Airlie Beach Qld

Its a real dragon with real fire coming out of its nostrils. Markets. Airlie Beach Qld

Blowing' in the wind. Markets. Airlie Beach Qld

Along came a lot of camels. The ride is about 100metres up and 100m back! Markets. Airlie Beach Qld

We were going out later one afternoon and came across a nest of grey nomads doing the cheese tasting thing in a big ring. 

This morning I was idling about and took a couple of snaps just sitting in this chair of the garden between us and the next van

Big 4 Adventure Whitsunday Resort at Cannonvale 

Big 4 Adventure Whitsunday Resort at Cannonvale

So, that's why one does at Airlie Beach when one isn't out depleting the children inheritance.

Townsville Qld July 21-23 2016

Townsville Qld

Three days in Townsville? You must be mad. What will you do?

Good point, but let me put the record straight; Townsville has got some great public spaces, some good tourist attractions and a few hidden things that are quite interesting.

Our van park, the Big 4 Woodlands at Deeragun is a fair way out of town itself, but provided you book into one of en the suite sites, perfectly comfortable. We stayed here last year, down on the powered site row and it was 'horrible, you had to take the car to the loo. This poor sods have been struggling with massive road works out the front and behind the parker over 2 years. The fact that they have managed to build a huge new lagoon pool, a mini-gulf course and a water play area for the kids is quite remarkable.

Interesting signage. Big 4 Woodlands, Deeragun, Townsville Qld 

A clean sweep of the 18 hole mini golf. Big 4 Woodlands, Deeragun, Townsville Qld

However, with the roadworks goes noise and smell and when the Strand is not that far away and is quite beautiful, why would one stay inside the park?

We hot-footed down to the Strand and sat in Adirondack chairs and ate ice-creams. Seemed like the best way to finish the day.

Apart from my struggling around the Townsville North Side Parkrun on Saturday morning, avoiding wild dingos, cyclone damaged tracks and lack of signage, we had no plans. Except, for I promised Judy lunch at the Strand at one of the nice places sitting out over the water. We chose Longboards, which is a nice casual sort of surfie place with slight Mexican slant to its food.

Judy pretending to study the menu, but really ignoring my prying lens.
Longboard Cafe The Strand. Townsville Qld

Longboard Cafe The Strand. Townsville Qld

Longboard Cafe The Strand. Townsville Qld

The Strand is about a 4km stretch of parkland  and playground and beaches all tied together with a great walkway that runs from the city proper up to the Rock Pool. There are a number of jetties out over the water, mostly eateries and gelato joints. One thing they have: free all day parking right the way along; this place is designed to be used! Strolling back from the Longboard to the car we came across a group of Black Cockatoos who were circling around and landing in the trees. We stopped for a good while trying, mostly in vain, to get the ultimate bird snap. They sure are pesky things! Birds in general that is. One came and sat in the fig right above us so we had a chance of sorts to get a close up, and get pooped on at the same time!

The Strand. Townsville Qld

Black Cockatoo. The Strand. Townsville Qld

Black Cockatoo. The Strand. Townsville Qld

They also have this place called the Great Barrier Reef Aquarium, so we went and spent a few hours ogling fish and coral and turtles.

Great Barrier Reef Aquarium. Townsville Qld

Great Barrier Reef Aquarium. Townsville Qld

Great Barrier Reef Aquarium. Townsville Qld

Great Barrier Reef Aquarium. Townsville Qld

Great Barrier Reef Aquarium. Townsville Qld

Great Barrier Reef Aquarium. Townsville Qld

On Sunday we went to try out the Rock Paper Scissors chain of seafood cafes, down on the strand of course. The food was overcooked deep fried heart failure material, quite disappointing really.

Since we were here last they seem to have redeveloped the headland next to the Rock pool up at the other end of the Strand. Nice new cafe for a start! Why didn't we go there? The headland, now known as Jezzine Barracks, had been used for army barracks for ages; to be ready for  the Russian invasion first and then later the Japanese. No surprise that they never fired a shot in anger, but that's our paranoia and our history. Now its all parks and an army museum and boardwalks and artworks. Its really nice and well worth a visit and a wander around.

Judy inside the rock symbolising the joint of the Black &White tribes in the area. Townsville Qld

Jezzine Barracks boardwalk. Townsville Qld

Land snake.. Townsville Qld

Nice artwork, you can just see them shoving off out into the bay. Townsville Qld

Being at a bit of a loose end, we followed the sign declaring 'Town Common Conservation Area' and were greeted with an extensive wetland with a heap more birds than you will see in Kakadu. One flock was a bunch of Magpie Geese which we stopped and watched for a while. Further along we came across some bird hides, so we hid and waited for something exciting to happen. The only excitement was the appearance of a water snake right at our feet.

Magpie Goose. Wetlands. Townsville Qld

Magpie gees. Wetlands. Townsville Qld

Weeds. Wetlands. Townsville Qld

Water Snake. Wetlands. Townsville Qld

A truly lovely and tranquil place, except for the occasional aeroplane coming or going to the airport, at the back of the wetlands.

Back out from the swamp, and further around on the headland we found the remains of the quarantine station and also more WWII bunkers. There is no doubt that we were ready for invasion and that the threat was real. We have seen heaps of this sort of thing all over Australia

WWII bunker, city in the distance. Townsville Old 

WWII bunker, city in the distance. Townsville Qld

Also on the top of the ridge is some state-of-the-art radar system or something for the airforce, looks like a great big golf ball

RAAF Radar or something. Townsville Qld

Anyhow, who said there was nothing to do here?

Richmond Qld July 20, 2016

Richmond Qld July 20 2016

Early start again, bright clear sky, looks like its going to be a cracker of a day as we drive across to Richmond. Richmond, Queensland, not Sydney or Victoria or the other one in Queensland.We pulled out onto the road and before we had reached to edge of town (its a small town) we were sitting behind a Road Train! 

'Breaker Breaker Good Buddy!' That’s what they do in the movies, the rest of us just use the standard;  ‘Copy Eastbound road train’

‘Yeah, I got ya’, the disconnected voice replies.

‘Yeah, hi and good morning. We are sitting in behind you with a van. We’d like to come around when its clear’, we speak into the ether.

‘Yeah, sure, theres a straight bit just past these curves. I’ll let ya know’.

'OK thanks'

Now you just have to be patient and wait for the call. Eventually then radio crackles back into life, 

'Ok, good to go'.

We thank him and wish him safe travels and we put the pedal to the metal and wind up the rig to 115 kph to pas the 53m long monster.

Sounds corny, but a heap safer than going kamikaze fashion, as the truckies call it. Mind you, when we got stuck behind the mobile paddock yesterday we had to clean the windscreen before we could attempt a passing manoeuvre!

Breezed through the Isa, refuelled and grabbed a quick snack at the ‘Curry and scampered on toward Julia Creek. The road is not brilliant and there are thick black clouds from here to the east coast. There’s one big long stretch of roadworks where we all crawl through sloppy mud and broken tar under control of traffic lights, and then we were stuck behind another road train who was stuck behind a couple of motor homes out for a Sunday Stroll on the once magnificent Flinders highway. 

We had seen a few road signs suggesting that the road from Julia Creek to Richmond was ‘Caution’, as opposed to open or closed. The radio soon let us know from the chat between the truck drivers that the road just outside Richmond had been closed due to rain washing the roadworks away, but was now open again, but really soft and sloppy. As long as it doesn't rain again, but its starting to spit already. What can you do but push on? It’s a zillion miles to go back and around the other way to Townsville, not really an option.

We've now been on the road about 5 hours and as we drew closer to The Creek, we jumped on the radio again, 

‘Copy the inbound road train’.

‘Yair mate’, comes the quick answer over CH40.

‘Hi, mate. Are you stopping at the Creek or going straight through?’

‘Nah, I’m going straight on through to Townsville’ he replies.

‘OK’ we say, ‘we’ll pull up and have lunch then, cheers’. This seemed safer and easier than trying to pass him on this stretch of road.

‘Yair OK’, the definitive laconic answer.

We pulled up in the main (only?) street of Julia Creek only long enough for Judy to assemble a few sandwiches and then we were back out on the road. Fast food, eat and run.

The road varies between rough and terrible to not-so-bad and we drove on, mostly by ourselves, with only one more road train to negotiate before Richmond.

The by now famous Richmond Road Works finally came into view, being only about 3km out of the town itself. Sure enough, it was open and when we were flagged through I was happy to sit in behind yet-another-road train and use his tracks through the really soft gravel that had reputedly been dumped into the washout, and just hoped we could keep moving through the slippery slimy quasi mud for the next km or so. The rain has held off, in fact the clouds have completely dispersed and its now brilliant hot sunshine again.

Eventually we made it into town and slipped quietly into our reserved, and last spot left in the Lakeside Caravan Park, so named because it overlooks the man made lake Fred Tritton, created in 2003 on the edge of town as a recreational facility and named after the ex-Mayor of the place.

I went for a bit of a wander up the main street and back, and reflected on our trip of 600km in 7 and a bit hours and marvelled at our good fortune to live in such a place.

The van park is probably busier than normal because the HappyValley Caravan Club has taken up residence. They have even brought their own supply of plastic chairs emblazoned with their initials, so that they can all sit around and ignore the Country singer who they have congregated to see. The ignoring I can understand, he’s a pretty dreadful singer even by country standards, and his patter and inane jokes are worse. And the begging for donations and for CD sales, oh please, spare me. You feel like going up and giving them $50 to go away so you can enjoy the peace and quiet.

I'm reaching for another Strongbow!

A PS from JB who always proof reads and corrects/adds/deletes the blog. It has to be noted that Brian doesn't actually like any singers we come across, so those comments need to be taken with a grain of salt!!!

Banka Banka NT & Camooweal Qld July 18&19 2016

Banka Banka July 18 2016

Up early and down for a lovely swim in the crystal clear waters of Bitter Springs, and almost no one there. After a quick breakfast we headed out to Banka just after 8. 

Stuart Highway, somewhere between Dunmarra and Banka Bank NT

The Army have been playing soldiers down in SA for a week or so, and now they are all heading back to Darwin. We must have passed 20 convoys of 10 trucks each carrying all kinds of guns and trucks and big-persons toys. A lot of the really big stuff was being hauled by private road trains, driven by their normal driver, but the off-sider was harder to tell, after all they were in camouflage.

Army on the move. Stuart Highway, near Banka Banka NT

I’m not sure where the actual ‘grunts’ were; they may have been in the backs of the long row of Armoured Personnel Carriers, or more likely in a nice air-conditioned bus or 10. I had no idea that we had so big an Army, and those are just the ones from Darwin.

Banka was almost full when we pulled in at 130, but they did say that a big bunch of vans had stayed on instead of leaving. Also Renner Springs (further north) is reported as full as well. We have seen a big increase in vans on the road this year, all heading north it would seem.

Banka Banka NT

Banka Banka NT

Cudjenbra Waterhole, Banka Banka NT

Camooweal Qld July 19 2016

Left Banka at 830 and headed south. First stop was for fuel at the 3-ways roadhouse. I keep mentioning 3-ways, which sounds simple for a town / roadhouse name, so here's the visual explanation:

See, there are but 3 ways one can go!

and then on to Barkly Roadhouse for more fuel, a sandwich and a cup of tea

Barkly Roadhouse NT 

Barkly Roadhouse NT

and then on, and on again, to Camooweal, just over the Qld border, some 525km in six hours. Its a long way but there is nothing in between. We went looking for some basics in Camooweal: milk, bread, butter, and found nothing that we'd normally buy. We went into the Hotel for lunch, but it was off, closed at 2 o'clock. 

Camooweal Qld

Camooweal Qld

Eventually we found the servo out the front of our little park had a decent sort of diner and so with takeaways in hand, lunch was finally taken sitting next to the van in the shade of a lovely big tree. 

Early night tonight, another big day tomorrow!