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?