Clermont Qld July 17th 2023

Clermont Qld July 17th 2023

Feeling lucky, we went up to Sapphire to Pats wash-n-wish and ran a bag of their wash through the process. This time it was a different technique, only the one fine sieve and no Willoughby to wash with. And just shake the dust onto the ground. Washing was done in a trough by hand and worked just fine, there not being a lot of mud on the stones, but at least some.

And you get to sit down at the sorting table and take your time making sure you picked up every little bit of coloured stone. Well not all the coloured stone,. most is rubbish, just as well Judy has a good eye for this and quickly filled the jar-lid with her treasure.

Judy at Pats, Sapphire Qld

The people here are new since last time and very friendly, however, the expert was a bit off-hand about Judy's gems, not declaring any as "cutters".

Even though it was a very pleasant spot to sit and drink coffee and chat with the locals and their dog, we had already made our minds up for a change of plan.

We had decided to leave Rubyvale a day early and move up to Clermont, which is 120km north. It's not much but brings the next day's run down from 490 to a more manageable 370. Actually we ended up taking this nice quiet drive up a narrow, winding hilly backroad, but one with great views of the volcanic plugs and the fertile plains. The backroad is 35km shorter than the main Gregory Highway, but probably takes just as long as its 85-90kph touring, the road being quite narrow and no marked lines. 

The surprises keep coming. On arrival in Clermont CV, we are summarily told to go straight back out again and take ourselves down to the overflow parking area, which is ok for one night but a bit off-putting nonetheless. The site allocated is quite steep for a van park, I had to take extraordinary measures to get the van unhitched, then even more extremes to jack it way up high to get it level. The back is so low I couldn’t use the legs and had to resort to our small bottle jack. A first for us, but not a bad spot once we settled in.

Angle parking, Clermont Qld. OK so the van is level, see how far the car drops down!

We had lunch down by Hood’s Lagoon, one of those little gems one finds in remote towns from time to time. It’s a man made lagoon, complete with a bridge, boardwalks and three fountains. 

 

Forest Kingfisher sitting on a safety fence. Clermont Qld

Hoods Lagoon, Clermont Qld

South Mission Beach Qld 12-19 August 2019

South Mission Beach Qld 12-19 August 2019

We moved camp down to South Mission Beach, and lucked into a reasonably decent spot in the Coconut van park. The newest attraction to Mission Beach is a brand new council swimming pool complex, pool heated to 28℃ and inside another pool for aquarobics and stuff, purportedly at 34℃. Just throw in a bar of soap and do the washing as well!

Cassowaries are alive and well in and around the district, we never fail to see at least one on the roadside, and here's one that strayed into the van park looking for a feed.

Cassowary. South Mission Beach Qld

From our park there is a 1/2km stretch to the end of the beach, where there is the beginning of the Kennedy track, starting with a boardwalk that goes for about 300m, and then a path, with steps, (60+ up each way) which continues round the headland to another beach, Lugers Bay to be precise. This is beautiful, except for the stairs down to it, pretty much untouched and except for the odd other walker at 730am is pretty much deserted.

Kennedy Track. South Mission Beach Qld

Luggers Bay Beach. South Mission Beach Qld

Bridge over Mine Creek. South Mission Beach Qld

Just in case you had forgotten that we are still in croc country. Mine Creek. South Mission Beach Qld

Mine Creek. South Mission Beach Qld

The weather closed in a bit, so we went for a bit of a drive up toward Innisfail to check out the other two beaches: Kurramine and Crowley.

This could be Kurramine Beach... Kurramine Beach Qld

Always wanted to see The Top End in the wet. Crowley Beach Qld

This would be the end of the Cane Cutters Discover Road then.... Cowley beach Qld

We did manage to snap this little fellow on the beach at South Mission, A Forest Kingfisher.

Forest Kingfisher. South Mission Beach Qld

And then there were these up on the wire.

'Guys! Stop pushing!' You make the Welcome a bit hard to Swallow.

A long range snap of the now defunct Dunk Island Resort, wiped out by Yasi in 2011, but as of yesterday, has a new proud owner who snapped it up for a lazy 30 mill.