The Grand Tour of Blackall

We decided to stay here for another couple of days to take advantage of the park and the town’s history. They have put a lot of effort into both finding things that would appeal to tourists and displays featuring historical content. We roamed the streets all morning taking in a number of the sights (and sites).

Standing next to Jackie Howe

The first impressive feat was by Jackie Howe who holds the world record for shearing with hand shears 321 sheep in seven hours and ten minutes. He went on to own a local hotel and was a pivotal supporter of T J Ryan who went on to become Queenslands first Labor Premier. Howe was revered in the Federal Labor Party as one of the original promoters of its ideas.

Lt. E. T. Towner

Across the street is the Blackall Memorial Garden with a bronze statue of Lt. E. T. Towner who received to awards for gallantry in 1918. He won both the Victoria Cross and the Military Cross for his heroics in France

The remnants of the original black stump

And finally, an explanation of the term beyond the black stump is provided by another landmark in Blackall. The black stump was a large black stump that was situated in Blackall and was used as a base point for surveying instruments used at the time to survey outback Queensland. At the time, Blackall was considered to be the edge of civilisation in Queensland hence the term.

Said elephant

From there we moved onto view an elephant, presented to Blackall by Perry’s Circus to commemorate Perry Bros Circus close association with the Barcoo area. Then onto Rams Park which has a display of the importance sheep and wool to the district. Sadly the exhibitions (like us) are starting to show their age. The ram has certainly seen better days.

The ram with a prophylaxis on his horn

Back to Blackall

Moon nearly full at Muttaburra

We left Muttaburra after a cool night. We retreated to the van after dinner as the cool breeze was to much for these koalas to bear. We tailed a cattle roadtrain out of Muttaburra down to Aramac where we had morning tea and inspected the white bull (yeah its a load of bull, just another tourist drawcard)

The white bull from legend

From Aramac we continued down to Barcaldine to check out one the shrines of Australian workers’ rights, the Tree of Knowledge (or rather the art installation that replaced the tree after it was poisoned by some clown in 2006). It’s the location where the shearers formed the Australian Workers Union and all enrolled to vote, forming the foundations for the Australian Labor Party in 1891.

The replacement for the Tree of Knowledge

We hit the local bakery to try out their vanilla slices and I reckon this one would beat even Bob Bentley – no way of stopping your fingers getting sticky on this one – to much icing and oozing custard. From there it was back on to the road and returned to Blackall to camp at the Barcoo River Campsite. We walked up the street to do some grocery shopping before settling back into the camp. We’ll head down to Charleville via Auguthella tomorrow after a quick look around the points of interest here.

Muttaburra Musings

Jenny, drink in hand in front of the fire, me slaving over a hot stove. Isisford Freecamp

Left the well resourced camp site at Isisford to head east to Blackall then North to Barcaldine. It was mainly new country today with lush pastures of native grasses and low height trees. There were plenty of fat cattle around and a steady stream of traffic coming towards us until we reached Barcaldine.

Dinner is served – marinated chicken, hot vegies and a fire.

We stopped there for a quick bite to eat before refuelling and heading north through Aramac and onto Muttaburra. We set up in the Muttaburra Caravan Park which you pay via an honesty box ($10 per night for unpowered sites which is all we could get as the park is full). It’s interesting to see all these grey gonads just parked here for the cheap accommodation. The hotel is just 500 metres walk up the street and, other than the Muttaburrasaurus Interpretation Centre, is the only attraction in town. It’s unusual for us to drive through such expansive scenery and actually see green grass and not bare red dirt.

No jokes about old dinosaurs…they’re to predictable

We will head south again tomorrow and check out the towns of Aramac, Barcaldine and Blackall before moving a little further south into previously travelled country.

There’s Thieves in This Here Neighbourhood!

Awoke this morning to a bright sunrise and a chilly wind blowing. We carried out our normal morning routine and discovered someone stole one of our wheel nuts during the night. Times must be tough if you have to knock off a wheel nut! I checked them yesterday morning as I usually do before taking off but we only travelled 30 metres to another site within the Caravan Park and the wheel nut indicators all lined up but this morning the indicator and nut were missing from the bottom stud on the front right hand wheel (the easiest to remove considering the tension on the wheel nuts – 230nM). The park Management had warned that there were strange things happening in the park and to watch our valuables as they had had some thefts on Friday night – but a wheel nut?

There’s fish in the weir!

So in a fit of pique we hit the road for the arduous journey of 117 kms to Isisford. It was all new roads today, single lane bitumen through open pasture country. Plenty of feed in the paddocks and plenty of tourists coming towards us. I’m still amazed at the newbie caravan drivers flogging along at 100 km/h on undulating, single lane, flood damaged bitumen where you have to go half off road to dodge oncoming traffic. They play with fate.

Inside the Hooper & Brockhurst display shop.

We made up camp on the Barcoo River Weir along with the numerous other gypsies. $5 per night or $27 for the week with a couple of onsite toilets, with toilets and free showers in a modern amenities block in the Main Street for those that need it. It’s a quaint little town with around 250 residents. It’s interesting that nearly all the street names in the town are named after saints. I must confess father, I hadn’t heard of most of them. Well maintained tidy street with a food shop with very limited supplies, obviously everyone shops in Blackall, the larger town 125 kms down the road. There are also several historic displays and a Barcoo River Area Interpretive Centre. Jen’s off fishing for yellow belly (so I’m guessing its chicken for dinner tonight). It’s a pleasant 20º in the sun so time to catch some rays.

And So to Longreach

Mmh… that ended up in a slippery situation! We were blissfully listening to the rain gently fall on our roof at 4.30 am while most of our neighbours panicked and headed for the hills. Trouble was that when we went to leave one of the panicked had parked himself on the track because he was frightened his caravan would slip off the highly banked road surface. This meant we had to take to the rather steep drop off to get out of there. Unfortunately, much like the caravan driver, I hadn’t engaged four wheel drive as I left the campsite. This meant that in the slippery conditions, it wouldn’t engage so I had to wing it over the edge in two wheel drive. A little hairy (and Jenny was doing the old let me out of here routine) but we survived.

We headed off for Longreach to do some shopping and decided to stay the night in the Longreach Tourist Park where we stayed many years ago with Melva and Laurie (and rude old grey gonads). This way we get to have a decent shower and do some laundry before moving on again.

No comments about old bovines please!

We went up to the street to top up on groceries and ran into the local man riding the bull on the footpath. Happens everywhere on a Saturday morning.

No not a white wedding. Street sculpture Longreach.

Nice to see that the town was rocking – plenty of tourists and a local was having a large wedding today.

Oh, That Waterhole!

Yeah I knew it… of course the Combo Waterhole was the alleged birthplace of Waltzing Matilda. We decided that as we may not be back in this area for a long time, we had better make the effort and visit the Combo Waterhole Conservation Park. It’s only a three hundred kilometre round trip but its better than sitting in the freezing cold in Leongatha.

We were surprised when we arrived there that there was only one other vehicle and the owners were just returning from walking the 2.6 km round trip. The flies were incredible, some of the worst we’ve seen in our travels. It was a nice flat walk and to be rewarded with a seat under a Coolibah tree was a pretty good outcome.

Well almost sitting, no jumbucks in sight!

We decided to head back to the Long Waterhole Freecamp 4 kms south of Winton (on the Jundah road). We last visited there when Turtle had a bad case of flat tyres but this time we actually camped on the edge of the waterhole. Jenny rewarded me by cooking a stir fry accompanied by a couple of glasses of red wine before the mozzies won the day and we retired inside.

Sunset at the Long Waterhole, Winton

Doing our Bit in Winton

Time to support the locals, so we headed up to town to have coffee and cake at the bakery. Once again, a corker of a day – bright sunshine and warm temperatures. After morning tea we continued to browse the two or three retail shops that make up the business district before heading to the Waltzing Matilda Museum. Last time we were here, they were still rebuilding the museum after a catastrophic fire. It is now complete and much improved. We spent quite some time going over the exhibitions.

Inside the Waltzing Matilda Museum

We purchased a Telstra SIM card and data so that we can at least message and email people while we are here. I got in touch via Messenger with an old school friend who used to live in Winton but in his answer he explained he now lives in Hervey Bay and is travelling himself at the moment so we miss out on catching up this time. We headed out to dinner at the Great Northern Hotel where a Country and Western singer, Matt Scullion, was plying his wares. The bistro area was packed as were the other pubs in town. I guess hot weather and plenty of tourists leads to an uptick in the beer business

The original Banjo Patterson manuscript

Time to sit quietly in the camp to reflect over a glass of Tawny.

Heading South Again

We left Cloncurry to continue our way south. A little way down the road we came across an unfortunate caravaner whose towing hitch had sheared off so he was stuck on the side of the road awaiting parts. (He obviously got them because he turned up in our caravan park later that afternoon). We stopped at the remote hamlet of Kynuna for lunch before moving on through the treeless plains North of Winton. We saw several small herds of wild camels on the pastoral leases, something we haven’t seen for years so I’m guessing the recent rains have helped their numbers swell as well (there were several young camels with their mums)

Awkward spot to lose your van

We passed the turnoff to the Combo Waterhole Conservation Park and I immediately thought that perhaps we should visit there now but instead we just kept moving toward Winton. We set up camp in the Pelican Caravan Park (which has neither water or pelicans to float on it) and it was a hot and dusty 33º afternoon. We were extremely disappointed with our Belong service here. Despite advertising themselves as being owned by Telstra and using the Telstra network, we were denied connection to the Telstra network completely, despite the signal being at 4 bars.

The Blue Heeler Pub at Kynuna

Time for a shower in the rather aromatic bore water and tackle the town tomorrow.

Under the disco lights at Winton

Oops, We’re at Cloncurry

Well how did that happen? We set off this morning in good time after listening to the occasional ore train during the night and the numerous road trains at the other end of the motorhome. A very pleasant morning with a heavy dew underfoot, we decided we would put in a longish day to a freecamp just west of Julia Creek. This road was once again fresh country for us, passing through the villages of Pentland and Prairie and onto the to larger towns of Hughenden (morning tea) and Richmond (lunch and refuelling at a very reasonable $2.199/litre). We reached Julia Creek in good time so decided we would push a little further than first planned to a freecamp 67 kms east of Cloncurry.

Now that’s a windmill (Prairie Lions’ Park)

As in all good sagas, the plans of mice and men came unstuck when we reached roadworks before the rest stop with a big flashing sign telling us that the area was closed so we had no choice but to proceed to Cloncurry Caravan Park where we are ensconced for the night. They are definitely making hay while the sun shines here as the park is full (and the sun is beating down at 32º but nice in the shade…I no complain)

The attack of the dinosaurs at Hughenden

Townsville to Compaspe River Freecamp

We had a great visit with Tom and Robynne, reminiscing about our days in Melbourne. We got to meet Maddy and enjoy some cheesecake that Robynne and Maddy had created. We got back to the Caravan Park in the dark but still managed to get into our tricky little spot without hitting anything.

Following Tom’s suggestion that we take a more scenic route back to Charters Towers, we headed along Hervey Range Road and completed the short climb to the top of the range. Unfortunately it was to early in the morning for a cuppa so we missed out on stopping at the Historic Tearooms at the top of the range. We continued on through the military training area along a road that we had not travelled before. Pretty countryside with abundant feed. We came across Stockyard Creek Rest Area, a place we have visited twice before but now all shiny and new. From there it was back to the Gregory Development Road heading to Charters Towers.

Stockyard Creek Rest Area al la 2022

We refuelled there (and got a rather good discount due to another customer paying our bill because he quoted the wrong bowser number, so they just made us pay his bill) and stopped for lunch and a quick walk around the shops.

Then it was back on the road again, once more travelling over roads we hadn’t been on before. We got to visit the metropolises of Balfe Creek (a service station and a private residence with a DO NOT PARK OVER DRIVEWAY sign) and Homestead which, strangely considering its remoteness, had a large school and quite a few dwellings. We finally settled into our camp for the night at Campaspe River Freecamp early in the afternoon and sat in the shade enjoying the rather pleasant 25º day.

Campaspe River Freecamp without the river