Tennant Creek to the Great Barrier Reef....
We stayed at Tennant Creek and saw some interesting and original Aborigine paintings. As we were now further north it was decision time....At Three-Ways, travellers decide whether to continue north towards Katherine and Darwin or to turn right and head east. As time was no longer on our side, we decided that our best option would be to turn right and leave the north of the Northern Territory until next time! We would not have time to explore the area and give it full justice so we would prefer to wait a while. On our next stretch of road, we came our closest ever to running out of fuel. Phil knew that Aussie would usually have done 550 kms to a tank, but terrific head- on winds increased our fuel consumption dramatically (down to 450 kms!) and we must have been travelling on fumes as we glided down towards the town of Mount Isa. We thanked more of our lucky stars for the fuel station ahead (and for selling diesel too!). When we stayed at the Sunset Top Tourist Park we met up with Rob and Janice and compared local lingos and phrases. We would like to thank them for their words of encouragement- ‘fair dinkum!’ On Good Friday we made it to McKinley and to the infamous Walkabout Creek Hotel. This was not the best day to visit a pub in Australia, as we soon found out. They are not permitted to open at all on Good Friday – so we camped at the site behind the pub and waited until morning. We stayed inside Aussie as the little black flies were very persistent again! We watched the Crocodile Dundee films and it was very strange to be watching them, on the premises where it all originated from. The next morning we had to have a pint inside the very traditional setting, with lots of photos and memorabilia on display. Unfortunately the ‘Never- Never Safari’s’ were no longer available! At Winton, the home of ‘Waltzing Matilda’, we found out more about the song which is now often referred to as Australia’s un-official National Anthem. It was written by A. B Banjo Paterson in 1895. There are now three different versions of the original song. Next we motored to Ilfracombe (near Longreach in outback Queensland) and pitched up at the caravan park. This campsite actually advertises that they hold happy hours most nights! This town is so called, as the architect came from Ilfracombe in Devon, UK. Phil was routinely stopped for a breath test on the way into Longreach, which took us all by surprise. This was for his first time ever – so he blew into the box and then we were able to continue along our way! Ilfracombe has one of the ‘oldest’ pubs in the area, which seemed strange to us -as it was only about 100 years old! At Emerald we found a place to camp right under a railway track, which was fine until the middle of the night when a 101 trailer coal train passed through on its way to the Capricorn coast! We also went on a night walk with our mag-light to do some animal spotting. We had to dodge the toads all over the tracks and only later found out that these were Cane toads. Phil, Jemma & Ben grabbed the chance to do a spot of fishing here too and Jemma caught two fish this time (a fork -tailed catfish and a perch). Next stop was Gracemere Caravan Park, along the Old Capricorn Highway, which was only five minutes away from Rockhampton. Here we met up with some more friendly neighbours- Dave, Yvonne and family. Their children were almost identical ages to Jemma and Ben and they all got along very well! We got talking about more recommendations to see and do and as the family come from Townsville, maybe we shall catch up again one day! The Great Barrier Reef was our next mission and so we moved to the Causeway Caravan Park to get more information. There were giant mosquitoes around this area, all who thought we were very tasty. They were even swarming around on the outside of our fly nets! We went down to the Causeway to find out some more and decided to take a ‘tinny’ motor boat out for an adventure! It was good fun but as a speed boat was zooming around there was little chance of us catching any fish! When we got back the children jumped ship and went for a swim along the shore. As we watched them, we had a dodgy encounter with a black and hairy spider that actually reared himself up at us (in anger?) We are still not sure what he was- but we weren’t sticking around to take any chances about how friendly he may or may not have been! We made some telephone calls to finalise the arrangements for our campervan hire in New Zealand and went along to Keppel Sands. The Bill Kingel Caravan Park and folk were very welcoming and we even joined the local gang for a scrummy pizza and a beer at the local pub! The Koorana Crocodile farm on the Capricorn Coast in Queensland was a very interesting and ‘safe’ place to find out more about these amazing creatures. John Lever and his family have been developing their thriving business for more than 25 years. There was a wealth of knowledge and information to be shared on a real life Crocodile Dundee guided tour! The many rescue and crocodile capture stories told were all very different and intriguing. We were very lucky to be able to watch a croc hatch from his egg – right in front of us! What a shock for him to come out and see all of us looking at him! Jemma and Ben got to hold another croc too – with his mouth taped up just in case! Afterwards, our sample of crocodile pie was delicious and we would all have liked some more! It was difficult to compare the flavour to any other meat in our experience- but it was really tasty! Honest! We took a fantastic trip on the Freedom Flyer, out from Rosslyn Bay to the Keppel Islands. The two largest of these islands are Great Keppel (1454 ha) and North Keppel (627 ha), and they are surrounded by 16 smaller islands. We took a full day cruise including morning tea and cakes upon arrival to the Keppel’s! The Glass Bottom Boat was next on the agenda with a very informative commentary on a wide variety of sea life that we saw along the way. After a delicious BBQ lunch Phil, Jemma and Ben enjoyed snorkelling over the Plate, Tabletop and Stag horn Corals on the fringing Great Barrier Reefs. They saw fantastic colours and over 80 different varieties of fish and sea-life, including a sea snake - in less than 2 hours in the water! I enjoyed a beautiful walk along the shore, in the bright sunshine and waited for their return! We hope that the underwater camera will have captured some of those amazing moments – but we shall have to wait and see about that! On the way back, Jemma and Ben had more great fun Boom-netting (or in the Ocean Spa for the more refined!) They laid back and held tight onto a net that was attached to the back of our boat – and were pulled along through the waves! At any time they got tired or got left behind, a speed boat member of the crew would come along to the rescue! Phil refers to this as ‘live bait trawling’!! Everyone was exhausted after an amazing day – another highlight on Macswayround!
Monday, 11 May 2009 12:15:26 (GMT Daylight Time, UTC+01:00)      Comments [0]  Australia