Day 26 and Day 27

Day 26 - Friday August 15th - Mt Isa 2

It was time to take it easy and have a bit of a rest. I went back to the information centre in Mt Isa where they have two museum galleries.

The main gallery called contained history about the local mining as well as the forming of the township. Mt Isa was formed around the initial discovery of lead in 1923. At the time Isa was (and still is to an extent) very remote. The first batch of ores was dug up and transported by horse and carriage for processing. The transport company took no upfront payment, but agreed to take a cut if the ore turned out to be any good.

Mt Isa Mines Ltd was formed by individual prospectors combining their claim certificates into a coordinated larger effort. This made them more efficient and profitable. In 1929 the camels had had enough and a rail line was opened into Mt Isa. This became the state government's most profitable railway line. The mine also helped build the town with schools, stores, water etc.

The museum also contained other odd interesting items, a few pictures are below. I believer the Telecom desk was for investigating faults, it didn't have a sign but the volt meter and switch labels seemed to fit with fault troubleshooting.

English for Newcomers to Australia

Telecom faults desk

In the afternoon I purchased myself a true Aussie outback souvenir, an Akubra hat. The store I went to had an excellent range of hats, with many styles to choose from!

Looking like I belong in the outback

Day 27 - Saturday August 16th - Mt Isa 3

This morning I packed up and headed to a local cafe for some morning tea. I also stocked up on non-perishables ready for my journey into the west. Mt Isa is the biggest town I will see until Alice Springs. It's essential to carry enough water to survive in the event of a breakdown.

Leaving Mt Isa I visited Lake Moondarra just out of town. The lake was built in the 1950's by Mt Isa Mines to be a reliable water source for the town. Without water there would be no miners and without miners there would be no mine. At the time it was Australia's largest privately funded water scheme.

I enjoyed the view and had lunch here. In the past there was a Surf Life Saving Club! I don't think there would have been much surf, but there was sand! Thousands of truck loads of sand was transported to the lake. Most of which has washed to the bottom of the lake.

Lake Moondarra  - dam wall to the right, picnic area (and beach) to the left.

I continued my drive out of Mt Isa over to Camooweal. Along the way I stopped to read about the old Barkly Highway. During World War II supply routes were needed within Australia. It was originally constructed as gravel in 1942, however due to the amount of traffic it was sealed in 1943. This part of the road was replace in 2008.

New and old Barkly Highway roads

I stayed the night in Camooweal, a Queensland boarder town to the Northern Territory. This town is small and basically has a petrol station and a pub. I stayed behind the petrol station, which was a bad move. It was a bad night's sleep with many trucks coming and going.

These trucks arrived in the afternoon, they had come from SA and needed to wait a few days to be escorted into Mt Isa

Tomorrow I will leave Queensland and drive into the Northern Territory.

Day 21 to Day 25

Day 21 - Sunday August 10th - Longreach 2

Today in Longreach I visited the Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame. This museum was huge and would have taken days to ready everything! I skimmed past some bits..

The museum is divided into sections. The first section was about the early days on the land which included aboriginal history, early explores & stockmen. It explained how the aboriginal assistance was essential in the early success of stockmen. There was also a section about the Royal Flying Doctor Service. It was a good museum, however due to the number of other museums I have seen recently, I was a little over looking at things and reading text.

Inside the Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame

A highlight from here was their outback show. The performer, Lachie Cossor, was a third generation stockman and horse breeder. He demonstrated stockman techniques using his well trained horses and dogs. He was also an accomplished country music singer and song writer. I bought his CD as a souvenir.

Lachie sitting on his horse singing

Day 22 - Monday August 11th - Longreach 3

I was off to an early start today because the coach doesn't wait for anyone. I was booked on a 7.30 am Kinnon & Co. coach ride. The coach ride was amazing and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I had prime position up top with the driver. Kinnon & Co. included a comical yet informative commentary. The ride was a return trip to the Longreach common following the original Royal Mail route.

Pre ride photo

The Longreach common is land owned by all local rate payers for their use, ride a horse, drive a car, etc. Back in the past farmers were allowed to graze their cattle on the common. However come branding time for the calves, it caused many arguments among the farmers. The council put an end to the grazing as a result.

Part way through the ride they took the horses up to a gallop from a trot. At that point dirt & stones started flicking up at us. I was told to keep my mouth shut, good advice! At the end I was completely covered in dirt and dust, I looked very authentic when I got off. It was a fun ride but would have been a horrible method of transport back in the day. It was very rough and slow compared to the modern day equivalents like a car.

My view from up top

The replica carriage I rode on

Talking to the Richard (the owner) and the guys after the ride, they highly recommended I come back for the tent show at 12 pm if I'm still in town.

I had breaky in town then headed over to the Longreach School of the Air for a tour. I remembered doing this tour in 1998 and at that time they used radios to communicate with the students. Now in modern 21st century they use telephones and internet. Some family have to connect using satellite services because ADSL or dialup isn't available. This Monday was the start of a mini school program for the year 1's. Mini school is when the students come into the school for a week and get to socialise with their peers while doing group activities. Normally the students work with their teacher's assistance remotely and a tutor at home. In most cases the tutor is a parent.

It was almost midday so I headed back to Kinnon & Co. for the tent show.  It was a brilliant comical show loosely based on some truth. I highly recommend this and the coach ride to anyone travelling to Longreach, if you're not travelling to Longreach, you should!...

Myself with Richard and his horse

I had lunch in town then headed off to Winton. Before pulling out of my car spot I had to give to a coach ride!

Coach ride in town

Day 23 - Tuesday August 12th - Winton 1

Waking up in Winton I had to be up and ready by 8 am for a bus ride to Lark Quarry. At Lark Quarry we were shown dinosaur footprints fossilised in mud. From the tracks and the types of rock, scientists have been able to work out that a large dinosaur snuck up behind a herd of smaller dinosaurs drinking at a lake. When the small dinosaurs realised they started running a chaotic stampede. Unfortunately the tracks aren't complete and they will never know if the big dinosaur got a small dinosaur. However I'd say it's pretty safe to assume that's what happened. These tracks were discovered back in the 1960's by people looking for opals.

This is me at Lark Quarry

Some of the footprints at Lark Quarry

In the afternoon I caught up over lunch with some people I had met earlier in Longreach. I then went into the Waltzing Matilda Centre. This place has a large amount of history about the song, plus many other period artefacts. Worth a visit if you're in town.

Another thing worth a mention is Arno's Wall. It's located behind the North Gregory Hotel and is made from concrete and objects, including the kitchen sink. Must be seen to be believed!

Arno's wall

While I was on the tour bus in the morning, I met Mary and Chee who are also driving around. In the evening we had dinner together at iconic North Gregory Hotel in town.

Day 24 - Wednesday August 13th - Winton 2

I spent the morning in Winton. I started with breaky at a local cafe where I was greeted with a handshake by the barista. Looking around at a few things in town I found the old cinema quite interesting.

Winton's Cinema

Old advertising slides - There were sound cheeky ads back then!

Old movie poster

I also headed over to the Australian Age of Dinosaurs, a not for profit organisation which has uncovered many dinosaur bones locally. They are very proud of two in particulate which have been named Banjo & Matilda. Banjo is the most complete dinosaur found in Australia. They also mentioned that the model built of his foot fits nicely within the large tracks left at Lark Quarry, meaning one of his species likely made those tracks.

Banjo statue outside the Australian Age of Dinosaurs

I then started the long drive to Cloncurry stopping along the way to give myself rest. At one of the rest stops just outside of town I spotted Mary and Chee (from the Lark Quarry tour), we chatted for a few minutes before I continued on.

Day 25 - Thursday August 14th - Mt Isa 1

Cloncurry had a museum, however at this point I'm a little over them, so I skipped it and had a look around town.  There were some impressive older buildings in town. I then continued on to Mt Isa.

Post Office Hotel in Cloncurry

At Mt Isa I booked on a mine tour and found a place to stay. To kill some time I visited the town lookout.

Isa lookout during the day

When it was time for the underground mine tour, we all met at the information centre located close to the mine. The mine used for the tour was purpose built for tourism. We went about 30 meters underground and got to see lots of older equipment actually used in the real Mt Isa mine. The tour finished up with beer and pizza in the crib room (miner speak for lunch room). We were also given copies of photos taken at the start of the tour, due to safety they don't allow people to take photos underground (it be easy enough to walk into something dangerous or trip if you're not paying enough attention).

The guide, Steve, was a volunteer who had previously worked in the Mt Isa mine and also volunteered his time to help build the tourist mine. He still works in another mine just out of town, donating some of his days off to Mt Isa's tourism program. It was a great tour and having Steve's experience made from some truthful yet funny stories.

Steve and myself

It was dark by the time we got out of the mine, so I then headed up to the town lookout (along with everyone else from the tour). The view of the mine is quite spectacular at night, everything is lit up and it is sad to look a bit like a ship because of the two tall chimneys. You'll have to take my word for it because I wasn't able to take a good photo with the low light.

I also got to see the evening blast. We could hear it at the lookout as well as see the dust clouds coming from the open cut pit. Backing up a bit, Mt Isa mine has an underground mine and an open cut mine. They have two major blasts each day at 8am and 8pm.

Day 18 to Day 20

Day 18 - Thursday August 7th

Exploring Charleville in the morning I took a walk by the Warrego River. The drought was evident by the gum tress with large trunks and small amount of branches, they had dropped quite a number of limbs.

Half a gum tree

Another interesting place in Charleville is their rain making guns. That's right, guns that produce rain, well that was the theory anyway. The science behind the guns is that they were designed to disperse destructive hailstorms and make it rain by shooting gas into the air (it worked for this purpose). Desperate times call for desperate measures, so the guns were trialled to end a drought. The drought ended naturally and most of the guns were pulled apart for scrap metal.

Steiger Vortex rain making guns

I followed the main road north into Blackall. Blackall is the site of the Black Stump, which was a key surveying point while marking out many towns in Queensland. The phrase 'beyond the black stump' refers to anything west of Blackall. The location of the monument isn't actually where the black stump was, it's been conveniently relocated for tourism. I remember visiting this site as a kid in 1998. I actually understand the significance of the site this time.

Mural of the black stump, with a petrified stump below to symbolise the black stump

I continued the drive on to Barcaldine with no knowledge of what this town was before arriving. Barcaldine is the place of birth for the Australian Labour Party. There is a special monument to signify this called the tree of knowledge. Later I found out that this tree was living up until a few years earlier, it was poisoned by an anonymous person. The Labour party was formed to help improve conditions for the working class man.

In the caravan park overnight I chatted to two guys who were excited to hear about my time at the Cosmos Observatory. We talked about our galaxy and the wonderful planet we call Earth.


Day 19 - Friday August 8th

I had morning tea at the bakery in town. It was a fantastic fresh muffin and a nice strong coffee. I then explored the town and checked out their old historic buildings. One building in particular that was of interest to me appeared to have a grand amount of woodwork on the facade, however it was all just an illusion of clever paint work! The building was moved to it's current location and is over 100 years old. It'd be quite warm inside due to the corrugated iron walls, they should plant more trees around it!

I was told the Australian Workers Heritage Centre was a must see, so I headed there next. I ended up spending at least 4 hours walking around, there is plenty to see. It has been built on the site of an old school, making use of the existing buildings with some extras as well. On display it had many sections donated by various government departments including; police, fire & rescue, hospital, school, rail with my favourite section being donated by Australia Post.

The post section covered mail (as we know it now) plus telegrams, telephones and Cobb & Co (they were the early mail couriers between post offices). On display was a scaled coach built by the original Cobb & Co. coach builder. This small coach was designed to be pulled by a goat. They had pictures of people awkwardly sitting on it being pulled by a goat.

Scaled down Cobb & Co. coach

The Barcaldine tourist broacher mentioned a lovely nature park by the Lloyd Jones Weir. It was just out of town so I headed there for a quick look. Getting there was the first road I've travelled on which only has a single sealed lane and the last 2 kilometres was sand. I survived the sand at low speed both in and out. (Back in 1998 we travelled on a large amount of roads with a single sealed lane, from what I've seen recently these major highways have been converted into safer dual lane roads.)

Arriving at the weir it turned out to also be a free camp site, there were many nomads with caravans onsite enjoying the views. Very quickly someone approached me and wanted to show me some birds they had spotted. Pretty soon there were 4 of us bird watching with a binoculars and a bird book. I've never done that before! Apparently later in the afternoon turtles would emerge on the banks of the river, while tempted to stay I wanted to get on the road before dusk.

I finished up my day with a short drive to Longreach and headed in to the Woolshed bar run by the caravan park I was staying at. We were entertained by a country music singer with his guitar. I enjoyed his stories and music then stayed around chatting to a couple who were sitting on the same table. The place also served dinner, so I decided to be lazy, after all it is a Friday night!

Entertainment in the Woolshed

Day 20 - Saturday August 9th

After discovering I had left some of my tent pegs in Barcaldine (didn't matter they were getting pretty bent anyway), I purchased more down at the bustling Longreach shops on Saturday morning. I didn't fit in, I was wearing shorts. The locals were wearing jumpers and pants!

I spent my day over at the Qantas Founders Museum. Here it explains the begging of the Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services (or Qantas as we know it today). Qantas all stated in the day of two choices, horse drawn Cobb & Co. coach or rail. Out in the west, rail transport on runs East / West with the only North / South lines being on the coast. Although the train trip was far more comfortable than a coach, it took longer due to the huge amount of extra distance travelled. Qantas provided the fastest service, at a higher price of course.

Full size model of the first Qantas plan - an Avro 504K

To drum up business, Qantas started off by running joy flights and custom charters. One story was of a wealthy man who hired Qantas to fly over all the farms of young eligible ladies so he could drop them boxes of chocolates. Qantas also got themselves respected in the west by transporting critically sick or injured patients to hospital. Later the Flying Doctor Service was founded to take care of the medical side (it only became the Royal Flying Doctor Service after a visit from the Queen).

By far I found the most exciting part of the Qantas Founders Museum was their jet plane tour. The guide was also fantastic which made the tour even more special. Qantas donated a Boeing 747 to the museum. It was a big day in town when this landed in 2002 to mark Qantas' 82^nd birthday. Longreach airport wasn't built for a jumbo jet, being half the width and length normally used to land these planes. The pilots practised the landing in a simulator before attempting it. The planes weight was also drastically reduced.

On the tour we were shown around and in the 747 as well as a 707. The 707 was Qantas' first jet plan, purchased to propel Qantas as an international airline. The 707 was sold on a couple of times through its working life as a private jet. A Saudi prince was the last owner before the plane was sent to a grave yard. After 6 years the museum was altered to the plane's existence, and they purchased it for £1. Many months of volunteer restoration work (mostly by Qantas engineers who originally worked on this exact plane) got it air worthy again and then finally flow home to Australia.

I could write pages more about Qantas, but I wont. You'll just have to visit the museum for yourself! Did I mention, it's close to an airport.

Qantas 747 - City of Bunbury

Inside a 747 Rolls-Royce jet engine

I will spend another day and a half in Longreach, more to come in the next post.

Day 14 - Day 17

Day 14 - Sunday August 3rd

Overnight it was mentally hard to cook dinner and get back into a swag after spending the previous night in a 5 start hotel! It's also now time to leave the beachy Gold Cost. After chatting to a local at the caravan park and having a coffee on the main street I left for the Tamborine national park.

On the edge of the national park is the Tamborine Rainforest Skywalk. This is a steel walkway apparently 40 meters up at the highest point. It gave a beautiful perspective of the tree tops. The walkway then took you back down to ground level were the track continued to a creek lookout.

Looking down the Skywalk

Check out the treetop view! That's me in the corner, of the fence.

After lunch I followed two walking tracks within the national park. Firstly I followed the Curtis Falls walking track. This waterfall provided a lovely cool lookout due to all the shade and greenery around. The next track I took was the Sandy Creek walking track. It went right over the top of Cameron Falls, the cliff edge was only meters away! This waterfall was pretty dry, however still flowing a little. The pictures show a stunning cliff face but not much water. The car park at Sandy Creek track was magnificent, you could see Brisbane in the distance.

Curtis Falls

Cameron Falls

Brisbane in the distance

Before daylight disappeared it was time to drive on to Ipswich. I didn't realise until after arriving that there was only one caravan park in town. I didn't like the look of it, so continued on to Toowoomba. I arrived too late due to roadworks so I stayed in a motel and had Grill'd for dinner.

Day 15 - Monday August 4th

I had been looking forward to this day, I visited the Cobb & Co Museum where they have some original Cobb & Co. coaches on display plus many others from the era. I just happened to time my visit with 200 primary school children from all year levels... Mum I don't know how you do it!

In the past there was a private collection on display. However like many things in the mid to late 1900's, it burnt down with the rest of the town strip. Residents at the time cut the locks to the building to save what they could. Later the owners donated the remainder of this collection to Queensland Museum which started the new museum I visited.

A charity raising event for the Royal Flying Doctor Service saw an original Cobb & Co. coach pulled by houses from Port Douglas to Melbourne in 1966. This was the longest coach journey in the world and took a staggering 3 months to complete!

The coach taken from Port Douglas to Melbourne

It wasn't just the coaches at the museum, there were a number of other displays. There was a 'The Beatles' collection on exhibit which I found spectacular. Another major exhibit contained inspirational sports people from the local Darling Downs area. Another interesting part was watching and talking to the in-house carpenters restoring a Cobb & Co. carriage.

I explored Toowoomba a little and took photos of some of the old buildings in town. Below are some of my favourites.

In the afternoon I made the short drive to Dalby. Once I got into Dalby I started seeing B-triples, I had only been seeing B-doubles earlier (for those who don't know, I'm talking about long trucks or Road Trains).

Day 16 - Tuesday August 5th

Before setting off from Dalby, I visited the Pioneer Park Museum. This place is huge! It's run by the local community and has plenty more land to expand on. There were sheds filled with tractors, glass bottles, rocks, indigenous artefacts and medical equipment just to name a few. The place had first opened in the 1980's and appears to have expanded many times since. Some of the old steam and diesel equipment had been restored at one point, but left to weather again over the years. They are currently saving to build a new shed.

Their highlights included a supervisor station from the old Dalby telephone exchange which was decommissioned on June 10th 1986, two flying saucers built with chainsaw motors and tested by NASA (it hovered at 15 feet) and a resident owl who stays around in the rafters over winter.

Flying Saucer

Supervisors desk from the Dalby telephone exchange, the whole exchange was many times bigger

A rusting local with no where to go

I headed off and had lunch in Miles. Continuing on I spent the night in Roma.

In Roma I watched their Big Rig night show which explains the history of the town. The show has two screens, a commentary / story, light effects and fire.

Roma is a gas mining town, however the gas was originally discovered by accident. On the search for bore water they struck gas. After many more bores and a series of mishaps, it wasn't until much later that a pipeline was constructed to Brisbane. The expense of the pipeline had to be justified with commercial interest and a fertiliser plant in Brisbane was the answer. Brisbane's natural gas is still supplied through the Roma-Brisbane pipeline today.

Big Rig nigh show

Day 17 - Wednesday August 6th

After packing up this morning I spent some more time in Roma exploring the Big Rig attraction. It contains explanations of how gas is created and trapped underground over thousands of years as well as some of the original equipment used in Roma.

This rig made many bores in Roma

Roma has a distinctive bottle tree planted around town. This is native to the area. It's also worth noting that from Roma onwards I have started to see lots of larger birds, presumably some type of Eagle, circling the skies.

A Roma bottle tree

I drove on to Charleville and booked in at the Cosmos Centre for their night time astronomy session. I was really interested in this because I don't get to see much of the night sky living close to Melbourne. I have been enjoying seeing the stars again while camping out.

Before dark I cooked dinner and spoke to a few groups of people around the BBQ. Like most others they were curious about my Yaris and swag.

The evening astronomy session was fascinating, they showed us Saturn, Mars, the Moon, as well as close up on some stars. Having never looked through such a powerful telescope (40,000x) I had never seen Saturn's rings anywhere other than a photo. Mars was pretty boring due to dust storms, but the Moon was amazing. I could see some craters and shadows in fine detail. At the end of the session they handed us information sheets and said something to the effect of 'we had all been so attentive and likely promptly forgotten everything we were just told'.

Day 11 to Day 13

Day 11 - Thursday July 31st - Coolangatta

Time for a shave, it's been 10 days and getting too long! Some of my mates had been wanted me to grow it all trip, I guess I'm just not a beard person.

Just got up, how did this beard get on my face?

Clean shaven at the beach

I spent part of my morning enjoying the view of Kirra Beach from a local cafe.

I then travelled down the coast toward the NSW / QLD state border. It's here at the border that the Captain Cook Memorial and Lighthouse has been built. The monument has been built 50/50 over the border line. In the centre is a map showing the path of the Endeavour took. The map is also significant because it has been made from Endeavour's iron ballast which was thrown overboard when she ran aground on a reef in June 1770. See the national archive for more details of the recovery. The view over the ocean from the monument was also terrific!

Captain Cook Monument and Lighthouse

Showing the state borders and cast iron map

View from the monument

In the afternoon I caught up with Megan and Ric (friends from Ringwood VIC), their 2 year old son Stephen and Ric's parents. It was so fantastic to see some friends all this distance from home! I should have taken a group photo. Never mind, the memories are enough. We sat on the beach and talked while Stephen was entertained by the abundance of sand!

Stephen running from Ric

For a change I went out for dinner, eating at the Tweed Heads Bowls Club. I had roast pork, something which I can't cook for one in a camp kitchen! The Bowls Club is appropriately nicknamed the blue room.

Tweed Heads Bowls Club at night

Day 12 - Friday August 1st - Dreamworld

It was time for a theme park and what an excellent day for it, the sun was shining. I went on most of the big rides. The Giant Drop was one of my favourites. It takes you 120 meters up where the view over the park is fantastic, waits for a random amount of time, then drops. I enjoyed it because of the feeling of weightlessness. I lifted out of my seat was was being held in by the harness. I also liked The Claw because it felt like being a kid again on a swing, only much larger.

I also went on BuzzSaw, Tower of Terror 2, Shockwave, Pandamonium, Cyclone & Rocky Hollow Log Ride. Overall I found the rides easy and enjoyable, I was laughing rather than screaming like some of the people next to me!

This is me in the Wiggles world at Dreamworld

For the night I settled into a hotel in Surfers Paradise. I browsed the night markets down by the beach and had dinner at Hurricane's. After dinner I went into a bar and danced to a set by a cover band.

View from my hotel room - 33 floors up. Q1 is the tall building to the right, Soul is the tall building to the left

Day 13 - Saturday August 2nd

Being another lovely warm day I headed down to the beach for a swim. The water was cold, but I did it anyway. I also swam in the hotel pool which was heated.

For lunch I caught up with my friends Courtney and Corey as well as one of Corey's friends. We went to Zanzibar in Kingscliff where the barramundi fish burgers were excellent! After lunch we spent more time catching up at Corey's parent's place.

Getting short of daylight, I headed back to Coolangatta. I cooked dinner and watched a movie before going to bed.