Camooweal to Alice Springs

Camooweal was a treasure. Not sure why we haven't done very much bush camping until now, guess the opportunity didn't arise while we were on the coast. Barkly Homestead is an oasis in the middle of nowhere. Well shaded sites, a tavern, roadhouse and fuel are all available here. One night and off again. Interesting to see that the park here fills up by late afternoon and the next morning, everyone is on their way. Generator runs 24 hours here and there are signs near the fuel bowsers explaining why the fuel price is so high. The remoteness, the generators running and the provision of the convenience of a place like this out here is fair enough. we had planned not to get fuel here because we heard it was around $2.20/ltr. The Barkly highway is a good road here. It ends at a roadhouse come caravan park come truck stop at Three Ways. North, South or East are your choices. We chose to turn South to Tennant creek. Fuel was a great deal cheaper there at about 1.70/ltr. Our introduction to NT here with a bit of a shock at the number of "locals" sitting under trees, in the street and a town struggling with its culture. Something new for us with windows on businesses barred up and a look of fortress like. Lunch here at the Gold Battery and on to Devils Marbles or Wauchope hotel, not sure. free camp at devils Marbles looks quite good and level sites so this is it for today. An Australian Army recovery vehicle has pulled in opposite us with a couple in a camper trailer. Fire places are with nearly every site and the couple next door have a large pot on the fire cooking Silverside. We have our tea and settle in for the night. No internet or telephone or tv here.We are woken through the night by a dog howling and being answered by others around the area. I blame the disturbance on the samoyed across the way but no, they are dingoes.The dingoes are still around in the morning seeming like they have nowhere else to go. Unlike us, as we pack up and move on. Harry and Wendy with the silverside are heading to Gemtree caravan park, where flocks of wild budgies and a large array of other birds can be seen. It's 70 klms off the road and sounds good to us. A bonus with Gemtree is the fossicking for garnets and Zircons that are found in the area. We sign up for the tag-along tour which includes the hire of pick,shovel,sieves water buckets and 20ltrs of water to wash the stones. We follow the leader and two other vehicles out the 25klms of sealed road before swinging off the road and into their mining lease for about 2klms to the fossicking ground. Garnets are everywhere.No need to dig even, you can see them on the ground. AMAZING. We collect what we consider to be quite a few, have our lunch and collect some more before driving back to have them sorted, graded and appraised. We are quite happy with our lot and the deep red colour is magnificent.Flocks of budgies are here allright, we also see a pair of wedge tailed eagles on our way out and while we were having lunch, a flock of black cockatoos flew by. We went out to the zircon field the day before and just drove around the open pit area where there are plenty of No Entry signs. There is an old gold area further south along this road at Claraville but its a further 70klms and I have had enough corrugations and red dust for today.

Our friends Trish and Rob were going on the zircon tag-along but we had already extended our stay and it was time to move along to Alice Springs. Isn't it strange, we had never predicted that we would be going into Alice Springs from the North. Tourist information centre in town car park is on the banks of the Todd river where a couple of locals were sitting doing dot paintings and beckoned us over. We encouraged them to keep up the good work and moved on after a toilet break. We met a buddhist nun who was taller than Marg and exploring Australia as well. She is American and teaching buddhism here. On to Macdonnel ranges caravan park, a big 4 park and we have booked in for three nights.Notices say that didgeridoo lessons will be on at 5.00 so we go along to hear. Wow, a whitey playing the didge and a variety of them as well, brilliant. Next morning, Saturday after a Collingwood win, we head for the camp kitchen with our plates, knives and forks and coffee mugs for the free pancake brekky.Wow what a feed. Todd Mall market is on this morning so its off to that now. Just start into the market and run into an old friend from Shepparton,Robin Wallace, looking at lovely postcards. Wallaces have been here for 19 years and love it and have asked us around for drinks that night. Wallaces explain to us about the environment in Alice and some of the other great attractions of the area. transport hall of fame and desert Park just two of them that we plan to see.    

Camooweal

A nice place. one out of the blue, so to speak. Thoroughly enjoyed our time there and we'll be back. The sad thing is that Liz, from Drovers Camp, is giving it away at the end of this year. I have noticed on Grey Nomads site that they are looking for volunteers to take up the reigns, so to speak. A great story there and a load of memorabilia including current portraits of some of the REAL drovers who still took cattle down...Out of there this morning and on our way to Barkly Homestead. An oasis in the middle of the desert. Full telstra coverage and the sound of the generator can be heard humming in the background. Fuel here is 1.99 per litre and they justify that by saying the generator runs 24 hours a day and uses 500 ltrs per day.Welcome to the Northern Territory, Bruce and Marg......

mount isa to Camooweal

Left Mount Isa yesterday and moved the 188 klms to Camooweal. Wow and WOW again, what a place. As you can imagine, there is not a lot here either, but I think that that is what makes some places special.One pub, two roadhouses (fuel) a general store, town hall and a population of 310. But there is also an awesome tourist attraction called the Drovers Camp. You need to get here sometime and see that. Camping by the Georgina river is free but there are also 2 caravan parks in town as well.The free camp has two different sections to it, both glorious. The first, closer to town is obviously shallow. and contains no fish to speak of. The second, we are told, has both perch (yellowbelly) and red claw (yabbie) and sometimes you may even see a jabiru there. Resident pelicans control the second section as well. Cattle roam freely here, there is a sign as you leave town saying road unfenced next 190 klms.

mount Isa

Interesting place the Isa, a very strong Irish influence with the Irish club as part of the dining/entertainment scene. Meals are good and reasonably priced there. The larger "award winning" Buffs club is fairly well supported by the rest of the locals again with fairly priced meals and also of a good standard. Our caravan park is 2.5 klms out of the town centre and we are on the direct flight path for Virgin, rex and Qantas flights leaving here for goodness knows where. We are doing an above ground mine tour tomorrow and also plan to see the underground hospital built by the Americans after Darwin was bombed during WW2. Caught up with some people I went to High school with yesterday. The next caravan had Murray and Judy Webb in it, right on the next site mind you. That makes about three couples from the Korumburra area that we have met so far. I suppose that will not be the end.

So to Mount Isa

Cloncurry was an interesting place but we have klms to get over. The road was again different. probably better than we have had so far in that it was at least smoothe, not the culverts we had before Richmond and now we have hills. Yes, hills , big red ones and plenty of them. Nice trip. If you haven't been to Mount Isa before, those memorable images of the red and white stack in the background of photos of this town, seems to dominate the area and definitely does that. Although a second stack is now in the scenery, the red and white one is still dominant. Multi-cultural? yes, the cultures here seem to be across the spectrum and learning a little of the history with Afghans and camel trains, the local Kalkadoon people, the first inhabitants of this area, the Scots, the Irish and the finns and Hungarian miners that came to find their fortunes from the spinifex covered hills. the Americans who built the roads through the years of WW2 all have a part in the history of the area. We now have a well established commercial centre of town. an introduction of the place may be found at the local Tourist Information centre or Outback at Isa. Local tours can be all booked from here. The centre is close to the Hard Times Mine where tours are conducted on a regular basis. We stayed at the Sunset Top Tourist park which is a couple of klms from the town centre and seems to be quite busy. We last saw Park Full signs out at parks at Yeppoon and haven't seen them til now, a fair indication of the travelling public at the moment.

Every Picture Tells a Story

Richmond to Cloncurry

Julia creek was to be our destination today. We had heard a couple of differing reports on the park there and without even seeing it, had a bite to eat in the town and seeing that Cloncurry was only another 140klms down the track, we pressed on. A larger town than both Richmond and Julia Creek,

Cloncurry has the largest saleyards in Northern Queensland. the variety of cattle around here is a lot different from what we are used to. Brahman being the dominant breed but also Brangus and Braford, so you have the Angus cross and the Hereford cross. All heavy cattle that climatise well to this area. We have seen brolgas frequently as well, Australias closest bird to Storks, they dance and perform for each other in beautiful dance. well beautiful if you are another brolga, no doubt. The black kites are another dominant bird we have noticed. Their prey seems to be carrion, so road kill is high on their menu. Today we had another pleasant surprise. we could see from quite a distance a larger bird than we had seen for a while. as the car/caravan team got closer, it was obviously a large wedge Tailed Eagle. Always great to see these normally shy giants, close. We are well and truly in Channel country, part of the large sub-artesian water basin where this great inland sea used to be. The road is frequently crossed by small creeks sometimes several times by the same creek as its waters make their way to "the Gulf."