West of Cairns is the Atherton Tableland, an agricultural region surrounded by small mountains and a national park (NP) providing camping around the lake Tinaroo. A good spot from where to explore the region which offers several waterfalls, a couple of crater lakes and a range of tasting opportunity: cheese, coffee/tea, strawberries, wine (the fruit kind, fake wine if you ask me, don’t like it very much)… We’ve enjoyed some delicious cheese and yoghurt at the Mungalli Creek and the Gallo dairy farms; had a couple of hours visiting Coffee Works, a museum dedicated to the history of coffee and tea around the world and offering tasting of many different coffees, teas and chocolate. Yummy. And some crocodile jerky and chorizo and smoked barramundi at the Tarzali lake barramundi fish farm. This place also has the largest colony of Platypus and we spent a good hour by the lake looking at them swimming by. We got pretty good footage of it too, see below.
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| Ellinja Falls |
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| Isn't that the cutest pigeon ! |
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| Milla Milla Falls |
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| Old expresso machines at Coffee Works |
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| Curtain Fig Tree |
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| largest flock of Cockatoos ever! |
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| Millstream Fall - Widest in Australia |
Atherton town used to have a Chinatown on its outskirts in the 1890’s, the chinese having come over for the gold rush and although all the dwellings are now gone, their temple still stands, made out of timber and corrugated iron, with a big altar inside. Very interesting visit apart from the guide who talked our ears off for about 1h30!!!
Heberton is a historical village born from the passion of one collector who decided to reproduce a typical village from the 1890-1930 period. An impressive collection of paraphernalia that makes for a nice travel back in time, strolling the streets and visiting the buildings (school, butcher, printer, clothes shop, farming machine and material…).
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| A pint please! |
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| wouldn't I be a good teacher! |
After that we started our journey on the Savannah way, a road that cuts across the country from Cairns to Broome. The road is boarded by knee high pale yellow grass most of the way, with the occasional group of trees in places where a river ran during the wet season. Pretty long straight boring stretches of road with only cattle stations (and their cows wandering on the road and looking absolutely outraged by being disturbed by a passing car) for hundred of km’s on end.
Our first stop on the road: Undara NP, an ex cattle station now protected land with a tour that takes you in giant lava tubes created by the lava flow from the Undara volcano eruption around 190,000 years ago. The tubes have formed with the top layer of lava forming a basalt crust and the inside turning into a tunnel for more burning lava to run through. They are the longest lava flow in the world, one of the tubes is 100km long! Beautiful colors.
After a night in Undara park we made our way to Mount Surprise (is the surprise that there is no mount?) and stayed in a lovely and quaint family owned carvan park, where we enjoyed wood oven pizza and a sing along around the camp fire at night. We also visited Copperfield Gorge, next to the small outback town of Einsleigh (1 pub and a few houses). The gorge was awesome and a beautiful swimming spot, delightful in that dry season heat, made even better by being the only one there.
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| Aren't you jealous right now? |
The next stop was Croydon, a busy town during the gold rush between 1880 and 1920, where you can stroll through the historical district and enter original buildings such as the police station, the courtroom and the jail (with a talking prisoner in it! Well a recording and a manikin) and a couple of typical habitations. But the visit has to be started at the visitor center we had been told. There they show you a 15 min documentary about life back then with pictures and testimony from the descendants of the family living there back then. Fair enough it was fun and informative. We also had a chat with the lady there who told us how green and lush the region is during the wet season, so hard to imagine now, during the dry.
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| Croydon Pub |
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| The original store |
A short stop in Normanton to take a picture of the Big Croc, supposed to be a real size replica of a big salty (over 8 metres long) killed by a woman a few decades ago. Hum real length replica maybe but with a much-inflated girth judging by the picture of her sitting on her kill.
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| Road train coming... |
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| ...where is the road? |
We then spend a night at the free camp of Leichard falls on the way to Burketown. During the wet the whole place is a large river but now in the dry it offers a vast area of rock and very fine sand to camp on with a great view on the waterfall. Because of crocs the only swimming possible is a dip in one of the small rock pools, crocs don’t walk over rocks apparently. So just a quick clean in a mini rock pool this time, still welcome after a dusty day on the road. And a nice campfire in the evening to warm us up from the chilly wind blowing.
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| Our set up... |
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| ...our view |
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| Camp fire bliss! |
After these many overnight stops (packing and unpacking the trailer everyday, believe me you get sick of it), we wanted to spend a few days with full set up in a beautiful spot and we knew just the perfect spot for that: by the river at Gregory Downs. The place had been recommended by many people along the way as a must-do. Our expectations being very high we were at first a little disappointed, seeing a river with rocky banks packed with caravans, but with a little exploration further down the river we found the perfect spot, away from the crowd, 2metres away from the water and spent 6 days there.
The river is fast flowing and a lot of fun to drift, floating down its wandering path for good 300m and then walking back along the bank to do it all over again. This was our main activity during our stay there. Heaps of fun. We did it with mask and snorkel as well, pretty nice but watch out for the tree trunk hovering just above water level! We also tried with various improvised floating devices: an empty bucket with lid and a large wine cask, emptied of its liquid content of course and blown up to form a cushion. Fun but not very easy to steer your way to avoid hitting the fallen trees in the corners.
This is also the spot where we finally christened our camp oven (thanks Sam, great gift). It is a cast iron pot and lid serving as an oven when put on burning coals from the fire. A family we met there had a bit of experience in damper making and showed us the different steps of the process. It was a great success and delicious to eat with a soup or a stew. The first one we made with self raising flour, butter and milk and the second one (on our own this one) with flour and beer as well as garlic, parmesan and herbs. So yummy.
During our stay there we also did a trip to Lawn hill NP, 90km down the road. We hired a canoe and paddled for a couple of hours through the majestic gorge and had a swim in crystal clear water by a little waterfall; surprisingly warm (I’d say 24 degrees). We also saw a big fresh water croc, sunbathing on the bank (those are nice crocs, they only eat fish) but we must have got a little too close to his liking to take the pics as it actually hissed at us. Surprising sound coming from a croc.
But all good things must come to an end and it was time to hit the road again, this time making our way toward the Northern Territory. The dirt road from Gregory Downs to Camooweal was pretty bad with a lot of sharp rocks everywhere and just when we thought we had done well, 5 km out of Camooweal, there was a lound noise and the truck started to slide, Pete managed the stop pretty good but told me straight away” I think we broke something on the trailer”. Out we get to see the damage, well it was not the trailer but a car tyre. Flat tyre you are thinking? Well exploded tyre is more like it. And completely buggered rim as well. We’ve destroyed the whole wheel and had to leave it on the side of the road. Now changing a wheel you would think is easy but quite a process for us with the high-lift Jack tucked away under the well bound cover on the roof rack. And quite a work out for Pete to lift our fully loaded car under the heat of the midday sun. But 45 min later the spare wheel is on and we should be on our way soon. Well that was without counting the jack not wanting to lower back down. Damn we are now stuck with our car up in the air on a desert road where no car has passed us for the past 1h30! We were very grateful for our VHF radio and the 2 guys that answered our call and came and help us get out of trouble from Camooweal. Lucky we were that close from town. So after 1h30 since the tyre exploded we were finally on the road again, but not without a quick stop at the pub to buy our saviours a few beers, the main Australian currency.
Shortly after town we passed the border, we are now in the Northern Territory and half an our behind in time (well 5 years and half an hour according to Queenslanders). We spend that night at the Barkly homestead, a cattle station that also offers campsites and cabins for travellers. Good spot if it wasn’t for the loud generator running all night.
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| Sign at Camooweal petrol station |
Next post our northern territory adventures. So long for now.
