The alarm was set at 6.00am as “She” wanted to get up early and do the “hair wash” thing. “He” got to sleep in.
First job today was to take several photographs as it appeared there was a spot of dust on the digital camera sensor. This provided the perfect excuse to photograph the caravan park and a bikie couple pulling a small trailer which converted into a camper.
First stop after leaving the caravan park was the local Woolworths to stock up on some essentials before heading towards Mitchell and then Charleville. A message on “His” mobile phone forced a stop whilst a call was made back to Sydney.
Distance to be travelled was 273 kilometres so there was no need to set speed records. Several stops were made on the way firstly for morning tea and then lunch before we arrived in Charleville at 1.45pm.
Today we also noted a high number of road kill including kangaroos, foxes, pigs and some other unknown animals. There were sections of the road where there were six dead animals within 100 metres. On one occasion, we started to count and we worked out that if the volume continued, we would see about 32000 road kill before the trip finished. We hope this will not be the case. As was the case yesterday, we only managed to see one single “alive” kangaroo.
We did notice a sign just after Roma that indicated we had reached the Queensland Outback. We also saw a change in the soil colour with the rich red soil you experience in central Australia also evident in this area. The land is very dry.
After checking into the caravan park we made a quick visit to Charleville (had to photograph “The School of Arts Hotel” – looks like the original one featured by Slim Dusty) for a quick look around (not really much to see) and refuelling. None of the four service stations advertised prices and we paid $1.819 per litre. Fortunately the consumption had been reasonable and only $60 was spent.
When we arrived at the Bailey Bar Caravan Park we were told that an evening meal was being served for guests ($14 per head) and this was in conjunction with a talk by local police on outback travel. We elected to go. Bush poetry was being provided before the evening meal as well.
First job after setup was to sort out the digital camera. “He” took photographs of the sky with two different lenses after firstly cleaning the camera. The marks still remained. As a last resort, “He” wiped the screen on the laptop and this part of the blog story now finishes…………
We enjoyed bush poetry from 4.45pm to 5.30pm when the local police Sergeant, Steve Schaeffer-Steel (aka Stainless), presented a wonderful talk on all aspects of safe driving in the outback. Whilst the talk did carry a focus on caravans, the information provided was simply outstanding and reinforced some of the precautions we have adopted but it also made us aware of local conditions that you would not normally find out about. We are far more rich in knowledge after Stainless’s talk and can understand the danger of outback travel but more importantly, what you can do to manage the danger.
We were back in the van by 7.45pm, “She” did the dishes whilst “He” wrote this blog.
We will watch Sea Patrol at 8.30pm and then call it a night.
It is getting hot!