Carnarvon Gorge to Sydney -The final entry for this trip.
Thursday 8 September to Tuesday 20 September
The sight seeing part of our trip is over and we are now heading back to Maroochydore for the repair of our van. As we drove south from Warremba Farmstay which is south of Carnarvon Gorge, the countryside was used more for crop growing than cattle and Carnarvon Gorge in the distance looked majestic.
Our first stop was Roma. Originally a mining town, it has a memorial of more than 90 bottle trees that line the street starting at the railway station and ending at the cenotaph. Each tree has a plaque for a soldier from Roma who was killed in WW1. We saw the Historic Lenroy Slab Hut. A tiny place that accommodated husband, wife and 9 children!!!
We had a look at the Court House and then headed off to Miles, Chinchilla Dalby and finally to Kumbia. The free rest stop had free electricity and available hot showers so we decided to eat out and support the little town. The food was great and with real country quantities so of course neither of us could finish our meals.
We spent some time in Kingaroy the next morning. The countryside grows most of Australia’s peanuts and beans for baked bean production and chic peas. Kingaroy has a huge peanut silo and processing plant. It is also Jo Bjelky-Peterson country. We were shown into the, as yet unopened, art gallery. Mike took a fancy to a water colour of a drover and cattle and an Aboriginal dot painting of a kookaburra, both of them are beautiful and painted by local artists and we made our first purchase of the trip. We made the compulsory stop at the Peanut Van to buy some of the local peanuts and then drove across the mountain back to Gympie on the coast and back down to Maroochydore on highway 1. We were definitely back in suburbia and our beautiful coast.
Cotton Tree Caravan Park at Maroochydore, situated on the beach where the Maroochy River runs into the ocean was our home for the 4 days before our van was sent to be repaired.
Phil, Helen, Steve and Leith, our Cape York Bushtracker friends were also there and we met up with a few other Bushtracker owners. We were all getting ready for the Bushtracker’s Rally at Copeton Dam near Inverell.
It took 3 days to repair our van but by Wednesday evening we had a new suspension and all the other bits and pieces had been fixed. The van was happy again and so were we.
We spent those few nights when we didn’t have our van in Seaford Oak Apartments in Alexander Head. I had walks along the beach, did the shopping, the washing, some reading whilst Mike supervised the work on the van. We enjoyed the local flea marked, watched the AFL and got to know Maroochydore really well. Another beautiful spot.
After having some repairs done on the Lexus in Brisbane we headed back over the mountain for Glenn Innes and were joined at the rest stop for the night by Steve and Leith who were also on their way to Inverell and Copeton Dam.
Copeton Dam is set in a beautiful State Park and there were about 40 Bushtracker caravans all gathered for a few days of fun and exchanging of ideas. Our first night, Friday night, was very cold with strong winds and rains and we all thought if the weather doesn’t improve we would all head home. Saturday morning arrived with beautiful blue sky and warm sunshine. We walked, enjoyed the kangaroos, many birds and cattle that wandered around the vans and of course the chats and meals around the camp fires.
There was a damper cook off which provided lovely hot damper and jam for us all to eat for afternoon tea and one evening we all enjoyed a spit roast, some country singers and a bush poet.
Tuesday morning we said our goodbyes, to old friends and new friends, after exchanging details to catch up in other places at other times and headed home.
We decided to travel home along a road as yet untravelled by us. The Thunderbolt Highway provided us with more beautiful scenery of undulating hills, lush pastures with cattle and sheep and a short stretch of VERY STEEP decline down the Great Divide to the coast to Newcastle and then the freeway to Sydney.
Our first trip was over. We saw fantastic places, met some wonderful people, made new friends and are already planning our next trip down south this time.
Thursday 8 September to Tuesday 20 September
The sight seeing part of our trip is over and we are now heading back to Maroochydore for the repair of our van. As we drove south from Warremba Farmstay which is south of Carnarvon Gorge, the countryside was used more for crop growing than cattle and Carnarvon Gorge in the distance looked majestic.
Our first stop was Roma. Originally a mining town, it has a memorial of more than 90 bottle trees that line the street starting at the railway station and ending at the cenotaph. Each tree has a plaque for a soldier from Roma who was killed in WW1. We saw the Historic Lenroy Slab Hut. A tiny place that accommodated husband, wife and 9 children!!!
We had a look at the Court House and then headed off to Miles, Chinchilla Dalby and finally to Kumbia. The free rest stop had free electricity and available hot showers so we decided to eat out and support the little town. The food was great and with real country quantities so of course neither of us could finish our meals.
We spent some time in Kingaroy the next morning. The countryside grows most of Australia’s peanuts and beans for baked bean production and chic peas. Kingaroy has a huge peanut silo and processing plant. It is also Jo Bjelky-Peterson country. We were shown into the, as yet unopened, art gallery. Mike took a fancy to a water colour of a drover and cattle and an Aboriginal dot painting of a kookaburra, both of them are beautiful and painted by local artists and we made our first purchase of the trip. We made the compulsory stop at the Peanut Van to buy some of the local peanuts and then drove across the mountain back to Gympie on the coast and back down to Maroochydore on highway 1. We were definitely back in suburbia and our beautiful coast.
Cotton Tree Caravan Park at Maroochydore, situated on the beach where the Maroochy River runs into the ocean was our home for the 4 days before our van was sent to be repaired.
Phil, Helen, Steve and Leith, our Cape York Bushtracker friends were also there and we met up with a few other Bushtracker owners. We were all getting ready for the Bushtracker’s Rally at Copeton Dam near Inverell.
It took 3 days to repair our van but by Wednesday evening we had a new suspension and all the other bits and pieces had been fixed. The van was happy again and so were we.
We spent those few nights when we didn’t have our van in Seaford Oak Apartments in Alexander Head. I had walks along the beach, did the shopping, the washing, some reading whilst Mike supervised the work on the van. We enjoyed the local flea marked, watched the AFL and got to know Maroochydore really well. Another beautiful spot.
After having some repairs done on the Lexus in Brisbane we headed back over the mountain for Glenn Innes and were joined at the rest stop for the night by Steve and Leith who were also on their way to Inverell and Copeton Dam.
Copeton Dam is set in a beautiful State Park and there were about 40 Bushtracker caravans all gathered for a few days of fun and exchanging of ideas. Our first night, Friday night, was very cold with strong winds and rains and we all thought if the weather doesn’t improve we would all head home. Saturday morning arrived with beautiful blue sky and warm sunshine. We walked, enjoyed the kangaroos, many birds and cattle that wandered around the vans and of course the chats and meals around the camp fires.
There was a damper cook off which provided lovely hot damper and jam for us all to eat for afternoon tea and one evening we all enjoyed a spit roast, some country singers and a bush poet.
Tuesday morning we said our goodbyes, to old friends and new friends, after exchanging details to catch up in other places at other times and headed home.
We decided to travel home along a road as yet untravelled by us. The Thunderbolt Highway provided us with more beautiful scenery of undulating hills, lush pastures with cattle and sheep and a short stretch of VERY STEEP decline down the Great Divide to the coast to Newcastle and then the freeway to Sydney.
Our first trip was over. We saw fantastic places, met some wonderful people, made new friends and are already planning our next trip down south this time.
