Its Over

"If time were not a moving thing and I could make it stay..." however the trip is essentially over but for the long run back to Brisbane.  On the way I stopped in Charters Towers at Barrs Tyres, the same shop that looked after me so well a year ago when I needed 2 new front tyres:  I arrived at 8am and drove away at 8:22am, with two new rear tyres!  I then did the walking tour of Charters Towers checking out its interesting history and heritage buildings before doing the tour of the Venus Battery, where they discussed crushing the gold ore plus the various methods for processing and extracting the gold.  The Charters Towers gold mines were unique in Australia as there were no placer deposits to indicate gold in the area, it was all hard rock deposits.  As it turned out, it was one of the richest mines in Australia if not the world.

Continuing south I stopped at a free camp for the night - and got bogged.  The ground was wetter than I thought and when turning around the next morning, the wheels spun ever so slightly but enough to dig into the jelly-like mud (those new tyres  sure had good tread!), so simple but soo-o stuck!  A couple from Victoria who were well set up for off road travelling/camping kindly unhitched their trailer and pulled me out; Thank you Thank you Thank you!  An entertaining mornings happenings for other campers, a certain relief for me when I was on the bitumen again!

From there to Emerald, with a significantly noticeable increase in traffic, especially on the road between Emerald and Townsville - Bye Bye Outback.  The night was spent with numerous other campers at the botanical gardens on the edge of town; through the night trucks would pass along the nearby highway, slowing by using their compression brakes, the loud staccato noise waking up all within hearing.  I think it was their revenge on the slower moving  campers and caravans they regularly get stuck behind on the road!  Before leaving I went to the nearby car wash and removed a significant quantity of red dust from my van, returning to civilisation clean and tidy as would be expected.  Two days later I arrived in Brisbane, pizza for tea and a real bed to sleep in.  In the 93 days travelling I covered 13,974 km, took some 3,600 photos and had the experience of a life time!

Thus, a close is brought to this part of my travels as I will be in Brisbane 6-8 weeks before setting off again.

Atherton Tablelands & Undara Lava Tubes

Only a few days were spent on the tablelands as the weather was not good.  Pity, there is a lot more I'd liked to have seen.  It was certainly different from most of the country I've been travelling through, hilly, green, very beautiful when the fog lifted.  Teaming up with another Grey Nomad (the first I've met through the Grey Nomads website), we visited Mareeba, stopping first at Coffee World, promising an indulgence of coffee and chocolate - like I could drive past that!  It was all it promised, endless coffee of an amazing varieties, ditto chocolate and also a coffee museum with a total array of artifacts past & present associated with coffee, it's preparation and drinking.  An amazing place-so absorbing I forgot to get any photos!  We then went to the rodeo grounds to look up another GN, to no avail as it turned out, BUT while looking I spotted a "Haircuts" sign in a caravan and got my first haircut in nearly three months!  In Katherine I could have made an appointment for a weeks hence, in Normanton I was told there are no barbers in the small towns, I'd just have to look bushy, which I did.  A good find.  Then deciding to return to Rocky Creek Campground, we passed an intriguing looking cemetery so stopped to have a look.  There were some remarkable raised graves and also some mausoleums, all very ornate - an interesting place to look around.  So, a great day and good to have some company - unfortunately no photos.

The next day I headed south through fog & winding roads off the tablelands, stopping briefly at a gas vent from an ancient volcano.  The hot gases formed underground blew up through the surface, creating a narrow vent going down 50m to the water's surface, to depths under water which haven't been determined (they got as far as 800m apparently but didn't reach the bottom).  I then continued to the  Undara Lava Tubes, where I spent two nights.  They were very interesting, a guided tour takes you into them, the guide giving a full explanation of the history, including the surrounding area.  The Undara National Park contains many old volcanoes which have spread lava over a vast area in the past.  The lava tubes are created when a lava flow cools on the outside but keeps flowing inside eventually emptying out, leaving the tube.  Nearby is 100 Mile Swamp, so named as it is 100 miles from the coast (this is QLD, remember). The swamp is about 8 km long and narrow, formed at the end of a lava flow which formed a dam.  A walking track along the edge is interesting, you are walking on granite ground but across the water you can see the edge of the old lava flow.  Quite a bit of wildlife can be observed on the walk, from a 15mm frog, many birds, 'roo and one - luckily not wild - huge cow sitting not far off the path contentedly chewing her cud. 

From here, the plan is continuing south through Charters Towers and on to Brisbane.

Gulf Country

I couldn't leave the NT cold, so spent six days at Elsey National Park as I really like it.  It was (and, I'm sure. always will be) wonderful.  The time went too quickly and soon I was on the road, to a nite at a rest area, then to Camooweal Billabong rest area just inside the QLD border for a couple of nights.  What a hidden treasure that place is!  It is a mini-wetland, brolgas, ducks, egrets and a flock of at least 1,000 noisy corellas.  Of an evening horses & cows come down for a drink to add to the overall ambience - a great spot!

Then off to Normanton for two nights, staying at a caravan park with showers, washing machines and such civilised luxuries, AND ALSO a very nice swimming pool & spa for that extra little bit of pampering!  A visit to the Railway Museum unfortunately didn't result in sighting The Gulflander, which was on a journey somewhere, nor did I sight it on my return a few days later - rather a disappointment.  But the town is very pleasant and friendly.  At one time it was quite a hub of industry, being a main port on the Gulf (the Norman River is navigable to Normanton) and hosting what was once the largest Burns & Philp emporium in Australia, trading with PNG & other islands to the north!  Gold from Croyden was freighted to Normanton by rail, fishing was a major industry and the Savannah Country is very good grazing land so cattle are a big industry to this day.  There is also a model of an 8+m croc on display, shot in 1957 by a lass!  "Oh, there are bigger crocs than that around" said the chap at the Visitor Information Centre! 

From there I spent a couple of days at Karumba, right on the Gulf, where the tourists outnumber the locals by about ten to one, I reckon!  Karumba is a pleasant little town and has an excellent coffee shop (its actually a bakery that serves coffee but the coffee is great!).  The caravan park was very full, many whom appear to be ensconced for the duration!  I saw freezers in the not-so-temporary annexes, pot plants & herb boxes tended in the 'garden' and plenty of boats parked on their patch.  You don't need an alarm, at 6am you can hear the vehicles start up to head for the boat ramps.  I also saw plenty of fish being cleaned, rather enviously.  Sadly, I also discovered from the poster of 'Fishes of the Area' that my barramundi was actually a bream of some sort:  I wanted it to be a barramundi and for a while it was. 

Between Normanton and Karumba is a coastal plain which looks like great cattle grazing country; the cattle were certainly numerous and healthy!  From Normanton south is savannah with grass and open scrubby trees.  Thus the name of the road through it - The Savannah Way, which runs from Cairns in QLD to Broome in WA. 

Once again the time to leave came too quickly so I am now heading for the Atherton Tablelands.

Link to Tassie Scenes web album

I have added a link to my Tassie Scenes web album for those interested.  The link is at the right near the top and titled "Link to Tassie Scenes web album".

Kakadu

Kakadu is unique on this planet.  It contains the oldest known continuous residence of man, as Aborigines have been living continuously for an estimated 60,000 years:  One rock shelter has been inhabited regularly for 20,000 years, based on an archeological study by Rhys Jones and local Aborigines.   Rock art exists here going back an estimated 20,000 years.  

Kakadu has some of the oldest exposed rocks in the world.  A massive escarpment - it formed the cliffs of the shoreline of an ancient sea - rises up to a high plateau.  Lowland between it and the current coast is a vast wetlands, mainly freshwater due to a three metre sand dune along the coast.  The wetlands is vital for many migratory birds that use the area as well as other water creatures, frogs, turtles, fishes, crocs.  In the wet season most of it is flooded; in the dry season some areas remain wet while others turn to dry land.

The South Alligator River is the only river in the world that has its total catchment within a National Park.  It was mis-named by early explorers who thought the crocodiles were alligators.  Two types of crocs inhabit the area, freshwater (freshies) and estuarine crocs (salties), the latter of which are to be avoided ("clowns" excepted).  They inhabit all waters going into the Timor Sea or Gulf of Carpentaria.  While hunted to near extinction, being protected since the 60's has seen their numbers increase (as has the number of tourists in that period - coincidence?). 

I was up on a bank on the Mary River - outside the park, but where I first camped along the way to Kakadu - enviously watching a fellow barramundi fishing from the shore, when the tour boat came along, told him it'd be a good idea to vacate the shoreline as the main saltie - a 5m male - was working his way upstream from not far away, patrolling his territory!  The Mary River is known for its number and size of salties.  I was informed it is not a good idea to be within 3 m of the waters edge at any time.

Moving on into the Park and a caravan park on the East Alligator River I visited the nearby Mamakula Wetlands, which included a Ranger Guided Tour explaining the ecology of the dry lands and also explaining the nearby billabong birdlife (in this area a billabong is more a lake or any large body of water, whereas in other areas it is a part of a river which has been cut off but still contains water). 

Travelling on to Jabiru, I visited Ubirr, which has excellent rock art and also an excellent outlook from the top of the escarpment.  A visit to the nearby Bowali Visitor Centre was very informative, giving both natural and cultural historical background of the area.  A flight over the NE part of the Park and a portion of Arnhem Land was fascinating - it is a rugged country indeed!

On the way to my next camp a visit to Nourlangie revealed some fascinating rock art!  Some of the later works are incredibly detailed and referred to as x-ray paintings as they show the internal structure of fish & animals.  As I headed up one track, a rare black wallaroo hopped along toward me, stopped to check me out (long enough to snap a couple of photos), decided I wasn't threatening and continued along his way past me!  The Gubara Pools walk is a 3 km walk under the escarpment into 2 pools, in themselves not exciting but important as permanent water is scarce; it was also a 3km return along the same track.  The night was spent at a nearby caravan park - the most expensive I've run across for an unpowered site so far -  and the next day I took the Yellow Water boat trip, an excellent cruise with plenty of birds and scenery as well as plenty of crocs - all salties - basking in the morning sun! 

That was my last day in the Park, as I then travelled to a free camp outside.  Looking at tourist literature, the steam train used for the movie "We of the Never Never", was on display at Pine Creek, just a short way off my planned route.  Now Bob is a real gentleman and a steam train officianado so it was a pleasure to nick in and get some photos for him!  The town looked interesting as well, but at 7am wasn't really humming so I continued on to Elsey National Park for six nights because it is so pleasant there.  Not wishing to tempt fate fishing off the river banks further north,, I tried again at the Roper River here, where salties are controlled (Ie, this stretch of river is heavily patrolled & trapped and any salties are soon moved on), I tried my luck once again and voila!  Caught one!  It was undersized but it was a barramundi!  I had previously decided any I caught would be photographed and released so at least in this regard I was not tempted to change my mind (the primitive, irrational nature of man is to bring it back to camp despite best intentions).  Tomorrow - 5th July - I will leave, heading south to the Barkley Hwy (Route 66!), east to Mt. Isa and Cloncurry, north along the Matilda Way to Karumba and then east along the Savanna Way to the Atherton Tablelands; the route from there to Brisbane is yet to be determined but will be inland as there are too many grey nomads lining up for a camping spot along the coast! 

This concludes the travels I had planned for the Northern Territory (some 8,400 km), which travels can only be described as, well, it is hard to find adequate words to describe them - I was completely overwhelmed at the natural beauty of The Territory.  While being limited to 2WD, the best areas proved  accessible.  Full marks to the NT Parks & Wildlife people, who provide excellent camping areas at very reasonable cost, great walking tracks to really get into/around the features, plus excellent Ranger tours & talks.  The Territory is a big open land with - I seem to recall  - lots of flat, featureless land between attractions;  the attractions I recall vividly.