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.