Days 28 - 31

Thursday - Lawn Hill National Park

 

We had heard lots about Adels Grove as a place to stay in the past so we were looking forward to having a look around the place today. Adels Grove was once an experimental botanical garden built by Albert De Lestang (where the name Adel comes from) in 1920 and had over 1000 different types of plants from around the world. He supplied seeds and information to collectors and museums around the world during his time there. In the early 1950's a fire spread through the area which destroyed most of his plants and records. That combined with other problems from then on destroyed his spirit and he soon moved into a nursing home in Charters Towers where he died in 1959. There are still a few of the plants he planted around the area and the grove camping area is a natural environment to camp in with no designated areas which gives it a much nicer feel, along with lots of shade (no good if you use solar panels though).

 

 

Unfortunately we only had the one day here as we were needing to be elsewhere later in the week so the first thing we did was to head to the main desk to get our bearings on things. We were advised of a short walk to a lookout on a hill nearby which sounded good but we managed to take the wrong turn and headed down what's known as the nature trail. This walk follows the creek as it meanders through the paperbarks and pandanus trees but what is obvious at the moment is the amount of debri that is there following some big floods that had happened previously. I had taken a few photos but it's hard to portray the size of some of the trees that had been taken down by the water. After a while we returned to the campsite area and followed the creek back to where we were camped. There is pretty much no debri along this section and there are numerous spots where you can jump in and swim. Someone told us that the water there is 24c and we knew we would be jumping in there at some stage of the day.

 

Some of the debri from previous floods

 

Now back at our campsite it was time for the obligatory morning tea which seemed to last a lot longer today. I guess that was because we were really enjoying just sitting there under the shady trees with very little noise and just chatting. When we finally looked at the clock it was nearly midday and it was time to go and check out Lawn Hill Gorge.

Brett had previously been here 24 years ago and back then the campsite that was in the national park was lush green lawn under the shady trees. That was not the case now as the campsite was now set out in individual sites on the stony / dirt ground and we found out later that the lawn had to be removed as the water that was required to keep it green was too much for the native trees and they were dying. We were also told that the showers there are not hot and camp fires are not allowed. We can see now why Adels Grove is so popular.

Nearby to the ranger station is the canoe hire which we wanted to do but unfortunately they had no 3 person canoes available. Well, there were 2 there but one had a big split down the bottom and the other had a small hole. All the rest were already out, so after Chantelle had some fun playing with the archer fish near the canoes we started off on a walk that would take us to Indarri Falls. Where the walkway runs along the river edge there are steps that go down to the water where you can sit and watch the fish come up waiting to see if anyone will throw them some food (not that your supposed to do this). Chantelle tried to fool them a couple of times with some little sticks but they soon figured her out. Brett also said that many years ago there used to be huge catfish which would come up wanting food, some whose mouths were as wide as a hand but apparently they got washed downstream in a big flood a couple of years earlier.

 

Archer fish waiting for easy feed

 

 

On with the walk and we were soon going over a rise which once at the top you looked down onto Indarri Falls. What an oasis. Fiona described it as something like where cleopatra lived on the Nile. These small falls act as a baricade between the 2 large bodies of water that you can canoe on. For the people in the canoes there is a ramp that you can use to slide a canoe up to the next level, but for us it was a case of walking down and jumping in. As is the case downstream, the archer fish were hanging around and one guy who was pretending to feed them even had them spit water at his hand. These fish do that naturally to try to knock insects off branches into the water. It's amazing how accurate they are and the 3 or 4 times the fish squirted the water they hit his fingers on every occasion which were about 50cm above the water.

 

 

After the swim it was time to wander back and have a drink at Adels Grove. Behind the reception desk is an open deck with lots of table and chairs over looking part of the creek. It's here that Fiona decided to book us in on a sunset hill tour which included wine and nibbles. There wasn't much time before we left on that so Brett and Chantelle went down to the creek for a quick dip then a quick change into some warmer clothes.

 

 

The sunset tour involved jumping on a small mini bus driven by Mick, who took us a short distance from Adels to a small rise which was deceiving in that it gave fantastic views west to the Constance Ranges and to the east the Century mine could be seen. On the way Mick gave us a detailed history of the Lawn Hill station including the story about the weathly Brazilian Sebastiao Maia who lobbed into Sydney in 1975, jumped into a cab and got the driver to drive him around the country looking for cattle properties he could buy (as he couldn't speak much english). He ended up buying Lawn Hill but years later gave part of it to the government (to make the national park) when they found out he hadn't been paying taxes. I think the funniest part is actually finding a cabbie who could speak english and find their way out of Sydney (but it was 1975).

 

 

Anyway, the sunset was wonderful and the fact he had 4 different bottles of wine for us to consume with the nibbles was also a bonus. More stories on the trip back and we had just enough light to make our way back to our campsite.

Once again it was a beautiful stary night without any wind and we were already planning the things we would be doing on our next visit here in hopefully the not too distant future.

 

 

Friday to Sunday - Lawn Hill to Mackay

 

These 3 days were pretty much a transit period as we were now heading to Mackay so that Fiona could be there for when her sister had her baby.

The drive out from Lawn Hill was good dirt for approx 75km except when you get stuck behind a road train. Ah well, who's in a hurry anyway.

Drove past Gregory downs roadhouse and onto the Burke and Wills roadhouse for lunch where there were quite a few road trains pulled up and most of them were the cattle trucks due to it being mustering season up this way. Shortly after leaving here we came across some mustering near the road. Apart from all the cattle there were guys on horseback, bikes, quads and 2 helicopters flying low over the trees. I wanted to get some photos but as some of the cows they were chasing were near the road I thought it best I keep moving and not get in their way.

That evening we camped in the one and only caravan park in Julia Creek and boy was it cold (compared to what we had up north anyway) as the wind was howling through the place.

From Julia Creek we planned to travel to Charters Towers that day and along the way we made quick stops at Richmond and Hughenden (lunch). Both these towns are part of what's known as Australia's dinosaur trail. Along with other towns such as Winton they all claim fossils are found in their area and generally have exhibits and other attractions for the visitor. We didn't really have time to explorer these things apart from a few hapy snaps and so we pushed on towards Charters Towers.

 

Outside visitor information centre at Richmond

Hughenden

 

On arrival at the van park we were advised that it was pizza night along with entertainment (bush poet) which was fine for us as we were going to eat out anyway. Our campsite was positioned in such a way that we over looked all the activity so didn't have to go far at all. It was good seeing all the people getting together to swap yarns and tell a few tall tales before they wandered back to their vans about 8.30pm.

 

Saturday night at Charters Towers Big4

 

The next day was an un eventful trip across to the Bruce highway and down to Mackay where we settled in to the caravan park for 3 nights. It was this day that I started to take more notice of my speed as we were back into speed camera territory and police who probably are not as forgiving as the policeman who just flashed his lights at me in Jabiru for doing 70 in a 50 zone.

 

 

 

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