IDENTIFY THE ROAD KILL - A GAME FOR ALL THE FAMILY

Deny, Deny, Deny. Yep we are in total denial here on the Smith tour. We are very quickly running out of time and we are so sad about it. But to combat this feeling of denial we are finding every back road and dirt track we can to bring oursleves home. Doing a bit of a zig zag on the map you could say. Part of this is because the futher south we head, the colder it becomes. But I suppose all good things must come to an end.

Oh That's how you spell it

Two miners in an Opal mine

Divining for Opals - very clever

Bit of a fixer-upper-a William Creek

We've put in a few big days in the car since we left Uluru to get ourselves further down the road. First stop Coober Pedy. What a place that is... we loved it there. First thing I learnt about Coober Pedy was that it wasn't spelt 'Cooper' with a P for Papa. Nope it's 'Coober' with a B for bravo. Well there you go. Didn't have to pay any tour guide for that snippet of info did I? Suppose I should have paid more attention to the map, instead of standing in wonder underneath the big truck at the entrance to town with the words Coober Pedy in big lettering, and saying- 'oh I think they spelt it wrong'.  I would describe Coober Pedy as a combination of  scene from 'Mad Max' or the town of Radiator Springs ( from the Cars movie) 85% of the residents live underground in houses carved out of sandstone. It's like another world there. Everyone has Opal fever and everyone watches their back. (and we were also told that everyone carries a gun) Another interesting fact about the place was...it's up to it's fifth police station because each time they build a new one it gets blown up. Every second man has a beard and there are lots of shady looking characters around. But strangly enough it was one of our favourite towns that we've visisted and we felt safe. We took in a Opal mine tour conducted by this crazy young girl who seemed to have a faciniation with explosives. (yes I know I have previously mentioned that we were not going to go to anymore mining tours but we hadn't covered Opals yet)

After there we made a bee line for 'The Oodnadatta Track'

Oodnadatta, what a cool name for a place. Love it! We stopped in at the William Creek Hotel and found ourselves having a beer mid morning with some locals (there are only 12 people who reside in William Creek and most of them seemed to be in the pub) then headed to Lake Eyre.

This was a complete suprise to myself and passengers as I wasn't aware that we were going to be visiting Lake Eyre and we were all quite excited as the lake was full, which is something of a rare occurance - like once every 150years. Here's some interesting facts about Lake Eyre.....

It is actually the lowest point in Australia at -15.3m (or there about's) below sea level
The catchment area for the lake takes in about 1/8th of the total of Australia
Even though the lake is normally empty, no one knows how all the millions of birds that fly there when it's full, know when it's full.
The water is saltier than the sea
And there was a plague of native mice residing there when we camped there - Nice!

We were excited to be at Lake Eyre - even if it wasn't full

Sunset over Lake Eyre

Lake Eyre was a spectacular sight to see and really nice to camp beside. It reminded us very much of home as the air was very salty, there was sand dunes and lots of seagulls. (me thinks we are missing the beach lots). We were quite looking forward to seeing the lake and had been talking to some people at William Creek about it prior to us going there. Whilst we were having this conversation another fellow whom had chartered a flight from Broken Hill to take in the sights of said lake was going on about how disapointed he was about his sight seeing over Lake Eyre, because he had been told that the lake was full. But when he flew over he could see where some of the water had started to evaporate....I'm thinking that this man was your glass half full kind of fellow, considering that it was probably a once in a life time thing to see ANY WATER AT ALL in the lake.

We've since driven through some fantastic small towns whilst making our way south and like I mentioned we have covered some miles. We have also played all our music three times over and no matter how much I try to mix it up there is no escaping the classic hits of Psuedo Echo, The Cars and Van Morrison all in one stretch of road. Geoff especially loves it when I change the words around to the songs. We have created some great games to keep the occupants of the vehichle amused on such journeys. One of which is who can identify the road kill on the side of the road the quickest. Not such an easy task for the driver when he is negotiating road trains, corrugations, massive potholes filled with bulldust and me serenading him from the passenger seat. I have to say it's an easy point score when you drive past a camel laying on the side of the road.

Another good game is to get as many waves as you can from passing motorists. Now this game cam play tricks on your mind and you can suffer from quite a bit of regection when you are faced with a large amount of non wavers in a row. We have found that Far North QLD and the NT were the places that had the most enthusiastic of the wavers. In SA we had to work hard to encourage the wave from passing cars. And people from Victoria were the worst - they just don't wave no matter what state they are driving in. You have to keep an eye out for the late wave too, which can be easily mistaken for a non wave if you are not carefull (it also depends how fast each car is travelling at the time) The game can also be broken down into the type of wave you recieve. But i will leave the technical details of that part of the game for another time. As you can see it is quite an intense game and I will be making a submission to the Olympic committee for the London 2012 games.

We've probably done the last of our bush camping and driven on one our last dirt roads for this holiday which is very sad too. We happended upon a Cattle Station in the Flinders Ranges in SA that let us camp, a few nights ago. It was a massive 450km sq property and was so much fun and so very quiet.

We've landed in Broken Hill, caught up on a bit of 'admin' and having a look around. We are making preparations to head futher south. Tomorrow we are going to have a sit in on a class at the School of the Air. Which should be really intersting - can't wait.

Even though this holiday is fast coming to an end we are still having a ball. The kids are exhausted and are starting to talk about home alot. Perhaps an indication that they are ready to head home? I'm not sure.

So in one week we have vistited Australia's lowest point at Lake Eyre and at the end of the week we will be at Australia's highest point hopefully skiing in some freshly fallen POWDER!

I am not sure if this will be my last oportunity to chew your ear off with our tales, but I just wanted to say how much I have enjoyed sharing our holiday. And to just say that we are truly blessed to live in such a BIG BEAUTIFUL country. It has left us speechess on many occassions and provided us with lots and lots of memories.

Slide night our house upon our return, you are more than welcome.....I promise to cull the 5000 photos I have taken.

Mmmm an old railway sleeper from the Ghan rail track
would burn nicely

Nope too heavy for the trailer ....what to do?

I know...chop it to bits

Then stuff it in the roof bag - we were very warm that night

PALM VALLEY - KINGS CANYON - ULURU



PALM VALLEY – KINGS CANYON -  ULURU

Let me just clarify the RED STILLETTO situation I found myself witnessing whilst at The Devils Marbles. (Due to popular demand) Let me paint a picture of where exactly The Devils Marbles is….It’s in the middle of the Northern Territory Desert! It’s dry, baron, hot and certainly no place for such a fashion statement.  I actually have photo evidence. I think I should be a detective. I have skills in surveillance like you wouldn’t imagine! After getting over the shock of said red shoes, and having to deal with the experience all on my lonesome at the campsite. I composed myself and grabbed my camera (which is always on my person for that perfect holiday snap) thinking to myself that no one would believe me if I told them about the red shoed lady from the campervan next door, I stood in my camper trailer, quietly unzipped one of the windows just so I could put my camera to the fly screen and snapped a picture. But my evidence was not required as the lady didn’t fail to bring out the RED STILLETTO’S the next morning. So here I am quietly boiling the billy for a cuppa and had to some how get Geoff’s attention to get him to look. Oh we are still getting mileage out of that one.

Palm Valley…. Finke Gorge NP in the Northern Territory. If you ever get the chance pop in for a look. Oh my goodness. We had done a bit of reading about Palm Valley and were looking forward to going there. It’s amazing!! This NP is in the NT desert and has the Finke River running through it. But what makes it all the more special is that it is home to The Red Cabbage Palm which is unique to that area and has a population of about 3000 of these palms. The history of this place and the reason that these palms can grow in such dry adverse conditions is so interesting. To get to the NP was an adventure, it’s about 2hrs from Alice Springs and the only access is via a 4WD only track that follows the Finke River. The camping area in the NP is about 16km from the main road and the sign at the beginning of the track makes it quite clear that it is ‘A severe 4WD warning’ Put it this way… it took us over 2hrs to drive there towing the camper (and no the length of time did not have anything to do with my superb navigational skills) it was very tough going. Not knowing really what we were in for on the track, we were totally amazed to find this lovely camp spot in the middle of the desert complete with fire pits, toilets and showers. We could have spent more than the three days we were there. But we took in the sights, went for a beautiful bush walk into the Valley of the Palms which took us about 3 hrs to walk 6km. absolutely stunning.

Palm Valley - NT

Palm Valley - NT

Palm Valley - NT

Leaving Palm Valley we shopped up a storm at the Hermannsburg supermarket, got a permit to travel through Aboriginal land and headed to Kings Canyon. Are you getting the feel for a bit of theme here? Yep – it’s all about THE ROCKS, and boy is they big out here. Kings Canyon is this massive rocky and sandstone mountain range where you are able to explore massive 100m high canyon walls and walk around the top. The walk is called ‘The Rim Walk’ for the moderately fit. It’s 6km long and took us about 4hrs. Absolutely amazing! To start the walk we had to scramble up the side of the mountain on these rough rock steps for about 250m at about a 60 degree angle. Phew it was a thigh burner! Once you reached the top of the mountain we then had the opportunity to walk for the next 5 ish km around the rim of Kings Canyon. Breathtaking and mind-blowing. Once again I will let the photo’s do the talking.

They say that you are meant to scare yourself at least once a day. We managed to have a bone chilling moment at the top of the Canyon when Ben’s hat blew off and was blown to near the edge and he went after it, being a natural reaction. Thankfully the hat and Ben stopped in time.  Now, don’t be fooled by thinking that my kids are getting into the swing of trekking and taking in the scenes via a lengthy walk. Oh no sireeeee. On this particular walk, Geoff and I had put a lot of forward thinking and planning into it the night before. We pulled out the big guns! IPods. Yep, I charged our two IPods the night before and they were ready for use the next morning at the beginning of the walk to motivate any non walkers. Nothing like climbing the side of the mountain to the strains of Katie Perry and a Michael Jackson classic. It did the trick and got us to the top without too much of a whinge fest. But we insisted they turn them off for the rest of the walk due to the safety issue of them not being able to hear us tell them to get away from the edge.

At the bottom of Kings Canyon - that's part of the rim walk
up the top left to right

On top of the world Kings Canyon

Kings Canyon

Absolutely exhausted, we left Kings Canyon the next day full of excitement because we were now heading to Uluru. A place that people talk of and we’ve seen lots of pictures of. But none of the Smith Tour has ever visited. There were points for the first sighting of the Big Rock. Score being…..Geoff scored points for first sighting of Uluru, Marley has two wild camel points, Matty thinks he has 50 camel points because he saw all the camels at the camel riding place (no protest there from the score keeper) and Ben has points for the first sighting of Kata Tjuta (The Olgas)

We are currently at Yulara which is where Ayres Rock Resort is; we’ve set up camp in the camping ground and have spent the last 4 days exploring the area. We have walked around Uluru….a snappy 10km walk – very flat – which took us about 3.5hrs. An amazing way to experience the rock though, I can’t even begin to explain how we all felt when we first got out of the car when we drove to Uluru. Overwhelmed perhaps. We’ve decided not to climb Uluru out of respect for the traditional owners of the land here. We’ve been Camel riding which was a hoot and a great way to see the sights. We explored Kata Tjuta today, didn’t do all the walks there, it was just so hot and we were completely exhausted. We also experienced the sunset at Uluru which was fantastic. They have a special place that you can drive to which gives you a great view of the rock, so in true Australian tradition, we cooked sausages on the barbie and enjoyed a few cold drinks whilst watching the rock change colour with the sun going down. MAGIC

At the base of Uluru

Sterlo the Camel and his friends

MAGIC

Sausage sangas at sunset at Uluru

Pretty stoked to be here

WOW! WOW! WOW!!!!

LAWN HILL QLD – WEST MCDONNELL RANGES NT

20^TH – 31^st July 2011.

Lawn Hill NP

Lawn Hill NP was only about 90km from Gregory Downs – where we last left you. But 90km on a dirt track way out here takes a lot longer than zipping down the freeway for 90km. Bulldust, creeks the odd heard of cattle grazing in the middle of the road, road trains oh yes and crazy emu’s darting in front of our vehicle.

Lawn Hill NP is a spectacular place and was high on our to do list for this holiday, we had heard and read so much about it and were so excited when we arrived. The excitement is like waiting for Santa to come, the build up nearly drives you insane and then when you get there after all these KM’s  you just can’t believe you are finally there. Whilst exploring Lawn Hill we camped at a place called Adels Grove. A beautiful camp beside a river under all these really old trees, so very, very cool in the shade, but no good for Solar Panel use.

Lawn Hill NP - girl power

Lawn Hill NP

Lawn Hill is known for it's Gorges, and one of the ways to explore them was to paddle a canoe. So off us Smith's set in our two hired canoes. What a way to see this place! I will let the photos do the talking.

I have to say that this post will not contain many words and mainly pictures. The places that we have been to and seen in the last 10 days have just been awesome, breathtaking and my words would not do them justice. (yep believe it or not i have been lost for words on more than one occasion this holiday)
The best way I feel that I can share these places with you are through my photos. I hope you enjoy.

Lawn Hill NP

Never smile at a Crocodile

After Lawn Hill we headed south, passing through Camooweal (groovy name for a town!) and hitting The Northern Territory. Now how excited were we! They even have a special place to pull over so you can take a picture on the boarder between QLD and NT.

Let me tell you some interesting facts about the NT.....

Maximum speed on the highway is 130km/hr
The highway is dead straight
You can see nothing for miles and miles. ( I am loving seeing nothing - I love nothing from my window)
Every passing vehicle waves to you
The ground is rock hard. Normally the density of the soil would not worry us, but when we need to bang 7 pegs in to set up our camper you begin to appreciate how hard the ground is.

our camp at The Devils Marbles

We had been here two minutes and I heard Ben and Matty yell out from this rock - heart failure!!!

Heading further south we stocked up at Tenant Creek. Now there's an interesting town for you! Can I just say is was a very brief stop. I will fill you in on the details another day. But needless to say we managed to leave the town with all our possessions and vehicle intact and set off to The Devils Marbles.

The Devils Marbles was unreal. We ended up staying two nights and exploring the area. The kids loved climbing all over the big boulders, it was every little boys dream come true to clamber all over the rocks. We camped with some great people and shared a rather late night around a rather large campfire with them all. The sunrise and sunset were spectacular. BUT I have to say that the most memorable thing for me at The Devils Marbles was.....The massive rental camper van that pulled in next to us one afternoon whilst I was preparing dinner, out hopped the two kids and the dad, then not long after out hopped mum, all decked out in her finery, hair coiffed, face on, wearing her Sunday best and something that I will never forget.......topping her outfit off with a fabulous pair of RED STILETTO'S - yes you read it correct. I was by myself at our camp and had no one to share this moment with and had to take myself inside my camper trailer and peek out through one of the windows to get a better look to actually confirm what I was seeing. Too funny! the lady didn't let me down the next morning when she stepped out in the very same pair of RED STILETTO'S. Love it!

Woo Hooo on top of the world - Devils Marbles

I always knew Geoff was STRONG

Spending only one night in Alice Springs as a stop over, we would have loved to spend some more time there but were keen to get out into to the wilderness and see the West McDonnell Ranges.
We stayed at and walked so many spectacular Gorges, camps, waterholes and experienced the Dessert in the Northern Territory. Like I said my words cannot describe what we have seen and done.

Enjoy the photos.

Only three weeks until we come home.....very sad.

Also may I just also say that not long after I was bragging about the 48% humidity in the Gulf, we experienced a chilly -4 degrees in Alice Springs overnight when we were there. So I eat my words. The days are still gorgeous blue bird days and we are still managing to keep our bones warm in the Northern Territory sun.

A Simpson at Simpson's Gap woo hoo (I was a Simpson's before I became a Smith)

Ellery Big Hole - West McDonnell Ranges NT

Ormiston Gorge - West McDonnell Ranges NT

Ormiston Gorge - West McDonnell Ranges NT

We are off to Palm Valley and then Uluru next.....can't wait

CROYDON - GREGORY DOWNS

Getting to know our camp.

A lot of people have said to us…..’I don’t know how you can live out of a camper trailer with 5 of you for such a long time!’ or they’ve said…..’How do you manage?’

We also get asked….’Do you get sick of putting the camper up and down every time you pull up somewhere?’

I am not sure if it’s because we’ve always been camping people, or that we simply cannot afford a 30ft Winnebago? But I can tell you for sure that we are doing it and can do it because we love camping and are thoroughly enjoying exploring Australia. And for the 4 months that we are away, it’s such a small chunk out of our everyday life and sure as eggs I will be back home doing the ‘school run’, zipping here and there with the kids and their activities and Geoff and I will be back at work, just like we did prior to us leaving. One thing is for sure, we don’t get sick of putting the camper up and setting everything up and we don’t think it’s a hassle to boil the billy for our cuppa on the gas stove or even collect the firewood to cook our dinner on the campfire. Because time flies when you are having fun and it won’t be long before we are back into the swing of ‘normal’ life and an electric kettle. (Might I also point out that on some occasions I have longed for a freshly brewed strong flat white from the Gerringong Deli to start my day! But you can’t have it all)

Sooooooo I thought that I might provide you with a little insight into our camping life on the road. It’s all pretty basic and simple and the key is to bring only what you need. As I have mentioned previously I am pretty sure that we have brought along a good amount of stuff and there would not be many things that we would leave behind next time. And just for the record you will NEVER EVER see Geoff and me tripping around in a Winnebago!

I hope you enjoy the photos!

Washing up tub - complete with washer-upper-a

Kitchen

Pantry

Fridge and fruit bowl in back of vehicle

 

Forget your ‘home brand’

Forget your ‘black and gold’

Forget your ‘Coles smart buy’

Forget your ‘no name brand’

I have discovered the generic brand to end all competition…..Let me introduce you to ‘FABULOUS’ unless I am missing something here and it’s new on the supermarket shelves Australia wide? I came across the ever reliable brand of ‘fabulous’ whilst shopping for some gourmet delights in the tiny Karumba supermarket. If it’s not already in NSW we I think I may start importing it. I can highly recommend their tinned pink salmon – it’s FABULOUS!

MMMMMM Fabulous

BULL DUST – two words, that’s all I have for you….. BULL DUST or maybe its one word BULLDUST. I’m not too sure. But let me tell you a little bit about it! Firstly pop into your pantry and get yourself some Flour, any flour will do. Bulldust is the colour of dirt but as fine as flour. Now, put some flour into the palm of your hand, and then clap your two hands together. POOF, a big cloud of flour! Well that’s BULLDUST! And that is the stuff that is mostly responsible for all the mess in our car and belongings. It’s everywhere; you drive on it, camp in it, walk on it and live in it. Every time you disturb the dust there is a cloud of smoke. Loving every minute of it! And a tip for the traveller – make sure you keep your eye out for said bulldust whilst driving on the dirt roads as the wind whips up the bulldust and deposits it into potholes or just leaves it in big mounds on the road, which doesn’t provide any traction for your vehicle what so ever.

After the Mt Surprise Rodeo spectacular we pressed on to the town of Croydon. Croydon is an outback town with a lot of history in the gold fields. One classic looking pub, one shop and a petrol station. $26 for the night in a cosy little caravan park. We soaked in a little more history from the Australian gold rush and then promptly decided that Croydon would be the last gold mining town we would visit for this trip. And whilst we are on the subject we have decided that we’ve also seen enough Lime Stone Caves, overtaken enough Grey Nomads and walked enough Gorges as well.

Leaving Croydon we passed through the Gulf town of Normanton. Here we had a photo taken with the giant Crocodile ‘Kris’ she was 8m long and is reportedly an actual size replica of a Croc that was killed by some crazy croc hunting woman by the name of Kris, many many years ago. The kids had fun laying in its mouth for a photo and poking its eyes. I am sure they were seeking revenge for all the water they couldn’t swim in whilst on this holiday. Normanton has the infamous ‘Purple Pub’ which we just took a photo of as we passed by and wished we had stopped at to have a ‘pot’ of beer. Normanton led us to Karumba, really the only two towns this end of the land of OZ, the area is known as – ‘where the outback meets the ocean’ and that is so true! All of the land in the Gulf of Carpentaria is very low lying and is mostly ‘salt flats’. In the Wet season it floods here and is not accessible. We also learnt that because the land is all ‘salt flats’ rubbish is a huge problem in the Karumba/Normanton region. Salt acts as a preservative and it takes such a long time for things to break down. They don’t have rubbish tips in this area and have to transport the refuse to another area and burry it in a really deep hole. The wild life don’t even touch the scraps on the ground that people might throw out their vehicle window because once is touches the ground it becomes too salty for them to eat. This was all made more real by a lady showing us an orange that was found on the side of the road 7 years ago and was only just becoming a shrivelled mess now. Amazing!

Kris the 8m Croc - Normanton

Karumba

BBQ Pontoon Karumba

 

The town of Karumba was beautiful, situated in the ‘big dipper’ of Australia. We got to enjoy beautiful sunsets over the ocean, enjoyed a nice meal at the pub at the beach, and shared the camping with about 12 billion grey nomads who migrate to Karumba every winter for 6 months from the Southern states. Karumba is renowned for its fishing! You know – species like Barramundi, Snapper, Bream, Salmon and Jew fish. I can report that ‘Team Smith’ gave it a red hot go and tested the theory…and can tell you the score ended up being: Cat Fish 2, Toad Fish 1, and any other desirable species – A BIG FAT ZERO!  Ten table points for trying though. We hired a BBQ pontoon for the day and took ourselves out on the Norman River, fished and fished, cooked up a storm on the BBQ, spotted some croc slide and claw marks on the shore line, enjoyed the scenery and had steak for dinner when we got back to camp.

Two nights at Karumba soon turned into four…yet again it’s time to move on.

Next stop Leichardt Falls, just a small dot on the map, down a dirt road on the way to Burketown. Had we not been told about it, we would have driven straight past. The dirt road lead to a weir about 150m long, we then turned off a side track which lead us to these magnificent falls which actually sat bellow the very same weir we had driven on. You know, you drive along and see the sides of the road and the horizon but you just don’t know what’s ‘behind the scenes’ until you look. I’ll let you judge for yourself by the photo’s.

Leichhardt Falls

Can someone ring Geoff’s and my boss please and tell them we are not coming back! We’ve just discovered Gregory Downs. We are camping beside the Gregory River – absolutely magnificent. You can swim here. The Fresh Water Crocs are not a problem in the river, if you leave them alone, they will leave you alone. (well now I am totally confused about the whole croc thing). The Gregory River is a fresh water river which starts right up in the Gulf from an underground spring. By the time it flowed past our camp site it was moving at a pace and provided much fun for everyone floating down the river through some little rapids. Putting their own spin on the word ‘fun’ the Smith boys decided to float down using our unused diesel jerry cans as a ‘floaty’, this enabled them to pick up quite a bit more speed and also was the cause of a few grazes along the way. Gregory River was free to camp, the ‘town’ at the top of the river bank consisted of a pub which provided ice, frozen bread (at $5 a loaf but who’s keeping count) a nice counter meal, oh and beer. There were also public showers and toilets and a great park for the kiddies. So we camped for 4 days. Whilst at Gregory Downs we met a young couple travelling for 12 months looking for somewhere to call home. They had watched me and the kids making damper one night and we ended up all sitting around the fire together with our new friends eating warm damper with two inches of butter – yummmo. The young couple asked if I could show them how to make some damper, so the next afternoon I went to their campsite to teach them and word had spread, before I new it there was two other people from other campsites all standing around watching my damper making lesson. I shared my recipes that I have collected on the way and we had lots of fun making a big mess and a big damper. Peter Russel Clark eat your heart out.

Gregory River

Our camp at Gregory Downs on the Gregory River

Gregory River - Geoff on the rope swing

We are on the home stretch and are becoming more aware of how much time we have left or should I say – don’t have left. We have been having such a great time seeing the land of OZ and don’t really want the adventure to end. We are well and truly in holiday mode and are very relaxed.

I think taking our time to get to places and not rushing has really paid off for us as we’ve been able to fully appreciate the places we’ve visited.

I have to tell you a funny story about how unaware of time we are at the moment. A few weeks ago the five of us had a fairly lengthy and animated discussion trying to figure out what day of the week it was, for the life of us we couldn’t figure it out. So when we came to the next town I was pretty excited when the general store (that sold everything) had newspapers. Being out in the bush, not only is it easy to forget what day of the week it is but you also miss out on the latest news. So I thought I was going to solve all our problems by purchasing a paper so we could catch up on what’s been going on in the world. Can I say that it’s just not that easy to do when you are in the QLD outback and the general store clearly doesn’t get a daily delivery of the current day’s newspaper. I had in fact purchased a newspaper that was over a week old and the only way we realised was that we had already read the same paper a week ago. You can imagine Geoff getting some mileage out of what I thought was a great idea. So I have decided not to purchase another newspaper until I return. No news is good news.

The kids continue to get dirty and dusty everywhere we go and are loving it. They have also met some lovely like minded friends and have exchanged addresses; I hope that they are still motivated to keep in contact with some of them upon our return. As I have said previously it is easy for us to keep going and going and get a little tired so it’s important to find places that we really like and set up camp for a few days to

 re-group. Because tired and cranky kids doesn’t make for a pleasant holiday experience.

they need this sign at the bottom of my driveway

So ON ON again next stop……….Lawn Hill NP

We do hope you are enjoying the winter weather as much as we are in The Gulf with our 30degree days and humidity well above 50%. Just thought I’d rub it in.

Vyrilia - Mt Surprise QLD

View from our camp site Vyrilia

It’s funny how when you spend a large amount of time in a place that you are quite fond of, that it’s very hard to leave.

We have been on ‘The Cape’ for 3 weeks now and are feeling that it is very sad to leave. But there is also so much more to see. After leaving Punsand Bay, we stopped of at Vyrilia Point on the west coast of the tip for a snappy overnighter….Yep you guessed it, four nights later we dragged ourselves away. Vyrilia Point is on the west coast of the tip of Australia and if you look at the map, we hadn’t travelled too far. It’s about 30km from the ‘main’ road and absolutely beautiful. We set ourselves up right on the beach and there we stayed, we caught Quean fish, tried our heart out for a Barramundi (no luck there). Being on the West coast we were able to enjoy the most spectacular sunsets over the ocean. Something that we don’t get to see at home that’s for sure. I am pretty certain that the kids didn’t share our passion for this once in a long time opportunity, to watch the sun set over the ocean. To them the sun sets every day and big woop if it happens to be over the water for these four days. Don’t worry I managed to snap a few pictures to record the memories.

Sunset over Vyrilia Beach

The beaches where we were camped at Vyrilia were beautiful! The tide goes out for miles leaving big sand flats. What was interesting about this place was the amount of ‘flotsam and jetsam’ washed up on the beach above the high tide mark, a legacy of the prevailing winds and big tides they get up here. We could have spent days walking the length of the beach collecting and looking at all the stuff. We were told that most of the stuff had been washed overboard from all the Indonesian and Korean fishing trawlers way out to sea. It had to be seen to be believed…thongs – thousands of thongs of all shapes and sizes (the rubber must just take that long to break down in the water) fishing nets, buoys, rope, bottles (couldn’t find any with messages) even though it was all rubbish it was still quite interesting to look at. Being the hoarders that we are, we felt quite pleased that we only walked away with one fabulously massive plastic white buoy and about 20m of big fat thick rope that is being transported home wrapped around our spare camper tyre.

The access to this particular camp spot was via a pretty dodgy looking log bridge that had not seen any maintenance for quite some time. On the way over we managed some pretty fancy moves to not come to any grief. On the way back from Vyrilia it was a different story. Managing to experience our first (and hopefully last) bit of 4WD mishap. I still blame it on the dodgy bridge and lack of maintenance, but my driver says that the mishap had something to do with the terrible navigation from the co-pilot on the other side of the bridge. And it had absolutely nothing to do with the 3 smallest Smith’s in panic mode standing with me. You see the bridge was made out of big fat logs all laying next to each other but one was completely missing leaving a nice gap all the way across and another log had fallen into the creek and was sticking up half way along the bridge. But you could not approach said bridge straight on as the track went off at an angle at either end and there was also a massive hole in the track to navigate around as well. So now I’ve painted the picture…. The vehicle made it across most of the way ok, but one of the camper trailer wheels fitted nicely in the gap left by one of the missing logs and became wedged up to the spring.

 Driver and navigator remained calm but the 3 smallest Smith’s went into overload thinking that we were going to be stuck on the bridge for the rest of our days. The emergency was over before we knew it. Thanks to the creative thinking of the driver. You see, we have been carrying around this round billet of wood since we left our very first campsite after we left home….Dunns Swamp NSW. (Never let it be said that Geoff throws anything out!) Well anyway this billet of good wood just happened to be the right size to wedge in under the stuck tyre, give us enough leverage to get some grip and get the camper back up onto the bridge. Not to mention the expert opinions from the host of on lookers and people waiting to cross the bridge as well.

Ooops

The log bridge

We thanked everyone for their participation and calmed the little people down and went on our merry way.

A snappy over nighter at the Elliot and Twin Falls again, then onto Weipa for four days of admin, car servicing, fishing, groceries and a much needed shower. Weipa is on the west coast of the tip and is a mining town owned by Camalco, parts of the area were forcibly taken from Aboriginal tribes in the days of Sir Joe ruling QLD, but some areas have now been returned to the rightful ownership of Aboriginal tribes and are being run as very successful communities with schools, medical and businesses run by the tribes.

Geoff was fortunate to meet some fellow campers who invited him to go fishing off the coast of Weipa on a 6.8m ‘tinny’ much fun and fish catching to be had.  As I have said again and again….we have been so lucky to meet such generous people. The kids loved Weipa as it was still QLD school holidays which provided lots of like minded little people to play with and the place we stayed at also had a pool! For me, the sunset over the ocean was a highlight (and a well stocked Woolies for groceries to boot).

North QLD car wash

Our plan once we left the Cape is to head to the Gulf of Carpentaria, described very keenly by the passengers in the car as….’the big dipper at the top of Australia’ We were hoping to take some back roads and cross a bit of outback country and head west from Musgrave to Dunbar then onto Normanton in the Gulf. Don’t worry this meant zero to me at the time as well. But had the roads been in better condition and not closed still in some places and we could go that way, we would have cut out a fair bit of back tracking and about 500km. We had been advised by the Coen police not to go that way, so we didn’t. 

So anyway we had to back track down to Mareeba and head North West from there to get to the Gulf. But things happen for a reason and when one plan doesn’t work out the next plan more often provides you with a new adventure. West of Mareeba we camped beside the ‘Rocky Tate Creek’ which was situated in the middle of a cattle station, it was here that we met a lovely family with 3 kids who were doing much the same as us and used to live in the Gulf area that we were heading to, so we spent a lovely time with them and the kids had a ball.

Had we not headed out this way we also wouldn’t have happened upon the Annual Mt Surprise Rodeo. You haven’t lived until you’ve experienced the Mt Surprise Rodeo. What a great night that was. Mt Surprise is not a very big town and I am pretty sure that every person who lived within cooee was there. A free camp out in the back paddock behind the main arena. Can I just tell you that I have never felt so out of place though, it would have been the funniest sight to see the 5 of us emerge from our vehicle looking like we were off to the beach in our classic coastal attire, you know…thongs, peaked cap, surf shirt, boardies – you get my picture? It’s 28 degrees in the shade and the whole population of Mt Surprise were decked out in their Blundstones, jeans, 10 gallon hat, chequered shirt, big buckled belt and a swagger to boot! There was no blending in the crowd what so ever. Talk about abandoning ship though, Geoff decided to change into his jeans, work boots and flanno for the evening’s program, it was a dead give away when he was closely followed by the four of us floundering around in our shorts and t- shirts. Too funny!!!

The evenings program was kicked off by a bit of a parade of local talent on horse back, closely followed by the MC swanning out into the main arena decked from head to toe in denim (double denim! A sight to behold) we all had to stand for a recital of ‘A Rodeo Cowboy’s Prayer’ I was so moved by the total silence of the place whilst the MC said the prayer over the sound system, it was to the beat or rhythm of ‘The lord’s Prayer’ (I managed to find a copy of it on the net for those of you who are interested, I have included a copy of it at the end of my words). And straight after reciting the Cowboys Prayer the MC threw himself into a magnificent rendition of the National Anthem that would have left Julie Anthony for dead. Goose bumps all round let me tell you.

We were treated to a wild night of mad people riding bucking bulls and broncos. Lasooing calves, barrel racing and more. And to top it off we were entertained by all the young cow-cockies partying on into the wee hours of the morning.  Yeeee Haaaaa

A Rodeo Cowboy's Prayer

Our gracious and heavenly Father, we pause in the midst of this festive occasion, mindful and thoughtful of the guidance that you have given us.

As cowboys, Lord, we don't ask for any special favours, we ask only that you let us compete in this arena, as in life’s arena. We don't ask to never break a barrier, or to draw a round of steer that's hard to throw, or a chute fighting horse, or a bull that is impossible to ride. We only ask that you help us to compete as honest as the horses we ride and in a manner as clean and pure as the wind that blows across this great land of ours.

So when we do make that last ride that is inevitable for us all to make, to that place up there, where the grass is green and lush and stirrup high, and the water runs cool, clear, and deep -

You'll tell us as we ride in that our entry fees have been paid.

These things we ask - Amen.

---

© Clem McSpadden. In memory of Howard Manuel, Jim Moore and Zachary Vanwhy.