Day 142 - Mt Isa to Burke & Wills Roadhouse

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We left Mt Isa and headed towards Cloncurry, from where we would turn off the main road and head north up the Normanton Developmental Road (a highway but with only one sealed lane due to the low traffic numbers).

We wouldn't get to Normanton in one day and so we decided to stay at the half way point, a roadhouse called Burke and Wills. The roadhouse is so named because this is close to where the explorers made a final attempt to get to the sea. Unfortunately for them, they picked an area that was full of mangroves, mud and crocs. The closest they made it to the sea (the Gulf of Carpentaria) was approximately five kilometres away, an agonisingly small distance given that they had originally left from Melbourne to traverse the continent. Of course, they were also desperately unlucky, returning to Coopers Creek and missing the remainder of their team by about nine hours. Both explorers eventually died near Coopers Creek.

We had plenty of supplies so we were OK but we bought hot chips from the roadhouse too.

The next morning we fed the local Apostle Birds and headed north to Normanton.

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Photos

Apostle birds squabbling
One pecked another and there was a mass exodus of birds

Apostle birds return
Eventually they returned to eat the remainder of the bread