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Published: July 19th 2009
When I published my last blog I thought I would not be chatting to you again until we reached far North Queensland, but the places we have visited and the things we have done really do warrant a mention.
After leaving Katherine and the beautiful hot springs we travelled on down to Mataranka. This is a small country town with very few amenities but they have two of the most wonderful hot springs you could ever wish to bathe in. We stayed at the Mataranka Caravan park which is adjacent to Bitter Springs and we were told that these springs are both deep and fast flowing which did not bother us too much but when told there was a big python living there we opted for the springs at Elsey Homestead instead, inspiration for the book and film, We of the Never Never. To this day the film is shown continuously on the big screen in the bar and locals are very proud of their heritage. The buildings which were erected for the filming are still there and you are free to wander through them. We wiled away many relaxing hours in the hot springs and as you can't do too
much swimming you chat to the folk around you and a happy, interesting group of people they were too. You feel so relaxed in the warm mineral water that when you get out it is hard to stand up and put one foot in front of the other.
The restaurant situated at the hot springs looked really good so we decided to treat ourselves to an evening meal there. Our table was at a very acute angle having one leg much shorter than the other three and we had to make sure our drinks and meals did not slide off, then halfway through the meal all the power went off, just as the waitress was walking towards us with a dish of pepper sauce for John's steak. We enjoyed our meal in total darkness apart from the stars (not even a candle) and it was interesting to bring the fork to your mouth not having a clue what you were about to eat. John's sauce arrived 15 minutes later after he had finished !!!!!
The wallabies at our caravan park were in plague proportions and at one time I was trying to count them, when I got to 20 a
noise disturbed them and about 100 took flight out of the trees and bushes. A beautiful sight to see. During the night we put the light on outside our caravan and the wallabies were grazing all around us.
Anyone who has travelled in this area will tell you not to miss Daly Waters. How right they are. We arrived and paid $20 to park in the caravan field with no power, just water supplied and being the first to arrive we thought it great to have so much room to ourselves. By late afternoon we were packed in like sardines but it did not matter, the place was just fantastic. Let me explain to anyone who has not visited Daly Waters. It is the home of the Daly Waters Pub, filled with things people have left pinned to the walls when they leave. Bras, shorts, money, even shoes. When Jeremy, Michelle and Lucy visited there last year they left a pink thong belonging to Lucy pinned it to a post in the beer garden with many hundreds of others. We walked into the beer garden and went straight to the thong as if there was a magnet in it. We
photographed it with our mobile phone and sent it straight to Lucy who was thrilled it was still where she had left it.
Happy hour was 4.30pm til 5.30 pm and during this time all drinks are half price. When Trevor placed our order they asked him to choose heads or tails while they flipped a coin. He chose heads and they said the coin was heads so the drinks were on the house !!! Not many places offer such a fantastic service.
Outside the pub (which is truly back of beyond) there is a set of traffic lights with a sign saying "The worlds most remote traffic lights" and another sign saying "Angled Parking - Any angle you like mate"
The Chicken Man (Frank Turton) is one of the main attractions of the pub where he has a shack with a helicopter on the roof. I have attached a photo as it is just too crazy to imagine. He has some beautiful white fluffy chickens which he calls his Wedge Tail Eagles and in the evening he sings with his guitar with two of these chicks sit on his hat which resembles a hen house. Another photo to explain
what I mean. When we booked in we were asked if we wanted to book for the evening meal, either barramundi fish or beef, or a mixture of the two. We opted for a mixture and this was cooked freshly and brought straight to the table, also there was a delicious display of salads and bread to enjoy with your meal. While we were eating we were entertained by a lady called Laurel Calvert who sang songs from our youth while playing her guitar and she was very good. Then Frank the Chicken Man came on and sang songs and told us jokes. We were all supplied with dry bean pods which we all shook in time to the music. It was a great evening and since we have moved on from Daly Waters if you ask anyone if they went there their face breaks out in a grin and you can tell they enjoyed it as much as we did.
We reluctantly moved on from there with many happy memories and we were heading for Tennant Creek before heading across the Barkley Highway to Mt. Isa but decided to stop for the night at a Cattle Station some fellow
travellers had told us about. It is called Banka Banka and is part of three huge cattle stations that put together are bigger than the country of Jamaica. It was just $18 to park our van for the night and at long last our dogs felt the gentle green grass under their paws after dry grass and dust we had endured along the way. $3 each bought us our tea of a sausage sizzle then we all sat under the stars and watched a fascinating slide show of life on a cattle station, from catching and branding to the pilots who fly the mustering planes, the Jackaroos and Jillaroos, right down to the cook and the housekeeper. The girl who gave the commentary was a real wag and had everyone laughing.
From there we headed across to Queensland passing through Camooweal, where we had decided to stop overnight. The camp was no longer in existence so while filling with fuel I asked the man in the office where we could stay for the night. He advised us to drive another 37km and look for a windmill on the right side of the road. This we duly found and spent the
most peaceful night under the stars. The following morning we headed into Mt. Isa, one of the biggest mining towns in Australia. We had booked into the Moondarra Caravan park and found we had been assigned THE most difficult spot which took us ages to get the van into we were ready for the hot coffee Pat had waiting for us.
We got caught up with haircuts here, I cut John's hair, Pat cut Freckles hair, I cut Millie's hair and a lovely lady on the park cut my hair, then in the evening she sang some lovely songs she has written and we all sat under the Bali hut and had a a nice drink. We could not decide if she was a singing hairdresser or a hairdressing singer. Whichever, she was very professional and very pleasant.
We had no idea that night time temperatures could drop so low in Queensland and we found ourselves filling hot water bottles and putting the heating on in the caravans to combat 2 degree nights. Day time temps were just lovely around 27 degrees.
We went to the town lookout to take some photo's of the mine all lit up at night
but found it hard as it is such a wide panorama and our photo's did not do justice to the beautiful sight that it was. Mt. Isa is very proud of it's Irish Club so we just had to go there (twice). The meals were fantastic and we sat in old tram cars to eat, then put just a couple of dollars in the pokies just to say we had done it. Won nothing of course, but then who does? During the evening we felt the ground shaking, we realised that this must be an underground mine explosion and nobody took any notice so it must be an everyday occurance.
That is enough for you to digest for now. I am writing this in Normanton near the Gulf of Carpentaria but will cover all that in my next blog.
Nigel and Michele are booked to fly to Cairns on 5th August to meet up with us and will stay in a cabin on the caravan site we have booked in Mossman, just north of Port Douglas which is a favorite place of ours. When our dear friends Carol and Ted were over from the UK last year we had a
very enjoyable holiday with them there.
Cheerio for now...................
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Dina Smith
non-member comment
great!
Oooh, how wonderful to travel with you, feel like I'm right there. Thank you for the laughs too! Well written and so much info. Love and thoughts to you all D