Saturday July 5th - Atherton Tablelands

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We left the caravan park just after 9 O’clock heading south from Atherton through Malanda to Milla Milla. From Milla Milla we went east to the “waterfalls circuit.” The circuit is a 15 kilometre circular loop which is extremely tight and very twisty. It winds through the heart of Queensland’s dairy land with three waterfalls being the attractions. The first two waterfalls were quite good but the third waterfall is the main tourist attraction of the area. Here at the Milla Milla Falls we got lots of warm dry clothes together and braved the EXTREMELY cold water, all for a photo and a good laugh.

After we were warm and dry we continued southwest stopping at a large wind farm and a lookout. From there we continued inland beginning the Savannah Way, a highway connecting northern Queensland to north south highway which runs through the middle of the country. Before getting on the highway we stopped one final time at the Millstream Falls. Here we got some photos and had lunch. The rest of the day was spent heading west along the Savannah Way.’ We were making very good time only stopping once in Georgetown to fill up on fuel and change drivers. We continued trying to make Normanton by dusk. In the outback you can’t really drive after dusk because there are so many nocturnal animals and the risks of running into a kangaroo are extremely high. As we got farther west the kangaroo road kill occurred more often. Luckily we were fortunate to see quite a few living kangaroos along the side of the road though as soon as you got close they darted off so it was extremely difficult to take photos of them. We passed through the half way point of Croydon at about 5:30. We had about 150 kilometres to go and about an hour of sunlight. We decided to drive at 130 so that we would make it there a little sooner. Just after passing Blackbull, a tiny dot on the map the power steering went on the car and then Mike noticed that the temperature gauge was completely over on the hot side. He pulled over the car and we opened the hood to let the engine cool down. Once we had opened the hood we found the radiator fluid boiling in its reservoir and it was starting to drop out of one of the connecting hoses. We moved the car over to the other side of the road where the pavement had the opposite angle so that the fluid could not reach the hoses. We decided that we should go back to Blackbull go get help so Mike hopped in the next passing car and Katja and I stayed with the car. About half an hour later Mike came back with two guys in their ute. They had a look around and realized that the drive belt was off a few of the pulleys. They tried putting it back on, but to no avail. It was extremely dark and very difficult to see as we only had one small flashlight. They decided to wait until the morning to try and repair it. Mike the younger of the two said that he had beds we could sleep in which we were very appreciative of. We got our sleeping bags out, got a bit of food and took the ute back to Blackbull. Mark, the other guy lived across the street so we dropped him off before going to Mikes place. It was about 2 kilometres off the highway to his house. It turns out Mike owns 300, 000 plus acres of land in the area which he uses for cattle ranching. At the moment his house was empty because his workers had gone home for the weekend but he said during the week there were two or three workers which stayed at the house. We ended up getting better hospitality at Mike’s house then you would at a nice hotel. All night we played card games.

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