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Birdsville airport
Today only one plane was there, race day up to 200 Birdsville is most famous for its once a year Birdsville Races held on the first weekend of September. The normally small town of 120 swells to 5000, as people fly, bus, drive and ride in for two days of races.
The airfield opposite the pub fills with up to 200 planes and people camp out under the wings, and all descend on the pub for food and drink.
The pub was first built in 1884, and despite fires and floods its original walls still remain.
The first hotel, The Royal, is also still standing albeit a shell of its former past
Another attraction is Birdsville's proximity to The Simpson Desert and Big Red, which is a huge sandhill attracting four wheel drive maniacs keen to try out their skills. It is the first and highest of the 1100 dunes in the desert. On the way to Big Red are smaller dunes, easily accesible by 2 wheel drive, with a great wildflower display when they have had rain.
Lots of sand nearby means dust storms which are a daily feature of this town.
Great coffee can be found at the Blue Poles Art Gallery and cafe and
Birdsville Pub
great dining room and huge meals fantastic huge meals at the pub. Visit the artesian pump station and see the water coming out with clouds of steam ready to be cooled for use in the houses.
Off to Bedourie at lunchtime which is 250kms north. Bedourie another small town of 120 people boasts a 22 person natural hot spa. Artesian water is pumped up at a temperature of 39C and cools to 34C to provide a very hot refreshing break. The swimming complex run by the council is free, you get the key off the pub or motel if you are staying there.
The Royal hotel built in 1880 of adobe bricks, serves great meals and drinks and is staffed by overseas backpackers so no aussie acents are to be found behind the bar. With plenty of rain recently every water hole was teeming with bird life of all sorts and shapes, with Bedourie's main waterhole home to hundreds of thousands of water birds.
Bedourie is also famous for its yearly camel races, one was very obligingly in a paddock nearby my motel room.
Birdsville, Bedourie and Betoota are the three main towns in the Diamentina shire which is twice the size
of Denmark with a total population of 350 people!!
After lunch the next day its off to Boulia again to the north and this time a quick trip of 200 kms. Along the way we saw many magnificent waterholes and fantastic differing scenery.
Boulia is a big town of 300 people boasting a supermarket, butcher shop, and is the home of the Min Min lights. Visit the state of the art Min Min Encounter complex and take the tour and hear for yourself just what these strange lights might be that have appeared to many people.
The 4 million dollar sports complex is another huge addition to this outback town.
Driving 372 kms south east to Winton was our next day trip, along an all bitumen road, which was a sight for sore eyes after the rough roads of the previous four days.
Winton is huge in comparison to the other towns and boasts a main street with a choice of pubs, shops and amentities. With almost 1000 people, 2 primary schools, child care centre and high school its almost civilisation.
Winton's 2 big claims to fame are 1. the home of Qantas the
national airline of Australia, and 2. home to "Waltzing Matilda" not the national anthem but better known and loved by all. It was said that one of the hotels was the site for the first public performance of this national song and that the billabong referred to in the song is around the Winton area.
Visit the Waltzing Matilda Centre to really find out what a "jumbuck" is and exactly how many "troopers" there were and while you are there buy your tickets to Lark Quarry.
Lark Quarry, 100kms out of town, is the site of the worlds largest fossilized find of a dinosaur stampede. This stampede is the inspiration for part of Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park movie and was used to accurately measure and then portray how dinaosaurs would have run. Dinosaur remains have been found all around this area, with many of the worlds best finds from this area.
Between Winton and Longreach, a cruisy 170kms on a 2 laned marked bitumen highway, is the Campore Lookout in the Lilyvale Hills. Looks just like a scene from the old spaghetti westerns.
And after this, the drive back to Mackay, home to my very own
bed.
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