Blogs from Longreach, Queensland, Australia, Oceania - page 3

On the way to Longreach we did a tyre. We made it Longreach without busting another tyre. We looked around for a replacement tyre. Lucky us, we found a tyre dealer straight away, so Dad ran in and asked if they could fix it. They came out to have a look and said “Sorry it can’t be fixed”. So we found the Information Centre and got a map of the time and asked about the caravan park. We found the caravan park we were after, so we went and booked in. We set up and made lots of phone calls to try to replace the tyre. The earliest we could get one was next week. We had to spend 5 days in Longreach, much more than we planned to. So we did one thing per day ... read more

Packed up camp and on recommendation went to the Working Museum at Birdsville. A real character ran a show on all the machines from 1970’s back to the 1800’s. Old fridges, washing machines, carbine lamp, old irons, huge biscuit tins, when you bought then by weight. It was mind boggling. Met two other Ultimate Campers and their owners, both were heading in different directions. The racetrack is just all dirt, but the Birdsville Races attract around 5,000 people come September. Apparently you have to queue for fuel when it is time to leave. Left late morning and stopped at Chubby Creek for lunch. Continued on the road - it is a really good road, fresh crushed rock and being graded. Unfortunately when someone passed you, depending on the wind, you got covered in dust and couldn’t ... read more

Travelled 3182 km’s since leaving Wollongong seeing the kids 1-6-09 Up early, had our last breakfast with Hayden foe a while. Packed up & said our teary goodbyes , Hayden was upset that we wont see him for probably 12 months & he wanted to go with us. We waved goodbye & looked at each other & said - here we go on the adventure of our life ( before dementure ) We had a good trip to Roma filling up with gas at Miles & Roma. We went shopping at Woolworths ( very exciting ) , Post Office, Chemist & Hardware store, Cheap shop & Filled up our Gas bottle on the van. First time in 4 years. We had parked the van in a parking lot & put the girls in the van , ... read more

We made our way to the Stockmans Hall of Fame to learn more about the life of the original stockman of Outback Australia and how things have changed through the year until today where the stockman is all but extinct. They have been replaced by motorbikes, helicopters and roadtrains. Then in the afternoon we went in to the Longreach Station Store to board the Cobb and Co Coach for a gallop across the town common (basically this is a huge paddock of mitchell grass and dirt roads in the middle of Longreach), this really gave us a taste of what it was like to travel in the old days. Then we returned to the store for some tea and scones before going into the old Theatre complete with canvas chairs and popcorn to watch “Smiley”. A ... read more

Well this will be my last entry from Werna Station as I leave tomorrow to head South to Goondiwindi and another Cattle Station although considerably smaller!! What have I been up to since the 'Killing'. Well we left the meat to hang for and couple of days and in the meantime mustered in a group of calves to brand, tag, castrate and de-horn (I have to say out of all of the things I've seen since being on the station de-horning is probably the one thing I don't want to see again!! It looks so painful!) I'm happy to say the only thing I got involved in was the branding! I have to add though I wouldn't want this done to me either!! lol We drafted in and branded etc about thirty calves. The nicest bit ... read more