Advertisement
Karumba Point
Every night the same - lovely sunsets At Sunset Caravan Park, Karumba, where the Outback meets the sea. Famous in Australia for prawns and barramundi. Today we got up “early” and biked into town about 8kms each way. Wanted to have a coffee at the Hot Bread Shop, but they didn’t have any milk. Bought a couple of very nice pies and rode home. Mucked around. One of Karumba’s unusual features is that it usually only has one tide each day. Apparently the land configuration in the Gulf of Carpentaria is such that every second high tide is cancelled out. Tides range from about 1.4m to about 3m.
Next day teamed up with Peter & Leigh Purches from Sydney and we drove back to Normanton to ride on the local train. Its run a diesel railcar since the 1920’s and runs as an excursion now. Luckily we took the short run as 2 hours on it was good, but enough. In the afternoon, we shared a hire of a helicopter and viewed the surroundings. Bruce, the pilot is also an aerial musterer, so we rounded up a mob of wild pigs, flying in a Robinson R22 at about 20 feet up. Thrilling. For dinner had a kilo of
Normanton Rail
Note the "straight" rails fresh prawns - $15.
Thursday, up “early” again and had 2 hours bird spotting up the river. It was too windy to go far downriver, but very well done.
We passed the terminal for the Century lead and zinc mine. The ore is mined about 300km inland (opencast), mixed into a slurry with water and fed by gravity to Karumba. There they de-water it, transfer it to a barge and take the material out to a waiting ship. The barge carries 5,000 tonnes and each time it unloads, the mother ship has to move further out into the Gulf because it’s so shallow.
We went to Ash’s, a cafe along the road and Pattie had a whole crab, while I had barramundi.
Friday 13th. No problems. We played golf at the Karumba Golf Club, no cards available $6 each. Sand greens again. They have a Barramundi Centre where they breed barramundi for release into local lakes and rivers, Barramundi are strange in that they are male up to a certain size and then become female. So there is a catch size limit of both small and large as they don’t want juveniles or breeding females taken. We had “B &
Savannah Rail
Normanton to Croydon since the 1920's D" prawns for dinner – “broken & damaged” - $10 a kilo – better still.
Saturday. Perfect slow day. Biked to the bakery for coffee, checked out diesel prices. Two outlets one was $1.73 and the other $1.58. Bear in mind we are about 1,500km northwest of Brisbane so prices are high. Watched the sunset and had a drink at the pub before dinner.
Sunday. Packed up and returned to Burke & Wills Roadhouse. Stayed the night and ate in the café there. Huge t-bone, chips and gravy. 2 pork chops, gravy and veg for Pattie. Plus a bottle of red wine. We were aiming to go to Lawn Hill National Park, but had conflicting reports about the road, so decided to leave the van at B&W and take the tent in to the park. There are five other vans here, so others have made the same choice.
Monday 16th. Up fairly early, locked the van and set off with the tent for the Adel Grove Camping Ground near to Lawn Hill National Park. Takes about 3 hours driving. Lots of birds on and near the road. Unfortunately we hit three or four of them. Quite a bit of roadkill,
Helicopter sightseeing
Roads - one and hills - none too. Lots of kangaroos/wallabies, some wild pigs and the occasional cow. The first 168km was good seal, mostly two lanes, and most of the remaining 80km was quite good gravel roads, with not too much corrugations. Should have brought the van! However, it gave us a chance to set the tent up, which we hadn’t seen since Cairns in October in the rain. Up in a flash! No worries! A bit harder to inflate the mattress, but all good.
We had decided to eat at the camp restaurant for the night which saved us bringing lots of extra stuff. Brought our own lunches which worked.
We were set up before noon, so went to the Park, ate lunch and then hired canoes to cruise the Gorge. Very pretty. Saw no crocs so had a swim. At dinner we talked with a couple of kids who were part of an field trip from the Mt Isa School of the Air. About 9 or 10 years old. Great kids. The school covers most of western Queensland and a lot of Northern Territory. The kids get together only a few times a year.
Tuesday 17th. Slept mostly well. We were in the camping
Helicopter sightseeing 2
Patttie landing after pig round up section and its quiet, so there was no-one within 50 meters of us. We did a couple of walks and discovered the camera and the phone both had flat batteries so no pictures. Again on the walks were impressed by the branches and rubbish high in the trees by the creeks. When it rains it must be really spectacular. Left just before lunch, now back at B&W for the 3rd time.
PnD
17May 2011
Advertisement
Tot: 0.09s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 10; qc: 49; dbt: 0.0581s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Rupinder
non-member comment
I envy you
Hi Don & Pattie Read about your adventures. No need to ask whether you are having fun...Wishing you best of times ahead RD