A very cold morning out here in lower Queensland, but the sky was clear and the sun was rising above the horizon.    We knew it was going to be a brilliant day, even before looking at the weather forecast.

A good day for washing too.    One of the machines was a card machine, great, no feeding it with $1 coins.   Still cost $5 though.    Everything went in: whites, colours and dark blue, except Walter's new track pants which were designed to put fluff on everything else in the machine.

The A & P Show is on here, so the shops are closed, and no diesel fuel is available in the service station.  Luckily we still have half a tank but we will not be going far with that amount, seeing as the next service station is probably two hundred kilometres away.

As the bakery was closed, the small supermarket, open only in the morning, did not have any bread.   Luckily Walter asked the owner of the store, and she went out the back and got a loaf of bread for us.   That is great customer service.

However, one would think that there would be extra stock of bread in the shop, and another delivery of diesel arranged beforehand.    Most people involved in the show would have diesel vehicles.

But not so.    And we have been caught before in country towns at the weekend.    Luckily we are not planning on driving anywhere until Monday.

We thought about going to the show today, but as we wanted to visit the Tourist Centre we gave it a miss.

I took Piper for a very pleasant walk on the footpaths that ran alongside the river.

Cunnamulla Hot Springs.    I know, it is a bit difficult to see the sign in the setting sun.   The thermal baths are the biggest in Queensland, I think.    Unfortunately I did not bring my swim suit with me, although I have done a fair bit of sitting around in thermal pools in New Zealand so the novelty has worn off.

The water in Cunnamulla comes from five bores, and the thermal water that comes from the taps is excellent for the skin and hair (according to the notices in the ablution blocks in the camping ground).   It is 100 percent pure so good for drinking, if you don't mind the taste of course.   

When we are in the caravan and are anywhere north of Adelaide we drink water that we buy from the shop.   Piper drinks this as well, as she has suffered from tummy issues in the past.    We have a filter on the tap but still bore water, and tank water, can be a bit off.   

And at some campsites you are now told not to drink the water, due to contamination.

Normally we buy water that is in a bag, in a box, which has been costing more than $10 for 10 litres.   I noticed that increasingly the supermarkets were selling the water in plastic containers, which I ignored, thinking they would be too difficult to gain easy access to the water.  I discovered today that they have the same taps as the boxed water.    

The plastic containers of water are half the price at $5 as the boxed type.

The boxed water, with the tap at the bottom.

And I know you are wondering about the disposal part of all the left over containers.  The footprint for the plastic containers is much larger than the boxed variety, as the boxes go into the yellow bins for recycling.   Hopefully someone will come up with an answer soon regarding the plastic containers.

When we arrived at the Visitors Centre there were caravans and motor homes lining the street, it was extra busy.   

It was an excellent centre, with a time tunnel, a video about the Great Artesian Basin, a museum and an art gallery.   The cost - $10 each.

The display outside the lift to the time tunnel.    It was not a real lift just a box that shook and a voice telling you about how many years you were going back in time.   

Then the door opened on the other side and you walked down a narrow corridor with displays on either side.     There were dinosaur bones, and explanations about the forming of the area over millions of years.  This part was very well done.

The shearing shed.

The museum.

I remember using a computer like this.

I owned a typewriter like this one.    Talk about feeling your age here.

The video about the great arterial basin was excellent and I think I finally understand how it works.  The basin covers one quarter of Australia (most of Queensland, and the top of New South Wales and South Australia).   It is all underground, except where it bubbles  up in springs and small ponds, often in the middle of deserts.   

The base of the arterial basin is hard rock, and was formed millions of years ago when this part of Australia was under the sea.   The base was lower than the rest of Australia which is why the sea covered it.   Then as the sea levels fell, a sandstone top formed which is porous.   This resulted in a huge cavern between the hard rock and the sandstone.  Eventually the cavern filled with water.   It is still being fed from the run off from the Great Diving range which runs along the eastern coast of Australia.   

The Aboriginal people cared for the land and the water that bubbled up, but when the European settlers came, they realised that the land was viable for sheep grazing due to the bores that were installed on their properties.   Towns were built, and the population grew, and so did the bores.   In recent times they have found that the high water usage (and much wastage) has caused the natural springs to stop running, which causes a loss of native animals and fish.

Luckily the government has clamped down on the number of bores, and have given subsidies to property owners to put effective taps on their bores and to run the water in pipes rather than in channels on their properties.    The water in the channels evaporates quickly.   The situation with the natural springs has improved considerably apparently.

But it is still a finite resource as more water is being taken out, than being put back in from the run off from the Great Dividing Range.   

The water is very hot when it comes out of the ground, hence the large number of thermal pools in Queensland and northern New South Wales.

And on to my pet hate, the cotton farms!  

Now where do the cotton farmers get all their water from?   The rivers? or The Great Arterial Basin?  And they still use channels to move the water around, even with the knowledge about evaporation.  

Those cotton farms worry me, and most other people, except for the people who are making huge profits from growing it.

The old bores looked like this fountain, with water constantly flowing but not being used.  This fountain recycles its water!    

I have just heard the sound of fireworks.   The A & P Show has finished.    Piper heard them too, and she was not impressed. 

Cunnamulla - a small town on the Warrego River

I am not sure how to describe Cunnamulla, except that it is beside the Warrego River, and is a pleasant little town.    Nothing flash.   Some poverty.    But their pride shows in the well looked after town centre.

Today the shops were closed.   It was a public holiday.    Show day apparently.   I am not sure where the show grounds are, but tonight I could hear announcements being made so somewhere close by.

The 200 kilometre drive today went very fast.   I do not think there was one bend in the road, and we only passed through one little settlement called Wyandra.    No fuel available there.   I am not sure how the people who live there manage without a fuel pump.

Most of the road was fairly rough, although a bitumen road.   It was busy, mainly people towing caravans.

And plenty of red dirt.

The Warrego River, with more water here.   Perhaps there is a weir close by or perhaps it has been fed with water from creeks.

There is no cotton farming out this way, nor was there at Charleville.   No crops either.  Too dry?

The lovely sunset showing behind the trees.    Not a bright red one, but just a pleasant glow in the skies.

The Post Office is situated in a lovely old building.

The Cunnamulla Fella statue.    It was commissioned in 2004 to personify the 'Cunnamulla Fella' in the famous Slim Dusty song.    It has become an icon of the town.

The Visitor Centre which was closed but thankfully will be open tomorrow.   It has some fantastic displays in it, which we have seen when we came here four years ago.     The building is an old secondary school buildings.

Looking forward to a pleasant day in Cunnamulla.

Sunshine again in Charleville

The brief misty rain that was here yesterday has now gone, and there is blue sky again.    A successful washing day with nothing acquiring extra bits of fluff.

We visited an historic house on the main street, which started life as a bank in the 1890s, with the walk in safe still in the front room.    After that it became a large residence for different families.

The house and sheds were packed with old things.   I think every family in the district must have donated items for this museum.   It was difficult to look at everything closely.   Just too much stuff.

 

A display behind glass.

An old curved fridge.   Not ever seen one of these before.

One of the bedrooms.

An old kitchen,

and an even older kitchen out in the side back room.   It had a pantry room next to it.

This is an old rail ambulance, which was built for Charleville.    Due to the difficulty in getting people from outlying areas to Charleville it was apparent that the best way was to use the railway.    The unsealed roads were often impassable because of rain.  The rail ambulance contained the patient/s, an ambulance attendant and a driver.    They stopped using them in the 1950s.

The rabbit poison machine which planted bits of poison into the ground in a way that stock could not eat them.    

The old car.

Afterwards we found a lovely cafe, in the old hotel which is now closed, that had pea and ham soup with sour dough bread as its special for the day.    We could not resist such delicious fare.   It was superb, although Walter looks like he is not enjoying the soup.   I think I caught him by surprise.   There is nothing worse than people taking a photograph without first warning the person.

It was definitely the  best pea and ham soup, even better than the Dutch pea soup.

The Warrego river, and the narrow bridge, with the very high flood bank on the town side.

The Warrego River is a 1380 km river in the Darling-Murray Basin.   It flows through Charleville and Cunnemulla before it joins the Darling in New South Wales.

There are many different places to visit in Charleville, as there are in most towns up this way.   One of them is the Royal Flying Doctor Visitor Centre.   We visited one of the centres in Alice Springs so decided not to go to this one.   

However, Walter had his own Royal Flying Doctor experience a couple of weeks ago, when he flew in an air ambulance from Cobar to Dubbo.    This was due to his bowel problem when in Cobar, and the Dubbo hospital wanted to check him out there so the quickest way was via the Royal Flying Doctor Service.    

For people that do not live in Australia the Royal Flying Doctor Service is a major not-for-profit aeromedical and primary health care organisation in Australia.  It covers 7.69 million square kilometres.  They provide 24 hour medical services to people in rural, regional and remote areas.   And it is free for patients.

Walter standing beside the plane that flew him from Cobar to Dubbo.  It contained stretchers and seats.  

An ambulance attendant was with him on the plane. 

This is certainly an improvement to the railway ambulance shown in one of the photos above.

Tomorrow we start to head south again.   The next town will be Cunnamulla.   

A damp day in Charleville

People were looking forward to the rain today, but it turned out to be a light drizzle which made the ground damp.    It was obviously much needed rain that did not happen.    However, it was a chilly day, so we spent the afternoon in the caravan, with the heater on, and reading our books.

That was after another visit to the local thrift shop in order to buy some books.   I love the country thrift shops, as they are full of really good clothes.   I have bought three shirts and a pair of jeans so far..   The thrift shop in St George was quite expensive, with the shirts priced at $15 each.    However, yesterday I bought a really smart white shirt, fairly new and hardly worn for $5.     Today Walter bought a pair of shorts, and a pair of flip flops, both new.  

Plus the books!

Our caravan before the rain started.

The campfire area.   The owners light the fire every night, and for the first two nights the country and the western singer entertained people here.   I am a bit over the singing!

The ablution blocks by us.

The view from our caravan.   The clotheslines!   Yesterday they were full of clothes.   Washing day.

Today we visited the Cosmos Centre, on Milky Way Drive!    Once this was a working observatory but now it is a tourist planetarium, the largest in Queensland apparently.  It was however very interesting and a great place to take children.   We found it fascinating, especially watching a video about landing on Mars, which was shown in the planetarium.   The entrance is free to see the displays at the front, but the videos, sun telescope and night star viewing cost quite a bit of money.    There was no sun today, so the sun viewing was not an option.

                                        

One of the displays at the Cosmos Centre.

And space suits for children to stand behind, and get their photos taken.

Piper and I went for a walk around one of the parks here.   Two very well done sculptures.

The large, muddy pond, fed by a small creek.

And finally a great dinner at the local RSL Club.    The best eatery in town, and serves both lunches and dinners, and it was full of people.   No doubt it does a lot of damage to the local pubs.     

This was the front entrance.

Tomorrow, washing clothes day for us.   I have my coins ready, four single dollars for the machines here.   Often they take five single dollars, so cheap in this campsite.    Of course everything goes into one machine, with no sorting of coloureds, whites and towels.    Walter had to throw out his two jogging bottoms because they were covered in fluff from being in the same machine as the towels.  They were very old anyway.   He then bought a  new pair of jogging bottoms, which put fluff on everything when washed, including my new blue shirt.    Luckily I had a lint brush on hand.

And I so appreciate the fact that the instructions for the machines are in English!   And in Australia the machines are mostly all the same.       

 

Australian Census Day

We have completed our Australian Census Form, which we got from the caravan park office.   Luckily we are 'pensioners' so it is relatively easy to complete.   Still a pain to do though.  I hope the government use the information wisely.

Other than that an expensive day.   We noticed before we left Roma that our back tyres were looking a bit thin so took the risk and made it here, thank goodness.    So today we found a tyre place (Dunlop tyres) where we bought two new tyres plus organised a wheel alignment.   $1000 gone, just like that.   

We bought the back tyres in Griffith two years ago when a bolt went through one of the old tyres.   We have covered huge distances since then, often on rough roads, but still two years is not long.   However, today the tyre person asked if we towed a caravan.   Apparently the car needs thicker and tougher tyres if towing, whereas we had tyres for passenger only cars.  

So now we have the new tyres on the front of the car, and tyres that we bought one year ago on the back wheels.   When we get home we will change them over to sturdier tyres too.

We have learnt two things in the past week.    Grease the tow ball and put sturdier tyres on the car when towing a caravan.

While waiting for the tyres to be changed we went for a short walk to the main street of Charleville.

There is definitely no water in this creek.

The main street, with normal angle parking.    I was getting pretty good at the reverse angle parking, but definitely not needed in Charleville.    Most people on this street were in the bakery, or eating delicious pies, pasties or sausage rolls outside.    We were very good, and only bought bread.   It was tempting.

The very long verandah outside the large hotel.   Walter went inside to check out the toilets and reported back that the staircase inside was very grand.   

The council buildings, 1920s style.

The School of Art, built in 1924.    I wonder if it is still used for this purpose.

Tomorrow a visit to the Observatory to check out the sun and a look at the sky during daylight hours.   No doubt it will be filled with satellites.

Cobb & Co Caravan Park, Charleville

Another great find!    At $45 per night.    A place where we do not feel as if we are paying for an over priced caravan park with mediocre facilities.    Great atmosphere too.

The caravan park is spread over four areas:  1 for cabins, 2 caravan/camping sites, plus a green area for camping.   There are two camp kitchens, two sets of fairly new ablution blocks, plus an entertainment area with a fire pit.   Not to mention a doggy area, and kitchen garden.

And plenty of shade.   Luckily we are not under any gum trees.   I love gum trees, but not to camp under.  The limbs can suddenly fall off.  

Plus people are very friendly, just like at the St George caravan site.    Lots of offers to help set up, discussions about our dog, and details about where people are from.

Then, at 5 pm we were entertained by a singer, rolling out his repertoire of country and western songs for two hours.   We listened to him singing as we drank our drinks.    

Our camping spot is just behind the large tree.

Smoke from the fire pit covers the singer.   I hope he wasn't too affected by it.

Our drive today was only 260 km but it felt like 500 kms.   I was extra tired due to being awake this morning for about two hours (2.30 to about 4.30) due to rain.   This was predicted but I seriously thought it would not happen.   But it did.    A good test for the roof repairs that I carried out just before we left, and there were no leaks but that could have been due to the angle of the caravan.   We were seriously leaning to one side.   I guess the water ran straight off the caravan roof.

And why were we leaning to one side.   We tried to put one wheel on a ramp but then could not get the caravan off the tow bar.   A man came over to help and he could not do it either.   It seems to happen when we try to put a wheel on a ramp.    So we took the caravan off the ramp.   We were advised that we should be putting grease on the tow ball, as the dust and vibrations on the ball cause an enormous amount of friction.    He duly creased the tow ball and the corresponding connection on the caravan.

And when we arrived in Charleville we put one of the wheels on a ramp, and guess what, the caravan came straight off the tow ball.      We are very happy campers.

We stopped at a town called Mitchell for lunch.   An historic town but, lovely atmosphere, although many empty shops.    There were caravans and motorhomes parked whereever they could find a spot.    So very busy.

I took a photograph of a truck loaded with huge tyres, travelling through the town.   In fact there were three trucks loaded with giant tyres.    I wonder where they were travelling to, a mining town perhaps.

A very large hotel, and then I counted two more.   Obviously plenty of thirsty customers in this town.

Tomorrow we will explore Charleville.