Civilisation!

Some photos from the Gopro yesterday, a different angle of the river. The reflections were incredible, though the colours aren't quite right.

30/6/16

Found out last night that Kay’s mum had an accident at home, dislocating her good shoulder and breaking a few ribs, so we’re rethinking our path back home and were going to leave Adels Grove early but decided to continue heading to Normanton, still on bitumen, then across to the coast and keep moving down.

We had time to discover the park here at Adels Grove this afternoon. 

Some of what the wet season leaves behind

Trees down and debris blocking part of the river

Now we know why everyone kept telling us we’d love it and must come here. Where we are is no different and not as nice as some of the free camps we’ve had but down in the grove is beautiful. The river is lovely, not that we’ve braved a swim…yet and a wander downstream was interesting with the debris left behind after the wet season, then in the calmer waters, the reflections again are fantastic.

I don't think we've seen tadpoles since our kids were little,
there were hundreds in the shallows here.

1/7/16

Our plan today was to get to Normanton for a couple of nights so I could do some washing and visit Karumba but when we finally arrived in Normanton there was one powered site that needed an extra long power lead and we weren’t sure that both ours together would be enough and there were branches too low for our van, no water, so we had lunch on the road beside the airstrip and decided to go back to the Cairns turnoff and get to Blackbull Siding where the Gulf lander train stops for morning tea each Wednesday on it’s way to Croydon, Qld. 

Lucky to catch this photo, they move too quick for me usually

The road keeps changing from a single lane to two way every couple of kilometres and the colour of the soil and the vegetation changes all the way along the road.

The railway tracks at Blackball Siding.
An interesting little place to stop for the night

Seemed such a long day of driving but the free camp is big with a few vans, a campfire tonight along with damper provided by one of the other campers. Lovely and quiet again and free!!

2/7/16

Set off at sunrise today towards Atherton, where we'd booked the last site available at one of the caravan parks. Another long drive around 500ks all up today.

Lucked out with the last site left in the caravan park, we're back from the vans either side and have this view out the back at Atherton

A quick stop at Croyden, then morning tea at Georgetown and lunch on the side of the road where there was a bit wider roadside, after not seeing one break spot along the road from Georgetown then saw about 4 or 5 not long after we started again, after lunch.

This river would be spectacular in the wet season but completely dry now

Views from the windscreen today

The wattles and trees are taller as we get closer to the Tablelands

Even the termite mounds changed shape

A bit of an up and down drive through hills as we neared the Atherton ranges. Such a beautiful site after such a long time of dry pastures and termite mounds and coloured soil, the green of the Tablelands is so refreshing. Clouds building for the first light rain (spits really) since the day we set off in a deluge. All this rain has done is make the dust run down the van and make mud. We're staying here for 2 nights, maybe 3 if we can. There seems to be so much to see here.

The roadside getting greener

The wind farm near Ravenshoe, very impressive as we drove over the hill