12 June 2011 - Finemore Holiday Park, Bundaberg, Queensland

I should start with a plug for these excellent council holiday parks in this area. There are about four in this area, and about four down Hervey Bay way. Not flash, but clean with excellent facilities, friendly service and a fair price (here a least) of $24 per night for a powered site. That is the same price we paid for that absolutely terrible camp just out of Maryborough. To compare the two is to do the greatest injustice to these council parks.

As I wrote the above, there was a flash of light above me and I realised that the setting sun was communicating with us. Our narrow view across the caravan park and above the bridge that spans the Burnett River reveals the golden sky silhouetting a cluster of palm trees; very pretty and especially so after the last two days of inclement weather.

The rain did not wait until Sunday as the Friday local weather forecast had promised, but set in that same night and continued all the following day. We ventured out to the Bundaberg Rum distillery to take the full tour and hopefully sample the product. This weekend here in Australia is Queens Birthday weekend, one week later than celebrated in New Zealand, so there were extra tourists and families lining up to do the same. There is a short version of the tour where you learn the BDC story by way of touch panels and visual displays. This was also the first part of the more complete tour, which we took, and we regretted that we had not turned up very much earlier and been able to spend more time in this mini “museum”. Instead however we lined up with thirty nine others, shed our watches, cellphones, hearing aids (had we had them) and anything that might spark a fire in the intensive alcohol environment, accepted the umbrellas handed out and trudged happily through the falling rain and wet wet ground. We were taken through the distillery, past the great molasses vats, past the yeast processes and in to the bond where huge barrels stand filled with millions of dollars worth of devils dew. Alas, it being Saturday, we did not see the bottling process, but had to be satisfied with a DVD showing that and the canning of RTDs down in Sydney. We were then taken in to the “bar” where our entry price included two drinks. We had taken the eleven o’clock tour, and this was just after midday. A generous shot of divine rum liqueur is actually very weird at that time of the day, especially on an empty stomach. We thought better of indulging in the second round, even though the spirit was moorish to be sure.

And so we went back out into the rain and returned to the caravan to hot soup for lunch and to spend the rest of the day holed up in the dry with the heater blasting away.

This morning dawned without rain, and suggesting a much drier day, even a little sun. We threw the windows open and were greeted by the prattle of fellow campers all pleased to be released from their sheltered confinement.

The Alexandra Park is just along the street from us, a little downstream, and boasts a zoo, a wonderful children’s playground and a Victorian era band rotunda. “Zoo” is really an over-the-top description for a small aviary holding birds that I would prefer to see free and flying in the wonderful trees that are also here. Security cameras are everywhere, obviously watching for the likes of me who would return with some wire cutters if we carried such a tool. Sadly for the birds, we do not. (Just joking) However I am not so sure that I would free the two emus and the ostrich, at least not here in the town.

We walked further along the river bank walkway, and then came up into the town near the Art Gallery. There we visited a rather strange exhibition; a collection of vibrant photos of young Japanese fashionistas decked out in their glad rags up town in Tokyo, mostly taken back in the 1990s, by Shoichi Aoki. They were quite wonderful but very off-the-wall.

There was also an exhibition of “Primary Colours”, works by children from primary schools in the area, and a work called “Wings of Hope:, origami cranes of many colours done as a tribute to the “artist’s” wife’s battle with cancer. The interpretative panels were more moving than the work itself.

After returning to the caravan park for lunch, pleased to find the relatively fine weather holding out, we drove to the north side of the river, to the Botanic Gardens, and spent over an hour wandering about the lakes in the park. Co-incidence brought us back to the cruiser just as drops of rain began to fall. We returned home once more, delighted to have managed two planned outings on this day that was supposed to have kept us inside again.