Perhaps I should also add the words “
It seems so much longer than just the two days it has taken us to come up from
- Mareeba to Lakeland Downs: 189 kilometres
Lakeland - Coen to Weipa 266 kilometres
I was pleased too that we still had telephone reception, although not on my own Vodafone, to make a call to Olly to wish him happy birthday. The call was brief, not from the need to curtail the cost of a long distance call but to accommodate the demands of the children his end, who he was in charge of for the day. I suggested he sit the boys down and try to explain that today was his special day, his birthday, and so they could help to make it special by being kind and good for Daddy. I somehow doubt this would work with Matthew still short of two, but you never know. Hopefully it will not be too long before we can catch up again on Skype and find out how the day panned out.
Our first stop was Split Rock, about 12 kilometres short of Laura, where we walked up a steep rocky incline to see three rock galleries of amazing aboriginal drawings and stencils of animals, people and spirits or “Quinkan” for which the area is named, done 30,000 years ago. The whole area is littered with this art, and much of it is so inaccessible that there are still more discoveries of similar work being made every year. This area is listed among the top 10 ancient rock art sites in the world, and is thus World heritage sire.
The road to Laura followed a plain through from Lakeland Downs, some of which was cultivated in banana and other crops, but mostly grazed by cattle, at least those that were not lying dead on the road. Fencing along the road sides is mainly non-existent and there are signs everywhere warning the motorist to watch out for wandering beasts. We came upon one simply standing in the middle of the road, looking at us and seeming to ask, "So??”
Finally we left that plain and drove over a saddle and down to Laura, a very small settlement which does boast an apparently excellent cultural centre. We stopped and used the toilets there, but decided to call on the way back past, depending on the cash left in our pockets.
Needless to say, nearly everywhere up here operates on cash, there being very few banks, and fewer EFTPOS facilities. We have drawn a sum of cash out, and while we would prefer to use our card as much as possible, will mostly resort to the spending this little horde of cash.
When we reached the Hann River Roadhouse, we found a place clear of the road and the roadhouse, under some lovely trees, retrieved our chairs from the back of the cruiser and sat eating our lunch and waving to the vehicles as they barreled on through. At the Hann River close by, there were the inevitable signs warning of crocs, however when we wandered down to the river after eating, we noticed road workers working thigh deep in the river repairing braces under the bridge. Hopefully for their sake the crocs had gone out for the day.
We paused again at Musgrave Roadhouse where the old telegraph office now stands as a refreshment stop and advertises itself as an information centre. Again we made use of the facilities then had a look to see what extra information might be on offer. The roadhouses are really there to offer meals to people who are not as well organized or as dedicated to self-catering as ourselves, and of course to sell beer, beer and anything else of the same to the passing public. (It should be noted here that the drink driving limits here in
That suggests that there are a whole lot of drunks driving around the roads up here, but we have seen no evidence of this. There are however an awful lot of crazy drivers who seem to have no respect for their vehicles. We were told the other day that just in this one Wet Season, there have been over thirty vehicles lost in the river crossings and in the past couple of weeks several fatalities. The advice when driving on these roads is that when a vehicle approaches, one should slow down, even to a halt, until the vehicle has passed and their dust subsided. This is not only good safety advice, but necessary. Soon after we hit the gravel road before Laura, we encountered a road train bearing down on us at one hell of a bat, headlights in the middle of great clouds of bull dust. As it past we were left in a black hole, unable to see anything for about half a minute. Obviously when anything passes us, we slow right down, allowing it to move well forward of us to minimize the dust eating exercise.
It was about three o’clock that we arrived at Coen. We had debated about where to camp and decided that we would have a look at the first option before considering the second. In the Camps Australia 5, Charlie’s’ Mine looked interesting and required payment of just a gold coin donation. We do appreciate that this book is out of date, so thought that it might be as much as say, five dollars. Our new
We turned east at Coen, drove out past the rubbish tip up a gully for three kilometres, following a series of hand written signs: 4 U 2 C, Bottle House and Mine 4U2C, Camping and finally (which should have rung alert bells) 4 U 2 F C. Finally we pulled in to a garden of bougainvillea and once well tended trees, and a collection of quaint buildings and rusting mine machinery. The conveniences were marked: Romeo and Juliet, Shaft and Tunnels, Adam and Eve, and 4U2P.
We parked and found our host coming down from his house to greet us. He was a delightful eccentric has-been, in his mid-sixties, an immigrant from Malta, a some-time gold miner, a sometime sugar cane cutter, a man with a million stories and lives, full of the proverbial and as so many men of that age whose first language is not English, managed to adopt the very worst of that second language. We were trapped and before we knew it, had parted with twenty precious dollars in cash. We found a flat space in this almost Mediterranean garden, and set up our camp, which I have to confess, took some time. We vowed that the next time we would be more efficient. We then realised that the one water supply was far away, and while the situation did have its charm, we had been stung for an unpowered site with very very poor amenities.
As we had passed over the Bamboo Range, we had stopped to gather wood, and made good use of the roof rack to carry it on to camp. Here at Charlie’s we lit a fire in the stone fireplace, and sat after dinner, as the full moon rose over the hill and the stars all came out to greet us. Over the wall but out of sight, we heard much snuffling and scuffling; we thought it was probably roos or wallabies.
This morning after we had packed up, we walked up to his house to have a nosey through. Trays of sliced tomatoes were lain out in the sunshine, soon to be preserved in olive oil. The housework had been down last year, he said, probably when the showers in the Eve’s had last been cleaned out. His atrium is full of old newspaper cuttings and photos of him in his glory days and I would say that he would have been quite a lady killer in his time. Walls and arches of glass bottle ends, floors of recycled tiles, wrought irons structures about the house as the garden worked from scraps rescued from the rubbish tip. Proudly he showed us his fridge freezer and television, also rescued from the tip. He scratches a living from ripping off us tourists with the other hand out for his pension from “Julia” (Gillard). Certainly he is a character, and that in the end is where we got our monies worth!
Just north of Coen we passed the Quarantine inspection point where we will have to stop when we eventually travel south. The road runs straight for such long distances that it is easy to detect vehicles coming toward one and commence evasive action. Today we did not seem to climb or descend many hills except for that when we came down to the Gulf Plains as we neared the turnoff to Weipa. Yesterday we had traveled up and down the gradual hills, until we were traveling along the top of the
Once we turned
We stopped at a turn off to a cattle station that now apparently reaps its income by offering camping and the station experience to travelers, where we found a lovely dam, just where the tarseal stretch recommences. (Ever fifty kilometres or so there are stretches of seal where you can overtake safely and give welcome respite from the constant shuddering and shaking) We pulled our chairs out and ate sandwiches made from thawed soggy bread while watching the birds over the water. It was very relaxing.
Eventually we gathered our picnic mess up and continued on, finally reaching the last twelve kilometres where the road passes through Rio Tinto land and from where one can see evidence of the bauxite mining. We soon found this camp, on the banks of the Mission River, close to the mouth where it flows into the Gulf of Carpentaria, and secured a spot right on the waterfront. We took much less time in setting up today, already veterans, took a dip in the camp pool, christening my new two piece “cozzie”, then found the gas cooker has fallen apart when we came to boil up the billy for our afternoon coffee.
Fortunately, with some assistance from our neighbour who carries a box of o’rings for just such eventualities, Chris fixed it to a point where we were able to boil the kettle and subsequently cook dinner. Thank goodness, because I was already psyching myself up to eating a can of cold baked beans for dinner. We understand that there is a camping store here and so will check out a more permanent fix tomorrow when the stores reopen.
As I write this, I am sitting out in the night with a lamp burning n the table beside me. The sky is full of stars and the moon is already up. Flocks of flying foxes passed overhead earlier, long after we watched the sun go down into the sea. All is well except for the knowledge that tonight with the crowd of campers in here, I will have to dress and walk with the torch some distance a couple of times during the night to the loos. Then I shall think of our caravan sitting all alone in
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