 |
| An Austin 7; the first car to drive to the tip |
Gareth called and spoke to Sara. Priscilla was ready for
pick up. Gareth wasn’t the most inspiring of Landrover mechanics. He answered
most of my questions with a shrug of his shoulders, and in his too soft Welsh lilt, he offered the
obvious but blindingly useless observation , “It’s a Landrover mate, you’ve got
to expect these things.” Makes his choice of profession seem gifted. Still, we
were back on the road, and it was action stations as we prepared for our
greatest adventure having done the least amount of planning.
 |
| Kids in a sprinkler at Moreton Telegraph Station |
Again we had heard the horror stories of strandings and
punctures and drownings and other Top End type disasters. Again we chose to
ignore them. We parked Kimmy up the back for the princely sum of $6 a night
(seventh night free), and managed to get out of Cairns in the late afternoon.
Too late unfortunately for coffee tasting at Coffee World, but not too late to
pick up a new coffee cup for Sara and a frypan from Crazy Clarks, because we’d
forgotten to pack one.
 |
| Wenlock River |
Mt Carbine was the
first stop and Mt Carbine has a pub. Mt Carbine also has a tungsten mine, a
lake popular with bird watchers, and a quiet caravan park on top of the hill.
The pub was a hit with trashie mags for Sara, free pool, darts, hookey, and
table soccer for the kids, and beer for me. Could have done without the cheesy
chicken and mango salad though.
We left the next morning having finally taken some advice on
board. We would take the inland route up and the coastal route back. Simple.
Armed with the simplest of directions, we eventually found the bird watchers
lake, but no ducks of distinction. From there the Peninsula Development Road
(PDR) stretched away into the distance. The days highlight was the iced coffee
in Laura, and learning that an Austin 7 was the first car to drive to the tip.
Not sure what Gareth would have made of that. A long day got us to the Archer
River Roadhouse, famous for…wait for it… the Archerburger! It is apparently
very important these days to be famous for something, but I’ve driven past too
many famous burger stops now to be impressed. No, it was time to open up some
cans of beans and put the new stove to the test.
 |
| Palm Creek; 8ft drop into a clay pit, no Discos allowed |
Jocy had said Weipa was worth a look, so we had a look.
First stop was the cultural centre, which happened to be closed. It was closed
because Rio Tinto, the small company that runs / owns Weipa, was celebrating 10
years of running an indigenous mining training program with a buffet lunch.
Noting our kids distress at being excluded from a museum, we were assured we
were welcome and so we went in, but that wasn’t the good bit. A big bloke
called Frank wandered over to our skinny blonde kids and asked if they needed a
feed because they’d over catered. He didn’t need to ask twice. Pies, pastries,
salads and fruit juice. Heaven. And then they brought out dessert. We rolled
out of Weipa after the obligatory, but ultimately duckless stop at the poo
ponds.
 |
| Elliot Falls |
More driving, a night at the Moreton Telegraph station, a
raid on a mango tree, and we headed off again. A brief look at the start of the
Old Telegraph Track (OTT) was all we needed to decide that attempting it in
Priscilla was well beyond her all too complicated engineering and us.
Fortunately the PDR is a super highway and we headed up to Elliot Falls for the
night. It got a bit tricky on the way in, but we made it, and prepared to
tackle the easier sections of the OTT the next morning. I’d been assured by
several blokes who were drinking beer for breakfast that the chicken tracks
were very doable. The reccie looked okay, but halfway across Canal Creek, panic
set in. I backed out, and slunk past my smirking blue singletted, Toyota driving friends. Pride
got in the way of comfortable conversation for a little while, but ultimately
sanity had prevailed and on to the tip we drove.
No comments:
Post a Comment