Townsville Area

4 Nov – Early start to the airport for our flight to Townsville via Brisbane. No screens so 5 hours of reading our Kobos. We caught an Uber to the storage place where “Andy” was waiting for us. Put the bikes on the back and then discovered the cranking battery was flat. Had to take a house battery out and jump start. No problems. We shopped before heading into Townsville city and the same camp that we stayed last trip at Rowes Bay. It was fairly hot (around 33C) so we enjoyed a cool off in the camp pool after we had set everything up. Dinner outside with the sunset around 6:00pm. A good long day with everything achieved. Bed was good!!

5 Nov – A good sleep and not too hot at night (around 22C).  I took the bikes off the back, pumped up the tyres and we rode along the cycleway to the Strand, the main Townsville beach. This is a great area and has a “stinger net” where we could safely swim without the fear of being stung by the jelly fish. We had a great morning with a couple of swims and reading in the shade of the palm trees. Back to the camp where we spent the afternoon at the camp pool, cooler than the sea!

6 Nov – Our trip this time is to re-position “Andy” from Townsville to Lithgow, just outside Sydney, so that we are in a position to head south next March. We have 4 weeks for this trip, so we have plenty of time. We headed north out of Townsville and drove 120kms to Ingham and then turned out to the coast, past the smelly smokey sugar refinery, to Forrest Beach. We camped in a large domain right by the beach with another stinger net. Unfortunately, the swimming in the stinger nets is only good a couple of hours either side of high tide.

7 Nov – Into our togs early for a swim (high tide) and a sit under the Palm trees in the shade. After lunch we walked around the small town and back along the beach, paid our camping fee ($10/night) and bought an ice-cream. Another campervan came in around sunset and we chatted with them.

8 Nov – Much cooler in the night and even had to pull up the doona! We headed back into Ingham for shopping, (stuff we forgot on our first day) check the tyre pressures and buy some plywood to fix the house battery locker. We drove 50kms south and then followed a rough road into the Paluma National Park and a camp at Big Crystal Creek. The creek forms a beautiful fresh water pool, called Paradise Pool, 100m from where we are camped. We tried the pool out. It was clear and cool with many fish swimming around. Just the ticket to cool off in. Quite a few mossies around at sunset!!

9 Nov – The weather is very unusual according to the locals. It should be cooler but much higher humidity. Today the temperature went to 37C but as it is dry is quite bearable. Being Saturday, all the locals have arrived at Paradise Pool for a picnic and a swim. We spent some time cutting and fitting the plywood, bought yesterday, to form a new base for the house batteries. We walked up to the pool to cool off and read in the shade in the afternoon before returning to the pool for another dip later in the day.

10 Nov – Swimming in Paradise Pool by 10:00am. Lots of families already there. Packed up and drove back out to the coast at Balgal Beach and found a site straight over from the beach and a grassy reserve. Low tide, so there will be no swimming in the stringer nets during the day. We sat in the shade of the trees overlooking the beach with a nice cooling on shore breeze. Temp a pleasant 29C.

11 Nov – Out of bed and straight into our togs for a swim at high tide. The water is at bath temp. After breakfast the reserve, which is also the local war memorial, was set up for a Remembrance Day Service. At around 10:30pm people started to arrive, so we sat under out awning and watched the service which included the singing of the NZ National Anthem and every possible local organization laying wreaths. We both have been bitten by some small insect giving very itchy welts. The Camping area filled up around dinner time and we even had an Asian family squeeze their caravan in next to us, with much yelling of instructions, at around 10:30pm just as we went were going to sleep.

12 Nov – Another pre-breakfast swim. We left Balgal Beach and headed south back towards Townsville for a last beach stop before going inland. This is another free camp right on Saunders Beach. No stinger nets here but some people braved the possible stingers and croc for a swim. We settled for reading in the shade and the cooling sea breeze. Later, when it was cooler, we walked along the beach and the small town.

13 Nov – We drove back into the outskirts of Townsville and after a quick shop (more insect repellent and anti-histamine) we headed inland following the road towards Charters Towers and stopped at a mango orchid where we could camp for the night. Very nice sitting under the old mango trees. At sunset thousands of fruit bats flew over us headed to their overnight roosting trees.

14 Nov – We drove west up the hills to Charters Towers. We stopped here earlier this year on our way to Townsville. As the forecast was for 39C and Val had a load of washing we went to a camp just short of the town. The camp had a great swimming pool and we spent the afternoon swimming and reading. As we had power, we ran the air-con and the interior is nice and cool. Tomorrow we start our trip south on the Gregory Development Road and it will be a few days before we get to any towns. We have been watching and listening to the news and so far, our trip will be nowhere near where the major bushfires are. We will be well west of them. This could change though!!