Lissner

Carnarvon Gorge to Charters Towers

HW. On the road again, heading for Emerald through scrubby countryside. Our drive out of Carnarvon along the dirt road was a lot less eventful with little dust inside the van and no disasters in the fridge! We stopped the night in a van park in Emerald and headed off again next morning – our mission being to get to the Cape within our time frame. More exploring of inland Queensland will have to wait for another trip. On the Friday night we free-camped beside the road along with at least a dozen other vans at a truck roadside stop with toilets. Met more nice people. Luckily there weren’t too many B-triples carrying cattle passing by in the night. (They sure are noisy and very smelly!)

We arrived in Charters Towers late morning on Saturday 6th and the centre of town was bustling with people and traffic. After setting up at a van park just out of town we drove back to the centre mid afternoon and because it’s a country town, almost everything closes after midday on a Saturday and you could have fired a gun down the main street and not hit a thing. There are some lovely old buildings in the town which is famous for its gold mining and for having the first stock exchange in Australia. We drove up to Towers Hill nearby which overlooks the town and the surrounding countryside which is flat as far as the eye can see. As luck would have it there was a motor show and swap meet at the local showgrounds over the weekend so guess where we spent a couple of hours on Sunday?? We looked around some of the old beautifully restored cars and Frank had a fossick through the tools (both old and new) and got a couple of bits he needed. We had a nice relaxing stay here.

FW. Including a few photos from Towers Hill (approx 300m high) where the view to the Nth, Sth, E, W is similar, flat right to the horizon. A lot of the buildings in the town have been restored and look fabulous, including the Police Station, a Mural depicting the town’s history and the Stock Exchange building which was supposed to be the first in Australia and the largest in the world in its time.
As Heather mentioned she took me to the local swap meet and I am including a photo of some Fergi’s and other farm machinery for your interest Max.Read more