MT ISA/CLONCURRY/BURKE&WILLS/NORMANTON

Dear all,

2/7/09
Awning fixed!!

Left Mt Isa for the short (170 kms) trip to Cloncurry. Lots of soaring eagles again and many caravans on the road. Petrol is now 134.9 and temperature today is 30 degrees.

The caravan park is really nice. It is quite green and, although on the highway, we don't get any noise from the road-trains (I might regret saying that when sleeping tonight!)

3/7/09
Road-trains not a problem. Slept well. Cold night.

Cloncurry was originally founded by a grazier called Ernest Henry who found copper in the area and named his mine Great Australia, but when the district was surveyed in 1876, it was called Cloncurry after the Cloncurry River, which Burke of Burke & Wills fame, had named after his cousin, Lady Elizabeth Cloncurry from Ireland. The Ernest Henry mine is still here and being worked today. Cloncurry is where the first Qantas flight landed from Charleville. The original hanger is still in use today as an aerodrome with the words "Queensland and Northern Territory Air Services" painted across the entrance. It has changed in appearance somewhat but the words are still there.



The cemeteries in Cloncurry show some of it's history in that there are separate ones for the Chinese miners of the day and the Afghan camel train drivers. Unfortunately, these are long gone and there are only historical signs indicating where they once were. There is only 1 headstone left in the Afghan cemetery and this is where a Mohammedan priest was buried. All the Afghan graves faced towards Mecca and date back to the mid-1880's. Dame Mary Gilmore and her husband are also buried in the Cloncurry cemetery.

The Chinaman Creek Dam is a pretty spot but has been closed to recreational use due to a large saltwater crocodile that has been seen in the area. We stayed there for ages but didn't see anything. I'm starting to think they are using these signs to entice tourists like us to the area!

We are starting to see much more aboriginal history the more north we travel. Mt Isa seems to have a problem, but as we get closer to the Northern Territory, the more cultural they are.


4/7/09
Left Cloncurry for the 180km trip to Burke & Wills Roadhouse. Road good and arrived at 1pm. The road from Cloncurry to Normanton to Karumba is called the Matilda Highway and is the route taken by Burke, Wills and King in their effort to get from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria.

Oh my gosh - this is a real roadhouse! I really don't know what I expected, but all it is is a big service station in the middle of nowhere. There used to be a camel called Lulu that roamed around the roadhouse and most of the stickers and postcards show her in the pictures. No-one seems to know what happened to Lulu - I was afraid to ask! The "caravan park" is at the back in the scrub with power poles and taps for water. The amenities block is huge but only one light bulb in the middle of the ceiling. The roadhouse is licenced so, after setting up, off we went to the bar. The bar is literally that - a bench - but surprisingly, out to the side, was a really nice verandah with timber tables and comfy chairs. The bar, roadhouse, and "caravan park" is run by backpackers from Scotland, Ireland and Germany. The owner apparently lives far, far away and is making a lot of money out of the roadhouse but doesn't put much back in.



Because the roadhouse is so far away from anywhere, they can pretty-well do what they like and all the young musterers who work in bush camps all week for the companies that own the stations, come to the roadhouse on Saturday, party all night (no police out here to enforce closing time) then it's back to work on Sunday night out in the bush. We spoke with many of them and they are gorgeous, polite, hardworking young men. I awoke around 3 in the morning and the music was blaring.

We had breakfast at the roadhouse - $12 for bacon and eggs, $12 for savoury mince on toast, $8 for eggs on toast. Ken went for $2.50 raisin toast (2 slices) and I went for $2 toast with vegemite. Even though it is so remote and so rough, we found it - well, the people - interesting and the place a must to see.

On the road again ...................

5/7/09
The road from Burke&Wills Roadhouse to Normanton is dreadful. We had to get right off the single laned highway each time a roadtrain was heading for us. It took at least 3 mins for the red dust to clear each time before we could get back onto the bitumen. There was a lot of road-kill - all kangaroos. However, it's quite lovely to see the scenery change as we move north. Also, we are now starting to see brolgas by the side of the road among the spinifex and the ground covered in ant hills, some taller than me.


Arrived Normanton at 1pm. The caravan park is really nice, although they do cram you in. We are fortunate in that our site is at the end of the road and we look out onto the park Managers backyard which is covered in green grass and dark pink bougainvilleas. Tomorrow we'll explore!

Lots of love,
Frances and Ken xox