Wow! What a fabulous day!

We had to be up early to leave the park and drive to Pier One, Rosslyn Bay Boat Harbour to catch a Freedom Fast Cat for our Adventure Tour of Great Keppel Island. The tour we booked included:

• transfer to Great Keppel Island.
• Morning tea onboard.
• glass bottom boat tour with a Marine Biologist
• Some free time to explore the island
• BBQ lunch onboard
• Snorkelling on the reef
• Boom-netting (for the adventurous)
• Afternoon tea
• Transfer back to the mainland

Our confirmation email suggested we pack light for our tour so we set off with just beach bags, swimmers, towels etc. We didn’t even take our water bottles as they are heavy and water was supplied.

We arrived with plenty of time to spare and quickly checked in. Riley and I bought a waterproof pouch for our phones so we could take underwater photos. We weren’t too sure how that would go but we’d give it a try! We were all given pink wristbands to wear indicating which tour we were on.

Right on time at 9am boarding was commenced and our big catamaran cruised out of the harbour very quickly at 9.15am. Maddie became very excited as soon as we left the harbour because she spotted a pod of dolphins off to the left of the boat. The skipper heard her excitement and saw her frantic pointing so he stopped the boat so other passengers could take a look too. Not far further along Maddie spied more dolphins. She became our dolphin spotter!

It seemed no time at all, only 30 minutes, and we were pulling up at Great Keppel Island. The big catamaran just pushes up onto the beach and the crew man-handle a walkway that’s attached to the front of the boat and once it is settled on the sand people can disembark. Our pink wristbands group was told to stay onboard for our morning tea and the crew served us up some lamingtons and a delicious cake along with tea, coffee and cordial.

Next up was our glass bottom boat tour with Brenda, a marine biologist, who skippered us around to some reefs and explained the various types of marine life that we could see below. We saw thousands of fish of all sizes and colours, soft and hard coral, stingrays, sea cucumbers, clams, and more. We toured over one section of reef that had strange man-made star shaped frames over it and Brenda explained she was involved in that project. That part of the reef had suffered a bleaching event and the frames were an experiment to see if the reef could be restored. Small pieces of coral were zip tied to the frames and within 12 months new coral could be seen growing all over the frames. It has been a huge success. The coral just grew completely over the zip ties.

We had an hour to have a wander around the island and we followed the rest of the passengers off the boat. Great Keppel Island used to be home to a 5* resort but sadly the resort did not survive the GFC in 2008 and was forced to close. The buildings have deteriorated and are set to be demolished as they are too far gone to fix. A bit sad. The remaining buildings house a smaller resort called GKI Hideaway Holiday Village and after having a bit of a wander along the pathways and boardwalks Rich and I thought it was a bit run down and tired looking.

In front of the main building which houses a restaurant, bar and shop we found huge sandbags. They were the size of a bus. The sandbags were placed to prevent further erosion after the last cyclone hammered the island. We hoped they work or the building will end up in the sea!

Sadly it started drizzling rain during this time on the island so sitting on the beach or having a swim wasn’t very appealing.

Back on board we enjoyed a delicious and simple BBQ lunch with steak, sausages, onions, salad and a bread roll while the boat made its way to the reef where our snorkelling would be. And the best part was, the sun came out. It was a glorious sunny afternoon.

The snorkelling was definitely the highlight of the tour. All snorkelling gear was supplied so at the back of the boat you were fitted with your wetsuit, fins, mask and snorkel then you could enter the water from the swim platform that had been lowered into the water. I also chose to take a pool noodle with me. Ben was the first passenger in the water and he was the last one to get out. Safe to say Ben LOVED snorkelling! Every now and then his face would pop up from the water and he was wearing the biggest grin.

The marine life on the reef was amazing and again we saw sea cucumbers, an enormous stingray and a little one too, thousands of different fish, so many different types of coral, Ben even found a clam! The only thing missing was a turtle but no luck there!

Once everyone, including Ben, had got back onboard, the crew let down a boom net from the back of the swim platform. Our three kids and three girls and their dad were the only ones giving it a go. Crewman Liam followed behind in the rib in case anyone dropped off the net he could retrieve them. Of course Ben jumped straight in and when he surfaced quickly grabbed hold of the net and was dragged along. More big grins on Ben’s face. The others were all a bit more hesitant but eventually they all tried jumping in, crawling back up onto the boat and jumping in again. What fun! We reckoned all the kids would sleep well.

Afternoon tea was served when the boom netters were back onboard then the big cat manoeuvred back to the main beach to collect all the other passengers before heading back to the mainland. Maddie kept her eye out for dolphins and was rewarded again just as we approached the mouth of the boat harbour. We arrived back at Rosslyn Boat Harbour at 4.15pm.

Back to camp and it was a tired crew who sat around the dinner table. It was off to bed early for everyone. What a fabulous day!

We got away from Rules Beach before 9am and set off towards Yeppoon some 270km away.

At Miriam Vale, population 500, we had to stop at the train lines for the City of Maryborough train to make a quick stop at Miriam Vale station before continuing on through the intersection. There was a sign on the pub that said ‘Our town is so small we don’t have a town drunk, so we take it in turns’. Katie pulled into the Lions Park to use the dump point.

We rejoined the A1 Bruce Highway at Miriam Vale. As it is still Qld school holidays there were lots of RV’s on the road. Quite a few were parked up in the Lions Park in Miriam Vale, probably having some morning tea.

We’d booked into Elysium Retreat & Stays for two nights which is a 10 minute drive inland from Yeppoon. I was excited to be setting off and travelling on roads I’d never been on before.

What a lovely surprise was Gladstone. Gladstone parks & gardens department must have a huge budget. The town is gorgeous with lovely manicured lawns and gorgeous gardens. I didn’t really know much about Gladstone but after our quick visit it is somewhere I would definitely go back to for a further look around.

Gladstone has a population of around 45,000 people and is home to Queenslands largest multi-commodity shipping port and is the fifth largest in Australia.

We drove down towards the boat harbour and found the Visitors Centre. The lady there recommended we drive around the boat harbour to the other side and we would be on a little spit of land between the boat harbour and the coal terminal with views across to the islands and the aluminium terminal.

The Gladstone area is known for coal mines and the coal export terminal is the fourth largest in the world. There was a huge ship at the terminal and some huge tug boats waiting to go out to sea to guide the huge ships in. 50 million tonnes of coal pass through each year.

The Gladstone aluminium smelter is further down the harbour. A fellow in the visitors centre told us 2 tonnes of bauxite makes one tonne of alumina powder and then 2 tonnes of alumina powder makes 1 tonne of aluminium.

We stopped for a bite to eat in the lovely park before heading back out of town.

We passed by a huge power station. The NRG Gladstone Power Station is Queenslands largest power station with six coal-fired turbines. Power has been generated there since 1976. It is jointly owned by Rio Tinto, NRG Energy and others.

We crossed the wide Calliope River and its anabranch with mudflats and mangroves. The kids were convinced they saw croc slides in the mud. They might be right.

A little further on we passed the Rio Tinto alumina mine at Yarwun. The highway went under a conveyor belt bridge that takes 3 million tonnes of alumina to the terminal each year. Continuing northwards and at Mount Larson we rejoined the A1 Bruce Highway again.

Our next stop was for fuel and a gas bottle in Rockhampton on the very busy Bruce Highway. Rocky, as the city is known, is home to some 80,000 people and it felt like a big city. Gold was found in the area in the 1850’s and this led to an influx of people seeking their fortune. The Mount Morgan gold mine was one of the most productive mines in the world at the time and the result of this is the many heritage Victorian buildings.

The Central Queensland University has its main campus in Rocky. Agriculture, particularly cattle production, is a dominant industry and this is recognised in the town by seven statues of bulls, known as ‘the Big Bulls’. I managed to get pics of 3 of them!

We were a bit surprised leaving Rocky that the road to Yeppoon was dual lane but pretty soon we came across roadworks where the road was being made dual lane then it dropped down to single lane for the rest of the way.

There were lots of cone shaped hills that looked like they might be remnants of old volcanos. No wonder the grass was so lush in the paddocks that it comes up to the bellies of the cattle. It’s growing in volcanic soil.

We found our way to Elysium Retreat and after checking in, set up camp. We were next to each other again.

I made a big mistake while Rich was backing in to our site and the motorhome ran into a tree branch. It doesn’t look too bad but I think I’ll get up there and put some tape over it in case there’s a hole in the sikaflex. We don’t want water getting in. Will have to get it looked at when we get home. My bad!!

It was still quite warm so we all dressed in our swimwear and headed into Yeppoon to check out the Yeppoon Lagoon. The water was really cold at first but we all enjoyed a swim. It was great to hear the kids laughing and having fun.

As our tour to Great Keppel Island was the next morning we decided to drive out to the harbour and find where we need to be at 8.45am the next morning. We found it with no difficulty and then timed our trip back to camp. It took 20 mins so we need to leave around 8am to make sure we are on time. There’s a large carpark near the wharf where we can leave the car for the day, and it’s free! Even better! Morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea is supplied and they have tea, coffee, water and cordial available all day so we really only have to pack our beach wear, towels, hats and sunscreen. Wetsuits and snorkel equipment are also supplied. How exciting! We will be snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef!

What a lovely relaxing day we had at Rules Beach. I actually slept in until 8.30am and was totally surprised when I woke to see what the time was.

We spent the morning at the beach and what a lovely morning it was. The sun was out, not a cloud in the sky and it was 21 degrees. I did stick my feet in the water but it was way too cold for me however the boys went in and enjoyed playing in the surf.

Pa went back to camp to read his book. I stayed on the beach and started another book. Katie watched the kids and they all played, dug in the sand and sunbaked. How nice it was to feel the warm sun after the freezing weather we’ve had so far.

After lunch Katie and I spent a couple of hours planning the next week. Where to go, what to do etc. We have one week until we should be in Airlie Beach so we had a busy time finding tours that we wanted to do and accomodation that would suit the various tours.

One of the big tick items for this trip was to snorkel on the Great Barrier Reef. Unfortunately we can’t do that from Airlie Beach as they were booked out already for the whole week next week so we had to be a bit creative. Instead we are booked to go to Great Keppel Island for a tour, glass-bottom boat tour, BBQ lunch and snorkeling on Thursday. So we need to make tracks the next day so we get to Yeppoon where we will catch the Fast Cat to Great Keppel Island.

We did manage to book a day trip to Whitehaven Beach and Hill Inlet for when we are in Airlie and we are really looking forward to that.

So we had to up and ready to get on the road the next morning and get some 280km done via Gladstone and Rockhampton.

Leaving Bundaberg around 9ish we headed north towards Angus Water and 1770. We had 150km to travel to 1770 from our great farm stay at Riverview Ranch near Elliot Heads.

It was an uneventful drive and as soon as we arrived in Agnes Water we went directly to the Visitors Centre. We were unable to book into any of the campgrounds in Agnes Water or 1770 that were on or near a beach but we managed to find a Big4 at Rules Beach some 60km south of Agnes Water. We booked in there for a couple of nights.

We drove through 1770 and stopped at the headland lookout for a short look at the view. I have to say we were totally underwhelmed by the twin towns. I realise it was Qld school holidays so that’s why it was so busy. The campground at 1770 that I’d heard about so much was just jam packed. That’s my idea of a nightmare camp spot!

So after a quick look around the twin towns we headed to the new shopping centre where there is a large IGA supermarket. I asked the check out lady about the town and she told me that during the pandemic the town grew in population from 3,000 people to over 8,000. Hence the new shopping centre built 2 years ago to service all the extra residents.

We were all quite pleased to leave the little towns and head back south to the Big4 Rules Beach. We discovered on arrival that the park is very new, only 17 months old. It is large and the sites are huge. Of course the amenities are fabulous and the camp kitchen has to be one of the best I’ve ever seen. There’s a walk over the sand dune to the beach.

After setting up camp next to each other with our awnings facing each other we enjoyed a scrumptious lamb roast dinner that had been cooking in the slow cooker all day. Off to the beach the next morning!

What a fabulous day we had exploring Bundaberg. If you’ve never been to Bundaberg then it’s definitely worth the trip. Bundaberg is situated on the Burnett River which flows to the sea at Burnett Heads. The Bundaberg district is a ‘food bowl’ of Australia and as you drive around you see a patchwork of green, productive farmlands on the rich red volcanic soil.

Think Bundaberg and everyone probably thinks Bundaberg Rum or Bundaberg Ginger Beer but there’s more to Bundaberg than that. There’s also wineries, breweries and so much seasonal produce including avocados, pineapples, macadamias, strawberries, limes, mandarins, ginger, sweet potatoes, sugar cane and more. All growing in the rich red soil.

The Port of Bundaberg is located on the Burnett River and this is where you can catch a cruise to Lady Musgrave Island on the Southern Great Barrier Reef. Bargara, and Elliot Heads are the spots on the coast. Here you will find lots of holiday lets, van parks, BBQ spots, playgrounds and surf beaches.

This is the first time I have come across the narrow gauge railways that are used to haul sugar cane to the sugar mills from the farm gate. All over the region you find tracks and crossings marked with the usual train lights to let you know a train is coming. The engines pick up the loaded bins from the farm and take them to the local mill for processing. We were quite excited when we had to stop at one of these crossings as the red lights were flashing and we had to wait for the little train to go past. The narrow gauge railway lines are only 610mm wide.

Our first stop of our tourist day was the Mon Repos Turtle Centre. This state of the art facility showcases the incredible work that has been done and continues to be done to safeguard the survival of turtles. Much of the work is undertaken by volunteers and there has been significant success in protecting the turtles that come each year to nest on Mon Repos Beach. It has been a Conservation park since 1981 and research is ongoing to protect these wonderful creatures.

The centre has fabulous displays telling the story of turtles from the varied types of turtles, to their life cycle, to their battle with climate and man made changes and children are encouraged to touch everything. The centre includes a theatre that continually shows a movie experience about the work done at Mon Repos and the turtles coming to breed there each year.

Did you know that of the 7 species of turtle in the world 6 of them are found in Australian waters? Mon Repos is the largest nesting hub for marine turtles on the east Australian mainland coast.

Outside the centre there are two boardwalks that take visitors right down to the beach. It would be amazing to be there during the season from November to March to see these amazing creatures come ashore and using their flippers to haul themselves up into the sand dunes, dig their nest and lay up to 150 eggs, cover the nest and then make their way back to the sea.

We all really enjoyed learning more about these amazing animals.

Our next stop was to visit the Hinkler Museum situated in the Botanic Gardens on the northern side of the Burnett River. This meant we drove from Mon Repos back into town and across one of the two road bridges across the very wide Burnett River.

By the time we got there is was lunch time and we enjoyed a lovely lunch at Cafe 1928 in the Botanic Gardens before visiting the Hinkler Aviation Museum and Hinkler House. Wow, Bert Hinkler was an Aussie legend and what a fabulous museum dedicated to his amazing flying career. There was a cinema with a movie telling the story of Bert’s aviation adventures, and lots of interactive experiences. The kids loved the flight simulators and trying to take off and land various types of aircraft.

Bert designed and built his first aircraft, a glider, in 1912 in his parents backyard. Bert was the first person to fly solo from London to Australia in 1928 (hence the name of the cafe next door!). He was also the first person to fly solo across the southern Atlantic Ocean.

During the First World War Bert flew for the Royal Navy Air Service in Belgium, France and Italy. He was an ‘exceptional mathematician and inventor’ and made a lot of instruments that were used up until the Second World War.

In WWI, Hinkler invented a machine gun adaptor for air gunners. Back then, when the biplanes were flying upside down in combat, the hot, ejected shells would fall and burn the chest of the gunners as they fired. Hinkler’s invention had the ejected shells all flying off to one side instead.

Wikipedia

Sadly when he was just 40 years old Bert died in the Italian hills when he crashed on one his record breaking attempts. He was so highly thought of that he was given a full state funeral in Italy and is buried in Florence.

Next door to the Aviation Museum is ‘Mon Repos’ the Hinkler house from Southhampton in England. It was demolished and reassembled in the Botanic Gardens in Bundaberg brick by brick and visitors can tour the house that Bert and his wife Nance once lived in. It’s fascinating.

We had booked a 2pm tour at the Bundaberg Rum Distillery so we had to cut short our visit to the Hinkler Aviation Museum. I think we could have all stayed there for longer and I would have loved to see more of the Botanic Gardens. Oh well. Always leave something for next time!

We set off back across the Burnett River to the Bundaberg Rum Distillery.

What a fabulous tour led by very capable guides, Shaz and Kobes, who kept their presentation amusing with lots of ‘dad’ jokes. They were great. We learnt how a group of men met in a pub once to try to decide what to do with all the molasses that is produced as a by product from sugar cane production. They came up with the idea of making rum and the Bundaberg Distillery Co was born.

Rum is made from just three ingredients, molasses, water and yeast. We were guided through the working distillery and shown the molasses tanks, which you could smell as soon as you were near and then on through the process until the rum was in barrels. At the end of the tour you could taste 2 types of rum but as none of us were rum drinkers Richard gave away our tickets to other people who would appreciate the drink.

On our way back to camp we drove by the Port of Bundaberg, the beachside Bargara and then back to our farm stay.

We arrived back to camp around 5ish and Pa quickly got the fire going, Katie prepared beef stroganoff for our dinner, and the kids had a soccer game.

We had another convivial evening around the fire. We’d had a great day being tourists.

We woke to a lovely warm sunny day at Pialba Beach in Hervey Bay. Katie & Maddie joined us for a walk on the beach. The boys were still in their swags. The caravan park is right on the beach so we only had to walk through the trees and we were on the beach. The tide was going out and we found the beach strewn with shells and lots of small pieces of coral. I do love a walk on a nice beach!

When we arrived back from our walk on the beach Katie and I got chatting with the campers next to Katie. They are a young family with two young kids who were in week 5 of their 18 month lap of our country. They were having a great time and settling into life on the road. What an amazing experience for those two kids to remember.

Our boys were finally out of bed and ready to get going so we all piled into the Prado and headed off to explore Hervey Bay in the daylight. Ben and Maddie wanted to go to the Skate Park with their scooters while the rest of us drove around Hervey Bay so the skate park was our first stop. We dropped them off and continued along The Esplanade which runs all along the beach.

Hervey Bay appears to be a few beach villages that have eventually joined up to become one large town. We stayed in Pialba, next is Scarness, Torquay and Urangan. Each one has a set of shops. It was all vey laid back.

We stopped off to check out the boat harbour and admired the millions of dollars worth of boats. Harvey Bay is the whale watching capital of Australia and we found whale sculptures and lots of shops selling whale watching cruises.

Saturday Markets were on at Torquay and there seemed to be lots of stalls with many people wandering about. All along the Esplanade is a walking track and that was being well used with walkers, families on push bikes and lots of e-scooters.

After packing up and leaving Pialba around 12.30pm we headed towards Bundaberg munching on ham and cheese sandwiches I made for everyone to eat along the way.

Approaching Childers we started to see macadamia plantations. As we got closer to Bundaberg we saw avocado plantations and large fields of sugar cane.

Upon arrival we drove across the very wide Burnett River and back again before stopping for fuel then heading out to Riverview Ranch farm stay. $25 per night for 2A unpowered. $30 per night for 2A & 2C unpowered. RV’s must be self contained. Basically a large paddock that the owners mow and you are free to choose anywhere to camp. They have a number of fire pits for guests to use and sell wood $25 for 2 bags of wood.

The son of the owner brought us a fire pit and a couple of bags of wood and we enjoyed jaffles for dinner cooked on the little fire pit. The jaffles helped use up our leftovers.

The kids had fun kicking a soccer ball around and playing grip ball.

We had a great night sitting around the fire, listening to music, talking movies and toasting marshmallows. You just can’t beat a good camp fire! A good nights sleep and then we’d be off to explore Bundaberg.

More washing! Where does it come from? A load of washing done and hung up in the moho. Water tanks full and toilet cassette emptied. We were ready to head out.

Katie and the kids were having a bit of a sleep in while Rich and I drove out to visit Carol & David who we’d gone to the Big Red Bash with in 2021. They live just outside of Dalby.

We had a wonderful visit with Carol & David. It was hard to get away, we could have talked all morning! Carol had made scones and pikelets as she thought we were bringing Katie and the kids so she insisted we take them with us for the kids. On the way back to the caravan park we received a message to say KT and kids were at the Tourist Centre so we met them there. We finally left Dalby about 10.30am and headed towards Kingaroy.

Dalby is situated on flat plains but as we approached Kingaroy we drove into hills. Closer to Kingaroy we started to see a very green low growing crop and we all wondered if they were peanuts that the area is known for.

Arriving in Kingaroy, the hometown of Queensland’s most famous premier, Joe Bjelke-Petersen, we went directly to the lovely little Lions Park. The community made possible the construction of the Big Peanut. It’s one of those large sculptures made from scrap metal, very clever. Of course we had to take pictures at the peanut photo screen.

Across the road from the Lions Park is the Peanut Van, a Kingaroy institution, with its variety of peanut flavours and peanut paste for sale. I bought Maple Bacon and Salted Caramel to try and some Smooth Peanut Butter. Will let you know how they taste.

We drove around to the Tourist Centre so we could take pics of the enormous Peanut Silos on the other side of the road. They certainly dominate the town and can be seen from miles away. The 43 metre silos can hold an incredible 16,000 tonnes of peanuts.

The name Kingaroy means ‘Red Ant’. Kingaroy is known as the Peanut Capital of Australia and has the largest peanut processing plant in the country.

Did you know that peanuts are NOT a nut? They are a pea and grow in the ground. Peanuts were first grown in South America some 7,500 years ago.

Kingaroy is also home to the largest pig abattoirs in Australia called Swickers Kingaroy Bacon Factory.

Another product of the district is the Navy Bean. Farming of Navy Beans in the area came about because American troops were stationed in the area during WW2 and the American military had been using Navy beans as a food staple sine the 1800’s. Navy beans are more commonly known in Australia as ‘baked beans’.

A quick lunch in our RV’s and then it was on to Maryborough.

On arrival in Maryborough and parking opposite the Tourist Centre we hurried across at the traffic lights. We arrived at 3.50pm to find that the doors to the Cistern Chapel had already been locked and they are meant to be open until 4pm. We were very disappointed. The Cistern Chapel is the toilet block attached to the town hall and apparently the entire thing is painted in fantastic murals however we can’t say anything about that as we didn’t get to see them. Oh well. The Story Book Museum was also closed so we didn’t stop in Maryborough although we did get a photo of the Mary Poppins statue on the corner in front of the Story Book Museum. The museum is housed in the bank building where the author of the Mary Poppins books, PL Travers, was born. Apparently there are some 30 murals around Maryborough so we’ll have to come back one day to check those out.

We continued on to Hervey Bay.

I called and booked us in at Pialba Beach Holiday Park and we were able to get two sites next to each other for $130 for both sites for one night. On arrival we checked in to find that they had plenty of vacant sites. The sites were all lovely grass and slab sites and the park is right on the beach.

On the way to Hervey Bay I also booked us into a Farmstay near Bundaberg for a couple of nights. Unpowered camping on large acreage along the Elliot River. You have to be self-contained but they have fire pits scattered around and wood for sale. They are 15 mins drive into Bundaberg or Bargara. Sounds perfect to us.

It was dark by the time we had finished setting up camp at Pialba Beach. Pa had offered to buy everyone fish & chips for dinner and, following the recommendation of the lady at the caravan park, we set off in the Prado to find Migaloos Fish & Chips at Urangan. It was all the way at the other end of The Esplanade and it was a shame is was dark as couldn’t see the water that we knew was just there.

There were quite few people out and about and seemed to be a lot of cafes and restaurants to choose from.

We found Migaloos near the entrance to Urangan Pier and bought a seafood feast. The fish & chips were delicious.

After dinner we all wandered out to the pier and walked all the way to the end. The pier is 800 metres long now but used to be some 1100 metres long. The pier was 100 years old in 2017. There were lots of people fishing from the pier but none of the ones we spoke to had caught anything. From the pier we could see lights across the water on K’Gari (Fraser Island) which is just across the straight. One of the reasons Hervey Bay is so popular with young families is the beaches are so safe because there are hardly any waves. The big waves are blocked by K’Gari.

The walk out along the pier was great and by the time we’d done that everyone was ready to call it a night so back along The Esplanade to Pialba Beach we went. We were all looking forward to seeing more of Hervey Bay in the daylight.

What a gorgeous sunny day we woke to at Bald Rock. It was a shame to leave. What a pity it was that we couldn’t climb the rock that day instead of the miserable day the day before!

We were up and away by 8.30am after I had got up on our roof with a broom to clean off all the sticks and leaves that had fallen on us during the windy night. The slide out was covered in leaves and little sticks. You don’t want to slide in with those still on there!

We just had to stop at the NSW/Queensland border. It has become a bit of a tradition when travelling with Katie, Riley, Ben and Maddie to stop at each state boundary and get a photo. So here we are at the border.

What a lovely little town is Stanthorpe. We were very impressed with this little town with its lovely flower beds and roundabouts. Some 6,000 people call Stanthorpe home. The lovely main shopping street looked full of interesting shops as well as many of the chain stores . It seemed to be a large shopping area for a small town so maybe there’s a larger shopping population that uses Stanthorpe as its shopping centre.

The Stanthorpe area is well known for its apple orchards and not far out of town is another Aussie ‘big thing’, The Big Apple. Of course, there’s a cafe next to it. We only stopped for a photo.

We passed lots of apple orchards, vineyards and a few cellar doors along the way out of Stanthorpe heading towards Warwick. It was a really cold day, only 7 degrees with a bitterly cold breeze blowing but the sun was shining.

Isn’t it excting to venture on a road you’ve never been on before?

We passed through the town of Warwick that we had been to before on our way from Goondiwindi to Brisbane. We didn’t stop in Warwick though and continued on to Toowoomba.

We arrived in ‘The Garden City’ of Toowoomba and went directly to the Tourist Centre where we stopped and had a look inside. Toowoomba is known as the Garden City because of the large number of parks and gardens. The council budget for parks and gardens must be huge as all the ones we saw were immaculately kept.

One of the very friendly staff at the Tourist Centre told us about Picnic Point and we thought that would be a great spot for a lunch break so back in the vehicles and off to Picnic Point. Toowoomba is built at the top of a huge escarpment on the eastern side and Picnic Point has been a tourist destination since the 1800’s. The view from there down across the escarpment is gorgeous. There’s been a cafe/ restaurant there for years and it’s a very popular spot.

We had our lunch and then walked around Picnic Point admiring the views. Ben and Maddie spied photos of an amazing park so we had to go check that out.

After our little wander around Picnic Point we set off again towards Dalby. It seemed to take ages to get out of the city and had to remember that Toowoomba is huge by Australian town standards. Some 120,000 people live in Toowoomba!

Somewhere near Oaky we spied a huge solar farm so I just had to google it. Wow it’s huge! Oakey Solar Farm is a 100MWp farm that generates enough power to supply 10,000 homes. It was built in 2019.

We were driving through a huge farming area and the land became very flat after Warwick with that rich black soil. Cotton fluff balls lined the sides of the road. As we drove into Dalby there were some huge farm machinery dealers. Agriculture looked to be the mainstay of the area.

We made it to Dalby and checked into the Pioneer Caravan Park. $33 per night for a powered site (no extra charge for the kids!) and we managed two sites next to each other. As in many parks we had to drive the moho in to the site because if we reversed in we couldn’t get level. I do prefer it that way anyway as then our doors and awnings are facing each other. Some parks frown upon it though as it’s a risk and vehicles have to face the road. Not sure how they work this out as we can just reverse out whereas the caravans around us all have to hook up before they can go anywhere!

After we set up camp the chores needed doing so washing was done etc. Ben and Maddie took great advantage of the paved roads to ride their scooters. Katie and I did a quick shop at Aldi and we settled in to enjoy chicken burgers sitting under our awning. Another great day!

We woke to a misty, foggy day at Bald Rock NP campground. When I checked the Weatherzone app it said the temp was only 2.1 and felt like -3.3 and it certainly did feel like that. The forecast was for cloudy with a chance of showers, maximum of 10 and winds gusts of up to 35-55km/h. Not a great day to go hiking!

It had rained most of the night. Just a slow drizzly rain that made everything all wet. There was no dry wood to light a fire. We’d left our awning out and our chairs underneath to keep dry however I had woken in the middle of the night to the awning flapping and just knew I wouldn’t sleep again until I’d packed it away. So I rugged up and went out in the cold and packed the awning up. I went straight back to sleep after that. We had really good sleeps and I was happy to hear that the boys were snug and cozy in their swags in spite of the rain.

I met up with Katie and Maddie going for a walk around the campground and we decided to give the weather a chance to clear before we made any definite decisions about the hike to the summit. We did see some intrepid hikers at the day area preparing for a walk and watched them set off into the misty bush.

The campground at Bald Rock is set on a loop around a small hill. Each campsite site is gravelled and clearly marked with a sign showing the number of the site and the type of site it is ie. tent, caravan etc. There are two dunnies and a large picnic shelter with gas BBQ’s and a small shed with free wood. Each site has a great fire pit with two swingle bars, one with a BBQ plate and the other with a couple of hooks to hang billies and camp ovens. They are well made. You need to book your site via the NSW Parks website before setting up camp.

There is a day area with picnic tables and shelters just before the campground so day visitors don’t need to drive into the campground. Most of the walks start at the day area and there is plenty of good signage to show you the way.

The rest of the morning was a quiet one. The kids read and played in their van. Rich went back to his book, while I sorted photos and did some research about the next few places we are going. Katie brought her laptop over and got some school work done.

After lunch we packed our backpacks and set off on the Bungoona Walk. The Bungoona Walk meets up with the Summit Walk and we were hoping to make it all the way. It wasn’t raining but it was bitterly cold and windy as we set off. The mist had hung around all morning but had cleared a little. The track is a good one and as you get higher you come across steps and even crossing wide expanses of granite where white makers show the best route across.

We eventually came to the sign that showed we had met up with the Summit Walk. The usual way up and down is via the rock face but on a day like this one that would have been foolhardy. It would be very slippery and quite dangerous.

We continued on and it became more and more treacherous until we finally made it to a wide open area of rock just below the summit. It was blowing a gale and the rain had turned to sleet. The summit is 1277 metres above sea level and it really felt like it might snow any second. We all decided that was as far as we could go, it would be too dangerous to continue to the summit and there would be zero view anyway. On a clear day you can see into Queensland.

A spot between some huge boulders out of the wind was a good spot on the way back for a fruit break and a bit of a rest before we followed the track back the way we had come. 2 hours and 40 mins after we set off we arrived back where we started. It was still misty, windy and cold.

KT and the kids spent the rest of the afternoon in their van playing card games whilst Rich read his book lying on the bed in the moho. I made a batch of chocolate brownies and cooked a tuna mornay to have with rice for dinner. The lamb roast in the camp oven would have to wait until we could have a good fire again.

Sitting in the motorhome writing this I could hear the wind blowing fiercely through the tree tops above us. It was quite loud at times. The motorhome was a bit protected from the wind down below but the trees were really blowing about. The gusts came and went and it sounded a bit like pounding surf on a beach. I checked the temperature and Weatherzone said it was 8 degrees but felt like 2. Glad we were snug and warm inside. There was a couple of cars with rooftop tents that had arrived earlier in the day and I felt a bit sorry for them in the cold. They must be freezing!

What a glorious morning we woke to at Tenterfield. The sun was shining so it was a good morning to get some chores done. Even though we are on holiday and travelling the chores still need to be done. Katie’s little wall mounted washing machine was doing its thing shaking her little van as it washed. I got two loads of washing done too and we hung it all out on clotheslines under our awnings to dry in the sun and the light breeze.

The kids got busy filling the water tanks so we were full to go out to Bald Rock NP later that day.

Next was groceries and we all walked up to the Coles supermarket which is situated only one block away from the Showground campground. Ben and Maddie took their scooters so they could ride the pump track we’d spied on our walk the evening before. That kept them very busy while us grownups did the shopping.

Coles, Reject Shop, another bargain shop, the butcher and a liquor store were all visited and we set off back to the campground carrying all our supplies, picking up the kids and scooters on the way back. They’d had a great time on the pump track and skate park except Ben had a fall when he stacked it in a puddle. He limped home.

We unpacked the supplies and quickly packed up so we could head out of Tenterfield to Bald Rock. It’s only 27km. Along the way we spied the signage for Captain Thunderbolt’s Hideout and thought we’d better stop and have a look at that. There’s room to pull off the road for a few vehicles. There’s a large signboard that tells the story of the bushranger known as Captain Thunderbolt. Fred Ward was born in 1835 and in his early years was an excellent horseman. He was caught in a horse stealing racket, convicted and jailed for 4 years. He was arrested again and escaped from Cockatoo Island by swimming to freedom.

He became known as Captain Thunderbolt and roamed the Tenterfield region holding up travellers, inns, stores, stations and even the mailman. He never shot a single person though and had a good relationship with locals. He was eventually caught in Uralla in 1870 and shot by a Constable Walker.

The kids enjoyed exploring the tracks and caves where Thunderbolt and his gang would have camped and hidden from police. Ben thought it was a good place to hide with lots of escape routes.

Back in the car and our next stop was for another history lesson. This time it was for the WW2 Tank Traps. Again there was room for a few vehicles to pull off the side of the road and signboards told the story of the tank traps and why they were built in that spot.

During WW2 there was a fear that the Japanese would invade from the north so lines of defences were constructed. During the war some 10,000 troops were stationed in the Tenterfield area and the tanks traps were built. They were built in a narrow gorge and huge wooden pilings were built into the ground to stop the tanks. Kids were learning their history!

Back in the car and we arrived at Bald Rock National Park around lunch time and quickly found our allocated and booked sites and set up camp. The boys were able to get their swags down and set up. KT set up a clothesline to dry out their sheets and mattresses and Rich got a fire going. It was a challenge because all the free wood was wet. Luckily we carry a supply of wood and combining our dry wood with the wet wood finally got the fire going well. It became dark very early and was bitterly cold.

No Starlink at Bald Rock, not because Starlink doesn’t work there but because there was no clear line of sight to the sky. The trees are so tall and tower over us so there was no chance of fast internet. Luckily Rich and I have one bar of mobile service with Telstra and that is enough to get messages in and out and for Katie to logon to get some school work done.

It was KT’s turn to cook and we enjoyed steaming bowls of pasta bolognese whilst sitting around the campfire.