The route takenWe were bound for the Gulf of Carpentaria and its Plains of Promise. Almost four years ago, October 2006 we had travelled the Savannah Way from West to East. This time we could loiter longer and fill in bits we’d missed as we retraced from the East, as far as Katherine. Back in 1841, a young lieutenant aboard Beagle had absurdly raised expectations of this area by writing: ‘a vast boundless plain lay before us, here and there dotted with woodland isles’ naming them the ‘Plains of Promise’. When explorers Burke and Wills came in 1861 to check out the vitality of these plains they learnt, to the cost of their lives and others in their party, that this inhospitable land was dominated by impenetrable swamps, vast salt pans and mangrove forests all throwing up barriers. Our memory of The Gulf appeared as a neglected and forgotten backwoods of Australia when we first traversed it – mostly dirt road with the odd stretch of narrow tar strip that frightening 54 metre long road trains hurtled along, giving rise to billowing clouds of either red or grey dust, which disguised any on-coming vehicle, pot hole or unstable road edge as we rapidly took evasive action onto necessarily wide, sloping roadside margins – white knuckle moments we recalled well! Thus, as we pulled out onto the Harvey Range road leaving Townsville, we felt a rush of nervous anticipation.
A very good road led us up and over the Harvey Range, past an extensive military training area, which probably accounted for the fine road as far as its junction with Gregory developmental road – we had no sooner turned onto the narrow strip than we faced our first dose of adrenalin with a couple of road trains, thereafter the road surprisingly improved and took us to Greenvale, where we hoped to spend the night. The caravan park’s informality was right up our street and after settling in we stretched our legs to discover a delightful little oasis and the beginning of episodes of boom and bust; flood and drought; isolation and improvisation that bedevil all the communities along the route. Greenvale’s story enlivened our stay... aptly named for its lush foliage it was built as a Nickel mining town in 1972 where it thrived for 19 years until the resource dried up and residents moved on. A passing business man, fortuitously a Melbourne millionaire, offered to buy the town from the Mining Company in 1994 and saved it from potential demolition. Greenvale, with a range of facilities for its size (Olympic pool, golf course) had a monument outside the pretty Three Rivers Hotel which enlightened us to an Australian country music legend we hadn’t heard of - Stan Costa, whose famous song entitled ‘Three Rivers Hotel’ records his time working on the Greenvale rail line. Portraits of Sam Costa and another muso legend we did know, Slim Dusty, were etched onto the glass door of the hotel. Slim won many accolades on the strength of songs written by Costa.
The Greenvale sausage tree! We contest the claim of only four ‘sausage trees’ in Australia. We have seen them in Maryborough and Einasleigh as well!
We were bemused by traffic lights materializing out of the middle of nowhere on the next leg- wondered if they even worked and we were sitting for no reason. They were! Intermittent signs of SLOW or STOP held up by weather-beaten road-workers indicated work actually in progress, all made for slow passage to The Lynd Junction. Here we made enquires about the condition of a gravel shortcut to the Savannah Way via Forsayth. Aside from potholes within creek dips we couldn’t complain and were most surprised to particularly enjoy a very good tarred road that twisted and turned through the rugged Newcastle Range and made a welcome change to the scenery and vegetation cover. Our thoughts were to spend the night in Forsayth and go through to see Cobbold Gorge, an hour southwest. However, on arrival we didn’t like the tight confines of the van park nor the clarification that we could only see the Gorge on a booked, guided tour- we’d missed the afternoon tour already. So bang went Forsayth – despite having decided not to judge settlements along the way by their odd covers rather discover their stories... We moved on to Georgetown, an old gold mining town where plenty of fossicking still takes place. It was peak season on this section of Savannah Way, with plenty of sealed sections and bridges over the rivers thus no powered sites available in the caravan park. Park owner very obligingly gave us a sunny spot away from everyone, although Lea was feeling the heat and refused to go walking until the cool of evening. Sandy Creek and the Etheridge River created town boundaries with a self-guided River walk thoughtfully provided. We got caught up in the cemetery as light began fading – the only headstone of note, was the loss of two young brothers, three days apart to polio in 1931.
Fuel prices were rising fast and we decided to keep topping our tank in each town. $1.36 per L in Georgetown turned out to be a bit of a ‘bonsella’. We were averaging between 150-200kms a day giving us around 3 hours of bump, rattle and shake that we found spending the rest of a day familiarising ourselves with an area most pleasant. Next stop, Croydon, another town- life after gold! Only this one in its hey-day was the third largest town in Queensland with 36 hotels to serve its population of 10,000. Gold found by two brothers supposedly digging a fence hole led to a goldfield being declared by 1896. The location of the caravan park was on the original Reward Claim, later its name changed to Lady Mary, which ceased operation in 1913. Croydon has also gone to a lot of trouble to provide the traveller with an outstanding True Blue Visitor Information and Heritage Centre.
The two of us spent long hours within the theatrette, displays and wandering in the landscaped garden with unique seating and sculptures and replica buildings from the past.
Breaker Morant’s name jumped at us from a display board! Literally a day or two before on television, a garrulous Aussie on a soap box in Hyde Park made a case for Breaker’s pardon from the British Government. Was he serious? Never mind that it’s over a hundred years since the British court marshalled and executed Breaker before a firing squad for his role in the Boer War. Here in Croydon, Breaker’s claim to fame came as an outstanding horseman- hence his name. Employed as a drover and breaking in horses on a local cattle station; a buckjumping show arrived in town featuring an unrideable horse named Dayan Grey – Breaker is said to have ridden him to a standstill.
Later we walked to the station. Two unconnected railways still operate in the Gulf region as tourist attractions. The Savannahlander runs between Cairns and Forsayth, which we didn’t get to see as it only leaves Cairns on a Wednesday morning. While the Gulflander RM93 also known as Tin Hare, runs once a week between Croydon and Normanton on original and unique termite resistant, Heritage-listed steel rails and sleepers over four hours. We had seen it pass by, on our previous journey but this time, it was in the Croydon Station for the night. Neither uses steam engines any longer, which may disappoint Pieter Smith, our ‘train’ friend.
The Savannah Way has an east–west orientation. When the sun is low in the sky, vision becomes impossible and one is advised to avoid driving before 7a.m. and between 4-5pm. Fortunately those hours don’t affect us one bit as we never like being on the road for dawn or dusk as the death toll for our indigenous creatures are a steady reminder that this is ‘their time’. In high country snow markers indicate the position of the road when it is under snow. Out here - the flat straight road has flood indicators marking the way. Don’t come in the WET!
Add that this is cattle country and the road is highly speckled with cowpats!
Stock on the road is all part of the outback experience.
We had spent time in Normanton on the previous occasion and we looked forward to returning to soak in the artesian spa come evening time. Despite arriving in time for morning tea a queue of ‘vans outside had us gulp! Lea dashed in to check whether the Park was only taking bookings... Packed cheek by jowl we were in two minds whether to stay. Fortunately we were given a fine spot and once we had settled in we were disappointed to find that the artesian spa was not in use, only the swimming pool. We walked down the main street to Burns Philp Store, a worthy survivor of former glory days this huge old timber shell covering almost an acre is now partly used as the Library and Information Centre. We were keen to find out about the floods and happy to spend a couple of hours reading within. When the world focused on the shocking fires of Black Saturday, in the State of Victoria, folk in the northern end of Queensland were experiencing dramatic flooding with towns such as Normanton isolated for weeks and cattle drowning. Rain started falling on the 1st January 2009 followed by thunder storms causing very high flooding of the surrounding areas. The Norman River peaked at 6.7metres on the 4th February cutting off the township. This was the second largest flooding recorded for the Normanton district, the largest being in 1974. Late afternoon we walked down to the River. Fishing for barramundi here brightens the town’s tourist prospects and the old bridge has been turned into a pleasurable fishers’ venue. The tide was high so we were unable to see historic remnants of corduroy crossing (a fanciful name for tree trunks lying side by side to cross over - our Begg family in Mozambique use ‘corduroy crossings’ frequently). A local warned of three large crocs residing close to it.
Kris the Savannah King hailed from the Norman River – shot by a woman. The sheer size and girth makes for nightmares.
9 July – a special anniversary day for friends and rellies including Dad Roger - we fittingly awoke to a birdie of a day! Starting with four bower birds outside Getaway (nothing blue, white or shiny to collect from us!); A willy-wagtail chased a butterfly that slammed into the caravan giving Willy easy meat – only to have it snatched away by a bower bird; en route to Burketown a bustard royally ambled across our red soiled road, beak aloofly raised; pratincoles diced with death as they swooped and twisted in the air. No sooner did they settle on the road, Skiv was almost upon them. They’d use a speedy gait very like sandpipers, trying to outrun Skiv and only taking to the air at the last- this occurred for kilometre after kilometre for our entertainment. A wedge tail eagle, crows and kites busy on a carcass; a small flock of sulphur crested cockatoos flew across our easy vision - their shimmering whiteness against the blue a perfect sight.
En route for Burketown, 230km west across the grasslands George says were responsible for the wonderful bird life – nothing to do with Dad’s day! Can you spot two pratincoles – don’t confuse with cattle dung!
Our first stop that morning, a couple of kilometres away from road, was Camp 119 – where Wills, Burke & King wrote: “It would be well to say that we had reached the sea but we could not obtain a view of the open ocean although we made every endeavour to do so”, (A true statement- we never even caught a glimpse of the Gulf sea throughout our passage). Plaques marked many places, which in most cases were simply the stump relics of historic tree blazes left by the men marking their passage here. A surprisingly chilly breeze swiftly sent us on our way. Many rivers and creeks intercept our travel and we were thrilled to spot four black pigs rooting around on the road side before scrambling away up a dry creek bed. We planned to lunch at Leichhardt Falls even though a guide book indicated it was ‘pocket-sized in an arid area’.
Approaching the Leichhardt River we were taken aback to wind through large sand deposits built like dunes, before dropping into a wide, flat river bed with little water in evidence until we had followed the narrow concrete causeway that wound across an extensive sheet of pockmarked rock to this point.
Close by the flowing water, a caravan had set itself up with washing strung out on a cattle fence well within the river bed. We promptly pulled off the causeway and stared around, wondering where on earth a waterfall would be amongst all this flatness and little water. A couple of 4x4’s coming from the opposite direction, stopped alongside us and the owners took off in a purposeful stride down the rocky bed- we followed behind. A large remnant of concrete slab, washed away from the causeway in times past, created a suitable crossing spot as rock began to create bigger gullies and shortly after, cascading water could be heard. We followed the sound.
Three hundred metres downstream, it seemed as if rock had suddenly been gouged away in the shape of a horseshoe. In one section the river simply plunged down 10 metres or so. We were reminded of a mini Niagara Falls!
In full spate these falls are probably imperceptible, simply a turbulence over-riding a massive depression. We were sufficiently impressed by the whole sense of place that we decided to stay a night. We accessed the West bank downstream to enjoy a panoramic view of both directions of the river within sight and sound of the falls. An afternoon walk clambering along the cliffs and down the steep sandy flood plains brought forth more birds, most upset at our invasion - channel-billed cuckoos with their raucous shouting; a great egret took flight with a frog-like croak of fright; a rainbow bee-eater displayed his marvellous colours as he hawked insects close to us; and as we walked the flat sands a good dozen whistling kites circled just above us – making us believe we appeared feak, weeble and dying! Sitting for a while we observed agile wallabies with distinctive stripes across their hips arriving in slow rocking horse motion, from all directions to take a drink.
We returned to Getaway to find other campers had arrived for the night- it was impossible to feel fazed. A rare sight, was seeing many toddlers ‘out bush’ enjoying natural sandpits and rock holes. Made us wish our little folk were with us too. As the sun set, road trains rumbled across the long causeway with red powder puffs rising around the wheels. We had seen surprisingly few of these monsters over the days in comparison to the numbers that had intimidated us that first trip. Perhaps they avoid this time of year with the posses of 4x4 that tear along the route mixed with caravan gangs seeking safe adventure together. As is the Australian way, fires flickered away; although we rarely make a fire, George very contentedly laid one and cooked our sausages. The milky-way was almost touchable, the falling water sounded like vuvuzelas through Lea’s pillow as a magical day ended in sleep.
Moving on, we came across well over a hundred brolga cranes, their silvery grey plumage, some with darker shades, impressively stood out against the golden monsoonal plains. We had only seventy kilometres to do that day until we reached Burketown - famous for the Morning Glory, sausage shaped clouds that roll out across the Gulf on a calm spring day. Creating strange wind turbulences beneath that many gliders, hang-gliders and sand yachts gather each spring to await their formations and take on the largest dynamic wave in the world. It’s possible for morning glories to arrive earlier or later in their season - we could only hope to experience the phenomenon! Instead, we ran into two ‘hail storms’ of deafening proportions on two sections of approximately five kilometres of newly laid bitumen. The loose gravel, thickly laid, sprang out in every direction, jumping jack shrapnel slamming against the caravan until one, under cover of all the noise, ricocheted back into Skiv’s back window and the entire glass quietly spider-webbed. We tried different speeds, in an attempt to cope with these flying missiles and dreaded the prospect of meeting other vehicles. Fortunately none materialised. It was a daunting experience with the full impact only realised, once we settled in our Burketown site. Layers of gravel caught on every flat surface; embedded in nooks and crannies; a water container shattered and partially filled with stones; aluminium protection and plastic handles all pitted. A little shell shocked we cleared up the mess. George reinforced the window with duck tape hoping it would survive the rest of the journey. By morning, he was scavenging the bins for cardboard as a back-up emergency shield! On the site alongside us a dear old couple from Orange, NSW have been coming to Burketown, the ‘Barra’ Capital of Australia to fish since 1972. In the early days they’d spend six weeks, now they spend four months escaping NSW winter. In his eighties, he brought the loose wire under the caravan, to our attention. “Shrapnel’ had dislodged the power to the electric brakes! George checked how they connected on the other side and was fortunately able to fix the problem. That night we indulged in ‘fresh barramundi’ take-away from the Park’s kiosk.
Between Burketown, Queensland’s last frontier and Borroloola in the Northern Territory lay a 500km. wild and lonely stretch passing through prescribed Aboriginal areas for this section of the Savannah Way. Immediately on departing Burketown, far from necessary adverts for VB, Mid-strength and XXXX Gold in the form of cans and cartons haphazardly strewn alongside the road grew until it was pretty obvious “Caring for Country” should still be considered a tarnished ethos. Alcohol management plans are in place in remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities for good reason to improve the health of residents, reduce domestic violence and give children a safe childhood and the best chance for a good education. The extraordinarily heavy penalties demonstrate the seriousness of the problem. However the route to Doomadgee flaunts this.
By time we reached the unrestricted southern boundary of the Nicholson River; the outskirts of the Doomadgee Community, the bush pubs beneath trees were vivid displays of piled and scattered green, yellow and red aluminium by the score.
We never did learn whether Hells Gates name arose from the sandstone outcrops and ridges, the first broken country since coming through Harvey Range, the gently rolling Dividing Range and Newcastle Range during the first two days of our Townsville to Katherine journey. As a result the road slowed us and hours passed as we wound our way along the rough road across the border into the Northern Territory. From memory and road chatter Territory roads are well maintained but other than one portion of bitumen to get us over a steep gradient there were plenty of washaways and very rough patches to contend with. Over four hours later we came to the steep decline into the Calvert River and there we paused to take a photo of our campsite perched equally high on the other side.
After hours of noisy rattling and bumping around with constant vibration, we were within sight of a familiar road side camp we liked – Wow! We craved STILLNESS
Having crossed a big river and many creeks that day, we didn’t feel any qualms about this one, until we were IN – not only could we feel the press of the running water, we could hear it high up the door. Pulling through the river was made all the harder and slower by large boulders to bump over and get between that for the first time adrenalin shot through our systems. Whew! We were safely across to grind our way steadily up to the top of the bank and round into a concealed track to our old camp site. Lea, glad to stretch legs strode across to survey this familiar territory, staring down upon the river that had just given her some heart stopping moments, when above the gurgling noises of a nearby creek , she heard George shout “water’s pouring out of the caravan”. Not too fussed, having just come out of a deep river, Lea was stunned to see through the open doorway a multitude of things floating around the floor of Getaway. The height of the river water along with the strength of current on the door-side had easily penetrated the door vent rapidly filling up our doorstep to flow across the floor. Climbing the steep incline, water gushed down to the bed end soaking our mats and infiltrating beneath cupboard doors. A cupboard latch hadn’t held, spewing out tins and a bottle of sauce which miraculously didn’t break as they rolled amongst other debris - bits of cupboard framework, framed photos and fridge magnets and door mat all swilling around. A compulsory spring-clean and mopping up operation took place over the next two hours. Fortunately the heat dried the wet items fairly speedily. Liquid nails assisted George mend the cupboard.
The days to follow we’d feel a dart of agitation crossing the waterways but the TOP End adage- whatever you put in the water, be prepared to lose it prevented Lea from doing a walking check! Fortunately other big rivers only wet the inner step nothing more. Bridge building was in progress over the McArthur River as we closed in on Borroloola – a sure sign we were close to refinement! Drawing up at the fuel station the first thing we heard was a chimed tune of Greensleeves wafting on the breeze. An ice-cream van trundled into town! How daft that seemed. Opening Getaway’s door after each encounter with the road has become something of a lucky packet! What will we find! This time the same cupboard door had come adrift on its opposite side. While George mended, I dashed off to the laundry to sort out our pile of red encrusted clothes, before seeking the pleasure of a deep cleansing shower. That night we relaxed to the sound of a piano-accordion playing a few sites away and learnt that Spain had won the World Cup although 15 yellow cards had been handed out during the game!
Back in Georgetown, we had chanced to read that many employers regularly look for workers along Savannah Way advertising job vacancies on Australia’s leading jobs website for travellers www.workaboutaustralia.com.au. With internet now at our fingertips, George checked out the site and spotted Lorella Springs Station was ‘looking for people, all types of background, travelling around who wished to drop in for a day, a month, even a season to help out, even if just a couple of hours in the day’ We were hooked, and looked up the whereabouts of the Station. Lea has always been keen to experience life on a remote station after reading Sara Henderson’s books. Fate was on our side and we were heading right past. Soon after Borroloola we turned off the tar onto the Nathan River Road – a sign saying the road was only suitable for 4x4 was a little confronting after what we had been on. Very late rains for the Territory “Wet” season was responsible for general road maintenance being behind and we soon came across road-trains bringing in soil to this first section. As we trundled along the road became almost like a track reminding Lea of old farm roads to concession in the 50’s and further on George remarked we could even be back in Niassa. The countryside was looking very green and most creeks still had water across the road. By the time we turned off to Lorella Spring Station, we were on a rougher track that the many signs urging us on gave us a smile...1,000,000,000 more bumps to go; relax in the hot springs; not long to go; survivors will be prosecuted being some that we remember!
This was a welcoming sight. Opening the gate reminded Lea of Africa & that oft heard cry SWWWEEETS....
Lorella Springs turned out to be more of a Wilderness Park set within one million acres of untouched and remote coastal outback wilderness than the working outback station we had looked forward to finding. We didn’t see any cattle although it is supposed to be a huge cattle station. It is certainly a unique getaway offering 4WDriving tracks, bird watching, fishing camps along the Rosie River leading to the Gulf. The camping area is set on the banks of a natural thermal spring with another hot health spring a couple of kilometres further away – this surrounded by a Nudist/Naturalist camping area.
We didn’t check out the Nudie springs as we found the Homestead spring a perfect temperature within metres of our site - so ideal for us. Lea would disrupt the peaceful surrounds with the odd squawk when fish nibbled her toes though.
The owners were away in Darwin and although this was a very attractive situation we weren’t prepared to hang around another day if we couldn’t be involved, so we bumped slowly, all the way back again to the Savannah track and continued through the Limmen National Park. Three water-buffalo gazed at us from their feeding grounds on the plain as we passed by.
On the causeway crossing to the Limmen River George exclaimed – “You won’t believe me, there’s a croc RIGHT HERE!” A ‘freshie’ of course, ‘salties’ are far too wily. This one was lying in ambush awaiting fish swimming upstream.
New campsites have arisen since this relatively new National Park has been declared. We checked out the Limmen Campground only to decide it was too early to stay and pushed on to Towns River rest area by our book. No longer in being! Instead, a most appealing camping ground had been established on the south side. Well wooded, we took a safe site with a view of the river- an amazingly large expanse of water that seemed broad and deep enough for big boats to move up and down from the Gulf, about 40km away as the crow flies! Crossing the river - a short way upstream next day, you’d never have credited the same body of water.
From the top of the bridge over the Hodgson River we saw another freshwater croc sunning on a bank. They are relatively harmless to humans having weak, narrow jaws. It’s rare that we see crocodile, never-the-less we pay close attention to all the warning signs as it is the saltwater crocodile that’s deeply feared! We were in two minds whether to stay in Roper Bar and continued on... A bad mistake as we landed up being on the road for six exhausting hours! Following the Roper River we were to be astonished by the number of caravans and camper trailers, bush camping alongside it. Another spot – “Tomato Island” somewhat of a misnomer, looked a shocker of a camping township! Either a fishing competition was to take place over the weekend or this popular spot was in the throes of being formalized. Certainly we passed a good many boats being towed south with the weekend coming up. Road kill was back in evidence and we often came across a wedge tailed eagle in attendance with a retinue of kites.
Suddenly dirt turned to a narrow strip of tar with road trains plying their trade overtaking us until we finally reached the Stuart Highway before turning into ElseyNational Park where we set up for the night in 12 Mile Yards Campground. Now that dirt roads were behind us for a while George couldn’t wait to wash away the thick coating of dust on Skiv & Getaway- slowly fetching water, bucket by bucket from the Park ablution block some distance away, he gave our rig a preliminary cleanse much to the awe of neighbouring campers!
Next day we moved on a mere 20kms to a Camping Park we enjoy very close to Bitter Springs. While Lea worked on the blog, George was able to climb onto the roof of Getaway with a hosepipe to completely wash down the van, spraying into all the nooks and crannies. He was staggered to find layers of “shrapnel gravel” still collected under the solar panels, behind the skylight vents and air conditioner. Some held in place with bitumen adhesive!
Despite rubber matting to prevent movement in drawers and shelves – the constant vibration undergone over twelve days reminds Lea of those square games with a blank space whereby moving tiles slowly within, a picture or number order is formed. It is incredible how such massive disorder happens within all our cupboards and drawers. All have to be scrubbed of blackened rub marks before being rearranged. Tinned foods have lost or worn labels.
After doing as much as we could to regain some order we retired to Bitter Springs or Korran (Black Cockatoo Dreaming), as the Aboriginals call this spring, a short walk down to the upper reaches of the Roper River. Bitter Springs lies on a fracture on the edge of a very porous limestone aquifer and swampy area. The Wet Season adds to the flow of this recharged aquifer and the Roper each year and the temperature is typical of groundwater in this part of Australia – about 33’C so it is not truly thermal as it isn’t heated, but deliciously right for both of us.
Noodles are ideal although the flow is strong enough to make it hard work to swim back.
Lurking along the edge of the swamp are thick mats of thriving algae driving a cycle of growth and decomposition which looks pretty gross. That typical ‘rotten egg’ smell arises should you move into the muddy ground and taints the water hence the name “Bitter”. The clarity of the water down the centre with rocks, logs and white sands enclosed within a swamp forest of pandanus and cabbage palms makes for a sublime scene. Oxygen levels are too low for fish but George itched to shout “crocodile’ to remove the many weekend visitors!
We left the busy park early next morning on our last leg of Savannah Way adventure – we were leaving it in Katherine. For a Sunday morning the Stuart Highway was teeming with caravans – creating a worry of overcrowding within us. Entering the town we discovered not only was it the Katherine Show weekend there was a massive Rodeo taking place. Every Park and Campground was humming as were the extra venues laid on to cope with the influx of visitors. Coming in to town early saved the day for us - we managed to get the last site available at Red Gum Caravan Park. We continued with our ‘clean-up’. On unhitching the caravan for the first time since Townsville, George found the legs had jammed up tightly with stones and mud that he battled to get them down. We discovered two caravan windows have popped their seals and a shelf on the fridge door had broken away. Tomorrow we will look into window repairs, replenish with fresh food and make beds in readiness for our Perth guests Di and Peter Ryan, arriving by train early Tuesday.
No way does the ‘beating’ taken on our rig detract from the pleasure of the two week off-road and Out Back journey we have taken. It simply adds a rich patina to the experience and makes us a little more skilful and self reliant.
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