Having promised Andy that we would be at the wedding if at all possible, we started planning our trip back to the Cairns area. We decided that we would position ourselves on the Tablelands. The idea behind this was twofold. Firstly, it meant that we could look for some work up on the Tablelands to top up the coffers and secondly, it meant we didn’t have to drag the van up and down either, the Gillies or the Kuranda Ranges.
So, now it was a question of how to get there!! A look at the RACQ website showed that there were several road closures due to water on the northern route through Normanton and Georgetown. That made our decision easy. We would have to travel via Richmond, Hughenden and Ravenshoe to the caravan park at Atherton.
We set off on Saturday morning to cover the 400km to Richmond, where we had booked a couple of nights at Richmond Lakeview Caravan Park. Once again we almost had the place to ourselves, with there being only two other caravaners staying. Our hosts at the caravan park were an interesting couple who have travelled far and wide, writing of their caravaning adventures for one of the well known caravaning magazines.
The town is small but pleasant with pleanty to see and do. Richmond, part of the Australian Dinosaur Trail, was once part of a great inland sea so it is at the centre of several large marine dinosaur fossils. We spent a couple of fascinating hours on Sunday visiting the local museum, “Kronosaurus Korner”. This museum holds lots of fossils including that of a Kronosaurus, hence the museum’s name, reckoned to be the biggest of the marine dinosaurs. It’s a bit like a bloody big crocodile with flippers! And, I mean big!! Its teeth were around 30cm long.
After visiting the museum, Sheila took her own old fossil for a stroll around the man-made lake at the back of the van park. That night, another check of the RACQ website, showed the track from Hughenden to The Lynd to be closed, so Monday found us heading further east to Charters Towers in search of our route north.
No comments:
Post a Comment