Roadtrip July 2021: Day 11 – Quilpie > Charleville > Morven

I mentioned at the end of yesterday’s post that we were going out to a community dinner last night at the Bulloo Race Track in Quilpie. They’d had a weekend of football and other sporting events and JT (Jonathan Thurston) was in town as the special guest.

The lady at the visitor information centre said that “anyone who is in the community is part of the community”, so we were made very welcome to go along and enjoy.

JT was indeed there, and unfortunately because they’d had a number (like 16) events on over the extended weekend, everyone was suffering event fatigue … and so there was only a small turn up. Maybe 50 people?

But it was a nice intimate little event. One of us was itching to go up and introduce herself to JT and get a photo. I may have given it away by saying “herself” …

But because there weren’t too many people there, we had the opportunity to talk with several people including a lovely, elderly local lady named Ruby.

Anyway, MBW was itching to get a photo with JT and we were trying to figure out how to “accidentally” bump into him to say hi. Next thing Sam – JT’s manager – dragged JT down to meet Ruby of all people, and so we were all introduced to him because we were all there there In that intimate little group. So it was kind of like JT accidentally bumped into us 🙂

I’d like to say that JT and I had a bit of an intellectual conversation about football, but those of you who know me would instantly recognise that as a lie.

Dinner was exactly what I would have expected from a CWA-organised dinner at the local race club – roast chicken and ham, potato salad, various salads, and a bread roll – all followed up up with apple crumble and ice cream. And there was enough of it to feed a small army.

And because it was a community event run by the local council, it didn’t cost us a brass razoo.

So that was a really nice night out, and a fun way to end our time in Quilpie. It’s such a pretty little town with so many lovely, welcoming people, it would be a great place to spend more time.

This morning was cold again, but it is also the day we have to leave Quilpie for Morven, and it is also MBW’s birthday.

The 6 degrees of separation happened to us again this morning. We were chatting to the guy in the van behind us at Quilpie as we were packing down and hooking up, and it turns out that he knows the father of a friend of ours from when they both lived in Biloela, and he used to live just around the corner to where we used to live in Alexandra Hills.

Small world.

So we had coffee, packed down the van and headed out. Well, out of the park anyway.

You may recall that I mentioned a day or so ago that the bluebird of happiness had visited and left his/her calling card all over the front of the van. So the first place that we needed to stop was the very handy, free wash down facility on the outskirts of town.

The water is hot artesian bore water and it did a great job getting bluebird of happiness (BBOH) poop off the van, and also got rid of a buildup of dirt and dust off Elsie and Ernie (van).

When we got to the wash down facility there was this (I assume local) guy washing down his ute. Seriously I have never seen so much red mud come out of a vehicle as I saw came out of his ute. Every time he pointed the hose at a different wheel arch, or down a rail, more dirt and mud came out.

In fact so much dirt and mud came out of that vehicle that I’m surprised that he wasn’t paying land tax!

After Elsie and Ernie were clean-ish, we headed down to the bakery. Note that I didn’t say clean? It will take a bit more work than just squirting them with water before I can claim that they are clean 🙁

We’ve been to the bakery a couple of times now to buy some sausage rolls and we have missed out every time. I asked the nice bakery lady to save us a couple and we were fortunate enough to secure a couple for breakfast on our way out of town.

Did I mention that when I was in the newsagent the other day, the lady ahead of me spent $756 on Lotto and Powerball tickets? Really? $756?

Well MBW had a similar experience at the bakery where the truckie ahead of her spent $75 on pies, sausage rolls and cakes. I’m not sure if that was just breakfast, or supposed to last him a day or two?

We rolled out of town and had a completely uneventful trip to Charleville. The roads have white lines and a speed limit of 110km/h – all of which seem unusual to us after travelling along these outback western unmarked/unlined and narrow roads for several days now.

The only notable event on an otherwise uneventful trip from Quilpie to Charleville was that we stopped at this tiny little township just west of Charleville called Cooladdi (population 16) – and specifically at the Foxtrap Roadhouse – to buy coffee, and I encountered possibly one of the most unpleasant people that I have ever met. So unpleasant in fact that I was about 2 heartbeats away from just turning around and walking back out again.

But my need for caffeine was greater than my desire to play the “who can be more obnoxious” game, so I ordered coffee, paid my money and left her a bad review on Google Maps.

Turns out that her coffee was bad enough that I would have been better off going out to the van and having a couple of teaspoons of Moccona straight out of the bottle. C’est la vie.

We arrived in Charleville for a late lunch at a little coffee shop, that was staffed with people who were exponentially more pleasant than the woman at Cooladdi, and their coffee was exponentially better also.

I mentioned that it is MBW’s birthday today. Our options of going out for breakfast were fairly limited in Quilpie, and as we are staying at a bush camp in Morven (population 199) tonight I suspect that our options will be limited again, so we celebrated her birthday over lunch.

You may recall that the last time we went out I had the steak and it was terrible, and MBW had the chicken schnitty and it was great. This time the tables were turned and MBW had the steak and it looked and tasted fabulous, and I had the chicken fillet burger which was OK, but clearly the inferior choice. Story of my life 🙁

We went to the local fuel station and filled the tank, then headed off for our destination tonight – Gidgee’s Bush Camp in Morven.

So the 6 degrees of separation came into play for the 2nd time today, as we found out that the lady who owns and runs Gidgee’s Bush Camp is best friends with Marie Jean who we had dinner with in Quilpie last night.

If I was paranoid, I’d claim that there is a conspiracy going on.

We arrived at Gidgee’s Bush Camp around 3.00pm, set up the van and lit the campfire.

We had the place to ourselves for a whole hour until another vehicle towing another Supreme/Leader van rolled in and a family with two small girls disembarked.

The lady who runs Gidgee’s is very artistic and she we had a look at some of her artwork.

Don’t tell Elise, but I’m seeing someone else …

It is also a working farm with sheep and goats, and they have a few newborn goats in an enclosure that the other family’s children fed.

Tonight MBW and I have had a nice evening sitting around the campfire, drinking coffee and eating chocolate. What better way to end the day?

Tomorrow we are off to Roma for a couple of nights and then the adventure will be rapidly drawing to an end 🙁 I’ll tell you about Roma tomorrow.

Ciao