Day 36: Karumba – Normanton – Croydon – Georgetown – Forsayth

Here is the leaderboard:

Geoff 3. Birds 0.

Yes, I hit another bird today. Somewhere from Karumba on our way to Normanton this morning, another slow-moving bird hit Elsie’s radiator, and exploded. It didn’t fly (pardon the pun) over Elsie and Percy like other ones have done.

I’ve checked Elsie’s radiator and while there is some evidence of bird remains there, the bird itself is not there. So I assume it went under Elsie.

I also ran over a small kangaroo this morning, but to be fair, it was already well and truly deceased. Only recently deceased, though.

Deceased, but still fresh, if you know what I mean.

The buzzards had already found it and were fighting over it.

It’s never wise to swerve suddenly to avoid something when you have almost 6 tons of machinery moving at 100km/h, but I also didn’t want to run over it.

Hmmm. I mean, it wasn’t ever going to try to get out of the way, so it was completely up to me to avoid it.

I managed to avoid running over it with Elsie’s wheels, and in that brief moment of relief that you have, Percy got it on the way through.

All MBW said was “eeewwww”.

As I said, it was already deceased, but I guess that’s not the point.

We see a lot of kites feeding on roadkill. Some of them are very risk averse and fly away as soon as you approach. Others are pretty keen not to leave their meal behind and stay until the very last moment.

We have also seen what we assume is an eagle or two feeding on roadkill, and they are seriously slow at lifting off and getting out of your way. I really don’t want to hit one of them though – while I am sure it would be life-altering for the bird, I’d reckon that Elsie will take some damage also.

We packed up most of our camp last night so we would be ready to get going as early as possible this morning. Percy’s awning was in, towing mirrors clipped onto Elsie, and not much left to do this morning.

No alarm this morning to wake us up, but we were awake about 6.45. Well, I was awake about 6.45, and MBW joined me in a state of consciousness around 30 minutes later.

You need extra beauty sleep if you are going to look as beautiful as she does 🙂

All the usual morning stuff – I’m sure you know by now that means ablutions and breakfast – and we were rolling out of the park around 8.20am.

50 minute run into Normanton and we stopped briefly at the supermarket to get a couple of things. We are going to be in some pretty small townships over the next few days, so we need to stock up when stuff is cheap.

You will remember the wisdom from my mate Jack Reacher?

Here is a quick quiz: Will groceries at Normanton (population 1500) be cheaper than groceries at Karumba (population 500)?

Bzzzzt. No points for you.

MBW emerged with only 2 litres of milk because – if we had purchased anything else – we would have needed to get the credit limit on our credit card raised.

“Eyewatering” was the word that MBW used.

We rolled out of Normanton and onwards towards Croydon. That is about 140km and an excellent road. I think we got around 17.5l/100km today which was nice. The closer we get to the more populated east coast of Queensland, the better the roads get.

Well, you’d think so, anyway.

We stopped in Croyden to have a poke around the Visitor Information Centre and look at the history of the township, and look at the trains.

You will recall that we took the Gulflander to Croydon yesterday, but caught the bus back so we didn’t have a great deal of time to explore.

Topped up Elsie’s tank, and we headed off on new (to us) roads towards Georgetown and Forsayth – home for the next couple of nights.

Just to be clear, we didn’t stop in Georgetown, but we needed to drive through on our way to Forsayth. We noticed that they have a coffee van in Georgetown, so that is a good reason to stop and look around on Saturday morning when we are next on the move.

With any luck they will have an Op Shop. If they also have cheap fuel, that will be a bonus.

The roads from Croydon were good, but pretty hilly so fuel economy wasn’t as good as it could be. But the roads were good. No complaints from me.

But MBW has been obsessing about why some road surfaces are black while others are red. Reddish, anyway.

If you know the answer to that puzzle, can you please let me know.

Frankly my dear, I don’t care so long as the road is two lane (one each way).

And then it wasn’t two lane. Just single lane.

But that’s OK. I only encountered one vehicle on the single lane bit and they pulled right off the road and stopped to let me pass. Road signs say that the smaller vehicle must give way to the larger vehicle, so I won.

But if it had been a road train, it would have been me sitting on the dirt.

The single lane road wasn’t too bad – I’ve been on better roads, but I’ve been on worse. At least it wasn’t gravel.

And then it became gravel. For a couple of kilometres, then back to bitumen, then back to gravel …

… then it became even trickier. Roadworks. Dirt. Soft and messy. With lots of graders and trucks.

Fortunately this only went on for a few kilometres and then we had bitumen for the remaining 5km or so into Forsayth.

Forsayth is a pretty little town (population 129), so not exactly a thriving metropolis. But the Forsayth Tourist Park is a friendly place and Ian – the owner/manager – walked us to our site and gave the directions to assist with reversing Percy into a tricky space.

I really do appreciate it when they give that personal service.

And only $30/night. Cheap, cheap.

He then took the time to tells us about everything going on around the place, and what there is to see nearby, before inviting us to “Happy Hour” tonight.

$15 parmys tonight, so while we have eaten out more than we have needed to, we are going to go over and support them anyway because places like this need all the support they can get so that they can survive and thrive.

Because they deserve it.

We did a quick walk around town and checked out the township and the trains (I can’t get it out of my system).

You may know that I don’t mind the odd Gingernut biscuit with a cup of coffee. Here is a fun fact: Arnotts make different GNBs for different states of Australia.

I guess that probably explains why the ones we bought in the NT seemed darker and harder than the ones I’m used to.

Weird.

Tomorrow we are going to Cobbold Gorge and that should be a great day. We decided to stay at Forsayth rather than right at Cobbold Gorge because we are better doing that last 40km or so without Percy on the back – we only have to come straight back out again on Saturday so it will shorten our trip when we leave and the less we tow Percy, the better fuel economy we get.

But mostly we are staying here because the 40km to Cobbold Gorge is 37km of gravel, and if I can avoid showering Percy with rocks all that way then there will be less damage.

Much easier to drive Elsie there and we will make better time anyway.

Okey dokey – I need to go and work up an appetite for tonight’s parmy.

I’ll tell you all about Cobbold Gorge tomorrow.

Ciao

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