The Great Tropical Drive
Following on from our spin to Cape Tribulation, and still part of The Great Tropical Drive, we headed inland and south through Marabee, Atherton, Ravenshoe and down to Charters Towers before ending in Townsville. We felt we would have enough of the coast from Townsville onwards so wanted to experience the outback on our own rather than on a tour like the one to Alice Springs.
Not as spectacular as we were expecting and it took us five days to complete, averaging around 300km per day. Mostly a desert road with nothing other than termite mounds, cattle, road trains and squashed kangaroos. Our funniest and most memorable experience was Charters Towers, a small outback town. Each year 200 cricket teams descend on Australia weekend for the Chartered Towers Ashes – one monolithic drinking session! The locals and visitors can only be described as cowboy dressed hillbillies. We pulled up at a bar a for a quick scooner before camping and had to dodge the flying bar stools, beer bottles and everything else not nailed to the floor – we didn’t stay long! Once parked up for the night we tried another bar but it was a similar situation. We got chatting to a few locals and all they wanted to talk about was fighting and riding women – again, we didn’t stay long.
On one particular night we pulled into a campsite by Lake Tinaroo and met a large extended family who took camping to a whole new level. They spent their time water skiing, tubing and fishing. All their food was cooked on an open fire. We had great pleasure in chatting to them and learning new camping skills.
Below are a few pics our journey in no particular order. Sadly, we didn’t get any pics of Charters Towers, too afraid to get the camera out!
