We seem to have been incredibly busy with our 'Grand Design' lately, the end is almost in sight so we have been pushing ourselves to finish. This means other things have been neglected, namely days off and this blog so what you read here today is actually from June and July.
As I said in a previous post, we had gone away to escape the rain and cold at home, which was all a bit bizarre because Australia was in the grip of one of the worst droughts in years. The rain followed us much of the time so I like to think we provided a bit of drought relief as we travelled around.
Having fuelled up at the home of Australia's biggest cactus we found that was certainly the case when we reached a damp Inskip Point, the furthest point of our trip. Camping behind the beach is permitted here for 4WD drivers so we trundled in across the sand, got bogged, dug ourselves out while fending off 'helpful' comments from other campers and finally got settled in a quiet spot at the back of the beach, which faces Fraser Island. We strolled along to watch people taking the short ferry ride across and kept a keen lookout for dingoes on the island. I still have not seen one even though the tourism signs give the impression they are everywhere. We walked along the beach for about one and a half hours before the storm clouds started to gather sending us scampering back to the van.
We had planned to stay a couple of nights at Inskip Point but it was pouring all night so we decided to begin the journey back. After coffee in the town of Rainbow Beach (nice town but hosing down by then) we pressed on. Rain was predicted all the way down the coast for the next few days so we opted to take the inland route back. I like travelling inland and stopping in country towns and they had not seen rain since the previous November so were guaranteed to be dry.
Our first stop in the big dry was Kilcoy, where it was raining! We stayed at the showground which had the best showers ever and would have been an interesting place to look around, but it was getting progressively wetter so we only stopped for the one night.
The target for the next day was Goondiwindi and we finally started to outrun the rain as we drove for about 6 hours along winding, hilly roads through countryside peppered with lakes until we reached Toowoomba. This was a much bigger city than we realised and the landscape changed dramatically there to flat farming country with dark brown soil that floods regularly.
It was quite a boring road, not helped by Queensland's lack of rest stops but eventually we rolled in to Goondiwindi.
We found the, much advertised, free camp absolutely packed so carried on to the showground. I could see why people crowded into the free camp because the showground was alright but a bit pricey at $25 a night and a bit of a way out of town whereas the free camp was in the thick of things.
Goondiwindi itself turned out to be a bit of a surprise, the town had beautiful old restored buildings, the finest example was the Victoria Hotel, it was magnificent. The town was a decent size with a good selection of shops and cafes and after a coffee we headed for the Botanical Gardens which were fabulous.
The gardens were not about flowers but trees and very interesting to me because they were so different to the native trees where we live.
Next onto the water park which had various walking trails marked out. This was another well thought out place with a beautifully kept lake welcoming fishing and bushland which was home to all kinds of wildlife including kangaroos, finches, wrens and hundreds of Whistling Kites.
