Wednesday, 28 August 2013

Forrest Beach,to Carnavon Gorge

Forrest Beach is one of the main beaches that services Ingham which is a large sugar cane producing area, the largest sugar refinery in the southern hemisphere is at Victoria Mill halfway between Ingham and  Forrest beach.  The port facility at nearby Lucinda  has a conveyor stretching over 5km out to sea.

The Caravan park at Forrest beach was attached to a hotel, which was newly rebuilt after one of the cyclones that periodically hit the coast up here.  The park was packed and we had a small site, fortunately we had good neighbors and had a few fun nights.  The pub/park had a bit of "entertainment".  The famous  Whip crack kid and his flaming sisters had traveled all the way from north west NSW to perform here.  A little circus also came to the park.  It consisted of a 15 year old clown, a contortionist with a bad back and a juggler, together with with 2 goats and an. alpaca.  We didn't make it to the circus but some of the kids at the park enjoyed it.

cath on forrest beach

There are some nice people up here.  We had to have our car serviced in Ingham and had to get a Taxi the 25km back to Forrest Beach.  There is only 1 cab in Ingham and we had quite a wait.  It was a $50.00 fare.  The cabbie was a nice bloke and on the trip explained how hard it was to make a quid, then proceeded to tell us that he would take us back the next day free of charge.

I had no desire to stay in Townsville so we drove down for a bit of a look.  It has certainly improved since my last visit.  The boulevard area is terrific.

golf course at Bowen
Our next stop was at Bowen, midway between Townsville and Mackay.  We stayed at the Wangaratta caravan park right on the beach and abutting the golf course.  For the second time on this trip I regretted leaving the clubs at home.  The are some sensational beaches at Bowen.  We spent a bit of time at horseshoe bay a small bay with coral outcrops 20 meters from the beach.  Fantastic!  The manager of the park dropped a big bag of tomatoes , a few cobs of fresh corn and a pumpkin. As we were leaving I mentioned that next time I would bring my clubs and he said "you should have asked I have a couple of sets in the shed you could have used.  Alas too late.

cape hillsborough cabin (1987)
27 years ago on out trip to Cooktown we stopped at Cape Hillsborough National Park just north of Mackay.  We thought we would relive the memory and stop there again. his time we were in a caravan site, but it was directly above the cabin we stayed in 27 years ago.  It's still a great place.  the only down side was that we were hit by sandflies on the last 2 days.

After a quick visit to Mackay to catch up with friends Barry and Rosa we headed inland, away from any more sandfies.  We stopped  at Fairbairn Dam just outside Emerald.  I have heard a lot about the mining boom in central Queensland  but travelling through it really brings home how extensive the coal and gas mining is.

Large mines, roadworks, electric rail lines, white twin cab utes and villages of dongas litter the landscape. It really is huge.

cath on one of the 24 creek crossings
After a relaxing couple of days at Fairbairn dam (wish I had that Kayak), we headed to Carnavon gorge nation park, apparently the most popular national park in Queensland.  Unfortunately the NP campground only opens in school holidays so you are forced to stay in the commercial campground at extortionate rates.

The Gorge is quite spectacular.  We did the full gorge walk which ended up being 23 km and took us 7hrs 20min.  The most spectacular sections were Wards canyon, the amphitheater and moss garden.  All of these involved climbing steep steps and some vertical ladders. Suffice to say we had a couple of days not walking afterwards.

Tomorrow we move on southwards.


more photos

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