We're up bright and early and hit the road at 7:34am. It's a good few km before you emerge from the Hervey Bay conurbation where we see a Tourist Route 12 sign. Aha, maybe this is the scenic way back to the Bruce Highway, route 1. We start following it and Helen immediately has a bad feeling about it. Brushing this aside we weave about until we find oursleves on the Hervey Bay shoreline heading back to the YHA. Despairing, we head back out on our original route fortunate to have only wasted half an hour on hour scenic drive. To heck with any further digressions, we head back to Maryborough on a known route to route 1.
That is, until Maryborough where the road sign system breaks down again. There are two signs to the Bruce Highway with no supporting information (other than, to be fair, "via Alice St." and other). Crossing Tourist Route 12 at least twice [whilst travelling the same road] surprisingly we find ourselves on the Bruce Highway in no time and make our getaway.
We stopped in Childers for a coffee. Childers has, in common with many Aussie towns, a decidely turn of the century feel with a single main road with wooden fronted shops with covered sidewalks and some of the community buildings have picket fence-sided flights of stairs up to the entrance. All painted some pale browny beige so as to blend in with the searing sun and dust. Our chosen cafe might have featured in a cheap chippy guide to Queensland, but little else. Feeling a little unrefuelled we headed off again on the 250 odd km to Rockhampton. The Bruce Highway in these mid parts of Queensland is a single lane affair, long straights followed by long sweeping curves, plenty of ups and downs and plenty of big flats. It's surprising how forested Australia is, most of the time Eucalypts (no koalas!) with sparse shrubbery or long grass or more often further north nothing, perhaps very short browned grass. Rarely, a few cattle graze on what must be dead grass sometimes in amongst the trees.
Arriving in Rockhampton the Bruce Highway blasts through some part of town and rather than chance our arm onn the not so hot cafes up here we plumped for the ever well advertised McDonalds. At least with a McCafe chaser. I did have to shout at the McCafe girl to get her attention. She's easily distracted by her paper, it seems, as she doesn't get too many customers.
Convincing Helen it was her turn to drive I settled into one of her novels [I'm still on page seven of my own] and thus missed most of the 338km to Mackay barring the shout for the dingo stood at the edge of the road. Cute fellas.
The YHA seems OK and the room fan should deflect some of the 34C heat. btw we've woken up to 26C almost everyday since Sydney. I understand it's below freezing in the UK. Hard to imagine. Curiously, even here there's no information on diving for any further [north] than Airlie Beach, just 150km north (probably only 70 odd as the crow flies). We decide not to go to Eungella National Park tomorrow (to see the fabled platypus) as we need to sort out our diving first. We book ourselves into Townsville YHA for AU$76, surely the most expensive YHA we've been to Australia (Adelaide was the same but we had an en-suite).
We roll into town for some tea. I scare myself reading one menu over a fence thinking something's bitten me, combined with increasing muscle stiffness since our rare exercise at Lennox Head, maybe I've got spider venom in my veins. Well, it's not killed me at the time of writing... Forgetting it's Friday we wonder why a roundabout is covered in PA equipment until someone starts wailing on our return up the street. We complete our fast food day with a Subway, virtually every part of which required checking as confusion reigned. Too many choices! I thought asking for one of the fixed meals would elimate all that.
Mackay YHA S21.14371 E149.17860 Elev. 26m
Copyright 2003 Ian Fitchet. All rights reserved.