The nights were warm to hot in Cooktown, and even though
this was meant to be the dry season, very humid. Added to this, Joke was coming
down with an epic head cold. The result was that we did not sleep much at all
and got up in the morning bleary-eyed and grumpy. So the prospect of more of
the same at our next chosen destination, Endeavour Falls, did not seem to awake
in us the desired joy. We made a radical decision: we would go south again to
the Mareeba area where Camps6 reported the presence of some excellent free and
cheap camps.
No sooner said than done. Plan made, action followed! Not on
your Nelly, of course. We packed on what Joke calls our dead ten cent pieces
(translate THAT, Mr
Google!!), getting into a half-hour conversation with our Canadian neighbour,
Charlie, whose grandfather had been part of the Palmer River gold rush before
emigrating to British Columbia for another gold rush. Charlie had worked in
B.C. in the 1960’s together with a Tasmanian by the name of Dick Groom, who had
later returned to Tasmania and entered politics. I showed him 1970’s pictures
of Roger Groom, the only Groom who could possibly have been in engineering in Canada
at the time. Charlie was determined to follow it up. Interesting person.
Then we were off, via petrol station and hardware store, and
onto the now familiar Mulligan Highway. We stopped off at the lookout in the
ranges,
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| Another perspective in the Byerstown Range |
and again at Bob’s Lookout
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| The view from Bob's Lookout |
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| Big wide view from Bob's Lookout |
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| The locals have tried to improve on "Bob" at Bob's Lookout |
and then through Mt Carbine and Mt Molloy
and finally through Mareeba. We had chosen a low-cost park in a little place
called Walkamin, 20 kms south of Mareeba. We wondered what we would find, and
were most pleasantly surprised. A very large field with an oval drive around
it. Caravans far apart from one another, amenities and The Shed in the middle,
outback windmill rattling in the wind. Bonus!
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| Evening glow on our setup at Walkamin |
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| The windmill |
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| Different weather to Cooktown! |
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