Tuesday, 11 May 2010

Monday – Town of 1770 to Clairview, 467kms

Today was unfortunately a day of many miles…or kilometres (as we are metric over here in Aus!).  After packing up the van and saying goodbye to our woodland setting at Captain Cook Holiday Village we started our drive north.

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First stop Miriam Vale for fuel, where we saw our next ‘big thing’…this time the big crab!! 

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Then we drove onwards across the Tropic of Capricorn to Rockhampton. 

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Rockhampton is better known as the ‘beef capital of Australia’, and the welcome sign we passed on the way in made us very aware of that, and also the strange smell that hung about the place (apparently that was cow dung). 

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We drove to the heart of town and visited the tourist information centre, and then wandered along Quay Street, the longest National Trust street in Australia, with several restored ‘Queenslanders’ lining it.  One of the most impressive buildings being the ‘Cattle House’, formerly a bank when it was first built in 1864, it was taken over by the Cattlemen’s Union in the 1970s.

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After a quick wander around the Botanic Gardens, and a stop at McDonalds to use their wifi we hit the road heading north again, there was nothing for miles and miles, just open country.  The landscape had also changed and appeared more barren than previous.  We were entertained by the amount of campervans similar to ours going in the opposite direction – a wave or thumbs up was the greeting we adopted!

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Our final stop of the day was a free campsite on the beach at Clairview, which we got to around 4pm.  As we set up for the evening and kicked back with a cold beer from the eski we contemplated our plan for tomorrow.

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