Longreach to (nearly) Mt. Isa

June 1 to June 8

QANTAS Museum, Longreach

We spent two days and nights in Longreach visiting the “tourist” attractions, some were a bit too orchestrated and structured to relieve you of your coin, from what I can see. We did enjoy the Longreach School of Distance Education “behind the scenes” tour, I had no idea how comprehensive the schooling program is, for teachers, students AND parents. We had planned to spend our second night at the Apex Park camp just outside town, but hearing of 4WD’s and caravans getting bogged and an extended towing program after the previous night’s rain, and more rain predicted, we returned to the caravan park.

Age Of Dinosaurs, Leah and "Banjo"

We left on Friday for Winton, 180km up the road, nothing in between. With no free camps close to town and a couple of tours I was super keen to do, we decided to park at the rear of the North Gregory Hotel, famous for being (allegedly) the first place Waltzing Matilda was performed. It was a great spot right in the centre of town (no power but toilets, hot showers, just $10 per night), we stayed for three nights.

Sauropod Bones at Age Of Dinosaurs Museum

The Winton area is now also famous for dinosaur bones and fossils, and I have been wanting to go here for a long time. Saturday was a trip to the Age of Dinosaurs Museum and laboratory, where you get to tour the working bone and fossil cleaning labs and see the actual bones that are were found and are building the story of Australia’s meat eating dinosaurs and plant eating sauropods.  The major dinosaur find is only very recent, in 1999 when a farmer found a large femur bone. The current laboratory was only completed in 2009, and the museum and reception in 2012. Like most of these important projects, much of the funding is through volunteers and donations, supporting the not-for-profit project driven by the farmer. I could see myself getting involved if it was “a bit” closer!

Lark Quarry, roofing covering footprint fossils

Merton Gorge, near Lark Quarry

Sunday we were off to an actual dinosaur site, Lark Quarry, where some 3300 dinosaur tracks have been preserved in solidified mud from some 95 million years ago. Lark Quarry is the highest concentration of dinosaur footprints in the world, with three different dinosaurs involved in a stampede in a prehistoric lake area. It’s a 110km drive with 65km of dirt road (each way), so we did a day tour with Red Dirt Tours. The actual dinosaur tracks aren’t as “visually impressive” as big fossilized bones, but as a historical find and its importance to the palaeontology community it’s fantastic. The animated interpretation of the scene was also very good. After the visit to Lark Quarry we travelled to Merton Gorge and the Rangeland areas through some of the massive private stations. Our tour guide didn’t stop talking (in a good way) all day, I’m not sure I’ve ever learned so much about local flora, fauna and geology before. This is the ONLY way to visit the Lark Quarry (IMO).

There are numerous other interesting things to see in Winton that the community and council continues to focus on to preserve its history and spirit. We departed Winton on Monday, but I feel I will be back here at some stage, a very hospitable town (a volunteer fossil dig and preparation trip might be in my future).

McKinlay - No, it's not my motorhome I'm leaning on!!

The second town in 240 kilometres was McKinlay, the town where Crocodile Dundee was filmed. The Pub was officially renamed The Walkabout Hotel after the filming and is now home to many of the props and memorabilia. We settled in for the night in a nice bush spot up the road a bit.

Tuesday we were off to Julia Creek, 120km in the wrong direction back towards Mackay, but we wanted to check it out since we were that close. They have a very well managed and maintained free camp about a kilometre from town, so we stopped there and walked into town to see the 3pm feeding of the Fat Tailed Dunnart (an endangered, mouse sized marsupial), then followed a nature trail walk before heading back to camp.

Corella Dam Camp Spot

Wednesday we drove in the right direction, into Cloncurry for supplies. Their visitor centre has an excellent museum, including well maintained machinery exhibits. From there we drove to Corella Dam, halfway between Cloncurry and Mt. Isa, another fantastic free camp on the lake. It was 32⁰C when we got there, the hottest we’ve had so far this trip. We will stay here two nights before heading into Mt. Isa on Friday.