Charters Towers

We left Mt Isa and headed east towards our first pit stop of the day, Cloncurry. The sun was shining of course and it was hot. The countryside is more hilly and rocky in this are. I suppose that's why they have a mine here. Here are some of the things we saw along the way...

Lots of road trains.

What a long and winding road, without the winding part!!!! The road less travelled.. The worst road on our trek so far... Holy Hanna Banana..... From Cloncurry to Hughenden, about 150 klicks, it was the most boingy boingy boingy road and we almost trashed the entire motorhome... ridiculous!!! Raised culverts over flood prone farm land, like hitting a series of speed bumps at 120kms. Batten down the hatches, cuz Susie's behind the wheel!! lol, Mark said to put that in.... brat!!!  It was awful... Mark got whiplash while sleeping and his head snapped forward when I hit one of the raised culverts at a speed not conducive to the conditions of the road... Sorry!!!!  lol... Anyway, we eventually arrived in Charters Towers with a couple of screws loose, which we will repair as soon as we can... yikes!

smoother part of the road

The weather is still really awesome and it's still about 34 - 37 each day...

And now, for the next in the series, "Did I Mention It Was Dark Out?".

  So, we arrive in CT around dinner time. It has been a grueling day on the road and we are both pretty much bagged... We decide to have dinner and then just chill for the night. In and around that time, we remembered that we hadn't dumped the "black water" tank (chemical toilet). So we said we'd do it after dinner, when it was dark, when no one could see us and identify the 2 crazy Canadians hauling a bucket full of,,,,, ummmmm, down the road to the dump point......... Oh ya, did I mention it was dark?  So we finished dinner and decided to dump the tank... Off we go.... It was dark, Mark had a headlamp on and I had mine shut off... Not sure why I even wore the darn thing.... doh!  Anyway....... we're walking down the road in between camp sites and we are gawking left and right at the wide array of various styles of camping units they have down here... Now I'm pretty sure by now I've mentioned it was dark, so, as we are walking and minding our own business, I happen to look straight ahead of me and see a stick on the ground about 6 feet ahead of me..... Just at that moment, Mark turns his head in the forward direction, and there in the middle of the bloody road, isn't a stick.... It's not even a dead skunk in the middle of the road... It's a three foot Carpet Python!!!!!  Minding his own business..... Well.... It became a Mexican standoff pretty quick...lol.... (I wasn't laughing at the time).... So we all three of us just stopped... I think we all figured that if nobody moved, then nobody got hurt.... lol.... The snake was the bravest in the end because he eventually started to slither across the road into the bushes and we just stood there and watched in awe.... He was beautiful... Totally harmless, to us..... We didn't know that at the time..... But he was a gorgeous looking snake.... That's our story and we are sticking to it...
Ok, so now we've dumped the tank and are sitting quietly enjoying the evening and all of a sudden the sky started to fill with Flying Foxes, Fruit Bats, hundreds and hundreds of them... Going from their forest   roosts where they sleep all day, to the palm trees where they feed. It was such an awe inspiring sight..... We have never witnessed anything so cool like that before... Awesome!!!
The next morning, we left for Cairns...

Fruit Bat highlighted by the moon....