Bowen river pub

09/11/12
We needed to be at the Bowen river pub to start work on or around the 15th of November so we arrived at terrible creek 40 ks from the pub having first popped in to the pub to say gidday and to tell them where we were and had found us a nice camp site down by the river on a grassy patch What a peaceful, quite spot with the only sound the river gently running 20 meters away over a rapid into a large pool. We soon made a fireplace and warren started gathering wood so that we could get the BBQ pig ( babe) out of its stye and into action. Next job was to bait up the fishing rod and head to the river to start fishing, warren caught several nice black bream ( sooty grunter) as the local cal them, so these were filleted ready for the freezer to keep our fish stocks up. Just above our camp on a large flat area was the Bowen river fishing club campsite that had several water tanks that were full, flushing men's and ladies toilets and a hot water donkey.They apparently had just had a fishing comp held here two weeks ago so everything was in good working order especially the flushing toilets. Warren rebated his line and added a float set the rod up then got an almighty strike and the rod nylon broke so the float and leader came away with the fish. I know a fishing story about the one that got away,,, HE came up to the van for lunch and then suddenly we could see the float over the other side of the river, that's strange we thought as it was broken off on this side just a few minutes ago and now it's on the other side, next thing it started moving around the large pool, bloody hell the fish is still hooked to the float! Warren spent most of Friday afternoon trying to hook the float with a barra lure as it went whizzing past without any luck. We got up early Saturday morning and the float was visible again over the other side of the river so the circus went on again with warren trying to snag the float with the barra lure. About lunch time another group arrived and camped downstream and soon they joined in with Warren trying to snag the float as it went past but like warren they had no luck either.
Sunday morning early warren saw the float on the other side off the river so snuck across the rapid around to where the float was and nearly trod on a brown snake in the process, he managed to hook the float first cast cast but "buggar" the fish had got off the hook. He was one very lucky fish that got away I am telling you.
12/11/12 we had the fire going early and babe had the billy on and boiling nicely when a vehicle arrived and it was the publican ringo who said was there any chance we could start work at the pub this afternoon. Instead of Thursday like we had planned? I guess so we replied so we started to pull down the camp and head for the pub. We had a weeks training to run the pub by our selfs plus found out that Clare the owner had also booked in a Christmas party of 26 for the 1st of December so we just would have to do the best we could with only Annmarie the backpacker from England to help us. The week before the Christmas party the numbers had grown from 26 to 33. Add in the others that were staying at the pub and it ended up being 40 to cook a three course meal for. An early start the morning of the party and having to set up the warming trays and cabinets when each time i plugged them in they blew the power fuses, anyway we eventually sorted that out and the roast meats we put on early and cooked in readiness for serving at 7pm for 40 hungry guests. The meal went off without a hitch and everyone seemed happy enough and by the time we cleaned up all the dishes and emptied all the rubbish we fell into bed at 11pm. Up early the next morning morning as breakfast to cook for 7:00 0, after breakfast the 40 guests departed and the pub was back to its normal quite self. Warren went deer hunting with one of the locals as they have plenty of deer on their 55000 acre property and he kindly offered to eliminate a couple for them that's how generous he is. Warren came home covered in blood and on a high with 2 deer on the back of the pub ute. these were boned out the following day then placed in the pub freezers in readiness for taking back to Brisbane with us. We met some great people while running the pub and they were true country people who would give you the shirt off their back to help you. We have been invited back so thats something i guess. We left the pub on the 8th Dec and heading back towards Brisbane to have Christmas with the family and in the 4wd we had a freezer and 2 chiller bags full of venison, the waeco 12 volt freezer we didn't have to worry about but the chiller bags full of venison and ice was the problem. Our first stop for the night was at emerald caravan park so i rang ahead to make sure they had room in there freezer for 2 bags of meat and it was all good so stayed the night there. Second night Nulgildie hotel free camping spot beside the pub, the two young ladies made room for the venison in the freezer and since the girls don't start early and we where wanting to get away early they left the pub back door unlocked for us hOw trusting is that. We arrived back in Brisbane safe and sound with the venison still frozen solid so that was the end of our 2012 travels.

12/11/12- 08/12/12 Bowen river pub

Lake Elphinstone and Melbourne cup day in Bowen

Lake Elphinstone is located 25k south east of the mining township of Glenden which has a population of around 1000 people. The lake covers an area of 310 hectares so it is a decent size. The camp site has toilets and hot showers with the hot water supplied by way of a donkey. For those of you that don't Know what a donkey is it is as follows;
2 x 200 litre drums That sit over a wood fire, inside the drums there are coils of copper tube, the drums are filled with water to keep the copper tubes immersed which in turn is heated by the wood fire. The water pressure pushes cold water into the coils and the hot water travels through the inside of the copper tube and is preheated by the wood fire. Each day around 3pm the wood fire is lit and tendered by whoever is around at the time. The same principle as the coils of black poly pipe on the roof of houses to heat the swimming pool water. We tried finding a place to put the red craw pots in but to shallow and not having a boat so no red craw. There is not much around here to do except relax and read a book. Glenden is a mining town and on the weekend the locals arrive at lake Elpinstone with all there big toys like jet skis, and great big v8 powered jet boats and tow all manor of skiers and water tubes. They piss up during the day and most of the night then hopefully bugger off on Sunday to leave us grey nomads in peace again.
4th November
Well it's been a interesting weekend with no sleep while the locals piss up Friday/Saturday night till way after midnight,Saturday night went till 3:30 am and with very hot days and heaps of beer its a bad mix.Some idiot decided to do a burn out in a ute about 10.30 last night obviously full of beer,I don't know how he didn't lose control of his car anyway there were a few locals that chased the ute and tore a strip off him and told him to "f..k off" and never come back if he did that again. We are very disappointed in the local coal miners as they are bloody inconsiderate, have disgusting personal habits, leave bloody rubbish around everywhere and have loud music and smokey fires going until all hours. Several of them have pig dogs that were roaming around and annoying other campers and of course there was a dog fight around 1:00 am this morning just to add to the excitement. We will never bother supporting central QLD mining towns ever again so they can get stuffed as far as we are concerned. Other grey nomads that are camped here have said the same thing, bugger the mining towns as most of the locals are bloody idiots! We had kept the gents toilets clean and tidy then once the locals arrived and within 4 hours the toilets were in the most disgusting condition I have ever seen so we gave them a wide berth! We will be moving on as far as we can from here that is for sure!
Our camping neighbors decided to follow us into Bowen for Melbourne cup day and we both set up camp in the Wangaratta caravan park and booked in for a couple of days. The caravan park managers put on a Champagne breakfast starting at 9:00 and we had to supply our own drinks while they provided the food. What a great day we had and we staggered back to the vans just before dark. It was a bloody long breakfast that's for sure. The girls had a beauty contest as well as broom races so there were plenty of pictures taken. As there were a shortage of brooms some of the girls had to straddle leaf racks so that looked really daggy to say the least.
We are leaving tomorrow heading to the Bowen river pub and will be camping at "terrible creek" until we start our job at the pub on the 15th November.

Bundoora dam 27th October

Bundoora dam is located 24k south of Middlemount and right opposite the "German creek coal mine" there is free camping available so we picked a spot right next to the waters edge and sat back and watched all the locals with their tents up and in there boats and jet skis have fun over the weekend. Sunday saw the weather start to turn colder and showery which sent a few of the local packing off home. We had another caravan parked next to us and they had been here for a week, and were putting red claw pots in each night using the tinny they carry on the roof of their 4wd. Last night I was cooking dinner out side and it was dam cold. I felt some thing wet by my feet, I was thinking may be a snake, so I froze for a few minutes then realized I had a light on my phone that i could use as a torch and found there was a turtle, he had part of his shell missing so had to of been hit by a boat propellor so decided to give it some thing to eat, so after eating dinner with us mr turtle was quite happy to head back into the water.
29th October
Had a few showers last night and this is the second day we have had rain since leaving Brisbane. Most days have been hot 30/40, today is only 24,yes we are feeling the cold.Tuesday 30th and still raining and camping right on the water edge decided to pack up and leave,and head up further north closer to the Bowen river pub.

Sapphire

Next stop The town of sapphire which is located west of emerald in the central QLD gem-fields. We booked into the blue gem caravan park so that we could unhook the car and head off fossicking for sapphires that the area is famous for. The area has been extensively worked over for more than a hundred years so the best bet was to go to a local mine "Armfest" and buy two buckets of wash and sieve them using the "willoughby" which saves the back big time. After we had worked both buckets we had picked up a few sapphires which will added to our growing gem collection. later in the day we went out to the field to have a go our selves but in 36 degree heat and in an area that has been extensively worked over we lucked out, so back to camp. We decided to try one more time at the back of the caravan park in the dry river bed but drew a blank there also. We would appreciate some feedback and comments as we are unsure if our families and friends are still reading these blogs.

Bedford Weir Blackwater 18th-25th October

Bedford weir is located 25k north of Blackwater in CQ and is a man made impoundment on the Mackenzie river. There are good facilities for free camping with hot showers, flushing toilets and an onsite caretaker to manage the facility. We are allowed to stay here for 7 days so we will take up that offer. The weir has a permanent boating a ski club so on weekends there is the continuous roar of ski boats ,jet ski & fishing boats up and down the river. We put the crab pots in last night and caught about a dozen red and blue claw so have rebaited and will see what we can catch overnight. We went fishing yesterday but there are many hidden logs and snags waiting for your hook and sinker and we lost a couple before reverting to using the float to no avail.
There are fish in the weir but the water temps are still to low at 22 degrees so the fish apparently don't become active and on the bite until the water temp reaches 24 degrees so who knows when that will happen. Daytime temps are between 36-40 degrees and down to16 overnight.Well it's been an interesting few days. Was talking to Mum on Saturday and she told me that Phil (nephew) was working in Emerald,my sister Sue then txt me Phil mob number, I left a message and within 5 minutes he rang to say he worked just a few hundred meters up the road so as his mobile was cutting in and out the next thing I heard was a quad bike driving slowly passed, and yes it was Phil. He just hopped off his machine and jumped on his bike and come down to see us where we were camped. We also found out he and his mates had the jet boat out on Sunday and we where watching them and not knowing Phil was one of them. Such a small world. We decided to have dinner together which was roast pork,cooked in the cobb cooker, thank you Barb & Lex for letting us try it out. I didn't put the pork on early enough so it was slow cooking so to speed it up we put the cooker in the car and followed phil up to his flat to finish off the cooking. So it ended up being a good night having dinner and meeting phils mates. In the after noon Phil took Warren to his workplace on the quad for a look around then they took Warren for a jet boat ride up the Mackenzie river and ironically the driver off the boat used to live opposite mum and dads old house in Motupipi road, in NZ.

Bowen/ Carmila

Bowen 2nd October
In all the years we have driven pass Bowen, this is the first time we have spend time here and what a lovely clean town. One of the walk ways along the beach front has exercise equipment, push ups, steps ups,weights etc. We stayed at Wangaratta caravan park which is
Located right on the beach front and beside the Golf Links. The next day we went up Flagstaff Hill lookout and what a spectacular view over to the Whitsunday Island. We ended up having fish,chips and salad for lunch and it was so relaxing looking out over the bay albeit blowing a gale. We where very impressed with Bowen township, it's well laid out, clean with heaps of shopping. Something we didn't know was that 90% of all the tomato grown in Australia are grown in Bowen. Driving into Bowen from the west all one see's is row after row of tomatoes for mile after mile.
Carmila Beach.
Next stop Carmila Beach which is about 60k south of Sarina, there are no shops only a BP servo where you turn left off the highway and what a well hidden gem it is. This was our first visit but certainly will not be the last. Been spending most of our days fishing, well I should say feeding fish again would of been cheaper buying from the fisho but we are having fun trying to catch them. It's been great staying here meet a lovely couple from Rocky, Barb & Lex. We all have been going out fishing each morning until around 10am then relaxing the rest of the day then happy hour at 4:30- 6 or 7 then eating dinner together. We have managed to catch the odd small fish but the big ones got away. The first fish I caught I didn't know Warren was standing behind me so i flicked the rod up and the fish got wrapped around Warren's neck.I must say Warren didn't see the funny side of having a fishing line and a fish wrapped around his neck. All I can say he was lucky it wasn't the stingray I hooked up and in the end it broke the line and took the hook as well. Warren had to help me with that one as all my line was heading to PNG. We saw numerous turtles every day in the inlet and they would surface near us then swim gracefully away to surface futher out. On our last day fishing I caught a crab just using the fishing rod but true to form and as the saying goes it got away. After spending a week camped next to our new friends at the beach we followed them to their beautiful home in Rockhampton and spent another 3 days camped on their neighbors allotment. Many thanks Barb & Lex for your hospitality and friendship.