Helenvale - Lions Den Hotel

Thursday we were on the road heading toward Cooktown, passing through Mareeba and Mt Molloy,   Bazza needed a comfort stop so pulled off the road at a rest area at Mt Molloy, only to have this 4WD pull up along side and abuse him for not indicating and then taking off skidding his wheels hoping I   am sure, to shower us with a spray of gravel. Bazza had indicated, so upon checking the trailer plug found it was not connected properly, we had gone over a rather nasty rut in the road previously so must have dislodged it. So he may have had a excuse for the road rage, but could have tamed it down a bit.

                                                                                                                                                      

The inland road to Cooktown must be one of the best in Australia no patching or pot holes a very smooth drive. We travelled as far as Helenvale which is 27kl short of Cooktown as we had heard about the Lions Den Hotel which has a good campground so had planned to stop there for the night before continuing onto Cooktown.

The historic Lions Den Hotel was built in 1875 and is situated at the beginning of the Bloomfield Track and has a lovely campground, and there is safe swimming in the little Annan River. We enjoyed a lovely meal of Barramundi and checked out the memorabilia around the walls. There were quiet a few campers there that had just completed the Bloomfield 4WD Track, and it was interesting listening to some their tales. A tow truck was seen earlier in the evening with a camper trailer on it's tray that had rolled that day along the track.                              

Theresa Creek Dam-Charters Towers-Undara

Thought it's about time to sit down again and write a few words about where we have been over the last week. We spent 3 nights out at Theresa Creek dam which is 40 klm west of Clermont, a lovely peaceful spot which seems to have grown in  popularity since we were there 2yrs ago. On a rough count there would have been around 60 caravans, motor homes and camper trailers camped around the dam. Travelling from Emerald to Clermont the Gregory Hwy was continual road works, there was at least 10 stages controlled by lights that we had to negotiate.

After refuelling at Clermont we headed north on the Gregory Developmental Rd, which ended up being one of the best roads we have been on so far. We saw lots of road kill along the way and lots of Emu's Kangaroos and wild pigs. We topped up with fuel at Belyando Crossing, good thing we had only done 167 klms as fuel was 39 cents a litre more expensive than we had paid at Clermont. We just wanted to make sure we had enough diesel to make it to Charters Towers. We arrived at Charters Towers around 3pm and headed straight to a car wash to give the caravan a good clean, when we arrived at the caravan park people thought we had a brand new van. We spent two nights there as we needed to give the car a clean also and we had washing to do as well as spruce up inside the van and restock our food supply.

Monday we left Charters Towers and continued up the Gregory Development Rd, this section was surprisingly an excellent road for most of the way, after 100klms it reduced down to single lane sections. Just had to keep an eye out for on coming traffic especially Road Trains, and move off until they passed. We were not sure if we would make the Undara Volcanic National Park as it was 420klms from Charters Towers, but after sharing the driving "NO POWER NAP" this time we pulled in around 2pm. We had a lovely bush campsite in at Undara Resort which is in the National Park. You are only able to go into the Larva Tubes on a guided tour, so we booked in for Tuesday morning. It was amazing going down into these Lava Tubes like entering a very large cave but it has this unique tunnel formation. After the tour we had a quick lunch and hit the road again only travelling for a couple of hours before pulling into a free camp spot at Archer Creek, this morning we woke to find the car and van covered in frost it was rather chilly but the day has been lovely around 24 degrees. We are now on the Atherton Table Land stopping off at Milla Milla to see the waterfall, we were just heading back up the stairway to our car when we ran into an old friend of Bazza's whom he went to school with, Kevin was also a member of the MG Car Club. We have stopped  for the night at a Memorial Camp Ground between Atherton and Mareeba and will head further north tomorrow to Cook Town.