Cape Crawford to Queensland

Sat 6 June… We broke our record of vehicles not seen today! Another 380K drive along a single track road and passed just 9 vehicles, that’s not counting the road work machines that we saw at the 240K mark. Those guys on the roads must spend most of their working day travelling to and from work. We have headed a bit further south over the Barkly Tablelands to the Barkly Homestead Roadhouse. Apart from the lack of traffic the journey was interesting in part. This is cattle country and unfenced so you have to keep an eye out for them wandering onto the road. We saw several kangaroos, 1 just standing by the road, looking at what was probably his mate before he was flattened. Later we ran into a swarm of locusts which was just like driving in a blizzard. The noise as they hit the windscreen and truck was like something out of Hitchcock’s’ “The Birds.” A couple did manage to get in the side windows before we got them closed so we took a photo of them.
Here at the Barkly Homestead the site is quite busy, looks like more 2 week wonders heading north for the sun. We, much to the delight of the Navigator are leaving the bush and heading for civilisation though we still do not have internet, radio, mobile phone or even public telephone yet.
Sun 7 June… We have left Northern Territory Outback and crossed the border. Navigator thought we were travelling into civilisation and there would be at least a Shopping Mall on the border. So where are we ,----- Northern Queensland Outback! It’s been a 3 and a half hour drive to the border, once again over enormous prairies, either side of the Barkly Highway. The traffic coming towards us is mainly caravans and campers hopefully Queensland will be empty when we get there. Just over the border is Camooweal pop 310 a servo with still expensive diesel and everything else shut. We are getting a little bit desperate as we have hardly any food and it’s a bank holiday again tomorrow. We actually ate in the roadhouse café last night, a roast pork dinner. Not too bad. We press on to Mount Isa which on the map looks to be a biggish town and we think we may find an ATM and a supermarket for some essentials. We found an ATM but the shops are shut as it’s Sunday Avo, Navigator has found some tubs of Bol sauce lurking at the back of the little freezer and we have some pasta. Not sure how long the sauce has been in there, it could be interesting. First impressions of Mount Isa, not too good. It’s a mining town dominated by a very tall chimney belching smoke and the campsite is full and cramped. We have yet to find the attraction but are staying 2 nights hoping we will find a shop open tomorrow. Oh and there is the best Irish club in Australia here so we have been told and so will check it out tomorrow.