Start of the journey home

 14/01/2013
  Today we started our long journey home though there is a small matter of 5,500K’s to drive before we actually leave Australia on the 13th Feb. We had yet another farewell drink with our good friends the Dunns, the McNamaras and the Millers this morning, tea and coffee this time though. They all turned up to wish us a safe journey………or to make sure that we left!
  This is not a good time to be travelling as we are still in the middle of this extreme heat wave and possible bush fires. Many places have had 11  consecutive days of temperatures in the mid 40’s and there is no end in sight. The wet has still to arrive in the tropical north, the odd showers we had didn’t amount to much. As we move south we will at least be moving out of the humidity but it will be a long time before we are clear of it.
 We have done about 300K’s today and are camped on the beach at Rollingstone. There is a lovely breeze coming in off the sea but still the idiots in the van next door have got their air con going full blast, a constant noisy drone. Bloody holidaymakers!

 15/01/2013
  We have put lots of miles on the clock today in an effort to get away from the humidity and monsoon that is forecast for the north of Queensland. We are desperate for rain if only to put out the fires, but the last thing we want is to get caught up in the floods.
 Tonight we are about 750K’s south of Cairns , at Mackay, and intend doing another big drive tomorrow. On the way down we could see fires up on the range and out in the bush but there is little chance of them reaching the highway as the roadside has been back burned.  The journey was a bit more comfortable as opposed to yesterday as there was some cloud  cover keeping the heat down. They are saying we will have 2 days respite (today and tomorrow) of this sweltering heat, and then it will be back up into the 30’s and 40’s for some folk by the weekend.

 16/01/2013
  The plan to put more distance behind us didn’t quite work out due to the late opening of good old Dan (Murphy) but mostly because of roadwork. We needed to do some shopping and a visit to Dan for essential supplies , and although we were up early enough we didn’t get away from Mackay until gone 9- 30.  Then we hit stop sign after stop sign.
 Eventually we made it as far as Rockhampton, some 1,074K’s on the clock and a couple of kilometers away from the tropic of Capricorn. It is still peak holiday season and all van parks are charging top dollar, a bit of a bummer really as there are not too many holiday makers about and even fewer travellers.
 The park we are in is nowhere near full and as usual we  have a site next to some prat with his air con on full whack. They sit outside in their annexe where they can’t hear it ( we are 5 paces away from the extract fan) and they have the door open, the windows open and the canvas pop-top up. Weekend morons! It’s not that hot!!


 17/01/2013
 Yesterdays drive was done in mostly cloud cover and a couple of short showers, the total respite in the heat wave as today it’s back to normal. Temperatures are in the 30’s and going up. The highway part of this drive is becoming very tedious as we reckon we have been up and down the Bruce Highway at least 6 or 7 times over the years and it’s still just one great roadworks. Without stop/slow signs we could have done todays journey an hour quicker. We have now come 50K’s off the highway to one of our favourite destinations, Agnes Waters and the Town of 1770. We are on a beach front caravan park which is nearly full, mostly young families with loads of kids , we have tents on either side of us, so no noisy air conditioners, just kids!
 We have already cooled off in the sea, the water being marginally cooler than the Cairns northern beaches. No stinger nets or Shark nets here but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any irukjandi or great whites around. We will stay 2 nights here whilst it’s so  hot then start moving towards Brisbane