Leigh and Mita's Travels: Savannah Way

After restocking essential supplies we left Normanton and continued westward towards Burketown eventually spending the night camped in a main roads gravel pit that was sufficiently cleared allowing us to enjoy our evening meal beside a campfire. Surprisingly as far north as we were, the evenings were still surprising cool with morning temperatures low enough to justify using the Webasto Diesel Heater.

Saturday morning we were greeted with another beautiful day. Following breakfast we packed up and headed for Leichhardt Falls twenty five kilometres further on however following a somewhat dismal “wet season” we were disappointed to find that “the falls weren’t falling”. Still we spent thirty minutes or so wandering around enjoying the landscape and chatting with several other travellers.

Having taken a few photographs we re-joined the bitumen and continued towards Burketown where we intended refuelling and having a wander around. Apart from the Albert River (which has limited free camping), a caravan park, an engineering workshop come fuel depot, a pub, a café, two shops and a sea food outlet, there ain’t too much else hence thirty minutes later we left the thriving metropolis of Burketown for Kingfisher Camp, our final destination for the day. Still we have to say it is a very neat and tidy community.

Next stop was Doomadgee, an aboriginal township of approximately twelve hundred people located one hundred kilometres west and the end of the bitumen until Borroloola four hundred kilometres further on. Arriving at the outskirts of Doomadgee we were greeted by signage announcing it was aboriginal land, to respect their land, and don’t litter. After passing mountains of empty beer cans, bottles, wrappers, plastic contains plus heavens knows what else, we stopped at the local roadhouse, topped up our fuel and continued on our way towards Kingfisher Camp.

After eighty kilometres of bulldust we arrived at Kingfisher Camp, a private bush camping area located beside the Nicholson River on Bowthorn Cattle Station. We were pleasantly surprised to find a well shaded grassed camping area within metres of the river complete with water points, showers (hot water complements of a “donkey” system), toilets, boat launching facilities, and warnings of crocodile activity which surprisingly one “expert” couple from Tasmania lampooned until I photographed a nearby “croc slide” on the opposite side of the river and showed them.

We spent two days at Kingfisher during which time Mita decided that since there was an inexhaustible supply of water it would be a great time to shampoo her hair that was by now impregnated with copious amounts of bulldust, wash some clothes, plus some exploring of the local environment was thrown in for good measure. Our only criticism of Kingfisher was if you wanted to visit a nearby gorge that had safe swimming, there was a $30 charge.

Leaving Kingfisher relatively early in company with four other vehicles forty kilometres later we re-joined the Savannah and continued west, surprisingly on bitumen for all of fifteen kilometres, and then it was back onto gravel and the start of some serious corrugation.

All in all the road conditions up to date haven’t been all that bad however unbeknown to us road conditions were about to deteriorate quite dramatically. Arriving at the Hells Gate Roadhouse we again topped up our fuel, brought an ice cream each and chatted with the establishment’s owner about what to expect further on, which amounted to “the roads a bit rough”.

BIT ROUGH!!!!!! It took 2 ½ hours to travel fifty kilometres from Hells Gate to the Northern Territory border however the saving grace was that shortly after crossing the border we encountered road gangs complete with heavy machinery and road conditions improved – well for a little while. Twenty five kilometres later we were back in corrugation hell.

Eventually reaching the Calvert Road intersection we stopped for a coffee and a serious discussion whether to proceed or abandon the Savannah Way as we’d reach the stage of no longer enjoying the journey and were equally disappointed that there’d been little scenery of note, and what scenery or points of interest that there were, no facilities were provided to allow viewing, in short it was monotonous; we opted to continue towards Borroloola in the hope that there would be an improvement in both road conditions and scenery.

After crossing the Calvert River that required the use of 4WD Low Range (which didn’t impress Mita at all) we located the camping area overlooking the river and settled in. It wasn’t too long before other travellers joined us all of whom expressed negative views regarding the road conditions and the lack of scenery. The plus side was we only had one hundred and eighty kilometres to go on this leg of the Savannah Way.

Depending on our mood and the continuing road conditions our plan for Tuesday was to visit the Seven Emus Cattle Station that purportedly had excellent camping facilities overlooking the Robinson River where we intended camping for three or four days. The big draw card for Seven Emus was that it was supposedly a prime fishing location with the added benefit of having access to the coast; the down side was that it was expensive at $50 per night - Well that was the plan.

Unfortunately the plan didn’t materialize. Leaving the Calvert River camping area the road didn’t improve, in fact it deteriorated further and by the time we reached the Robinson River crossing (one of the few scenic points along the Savannah Way to date) we’d lost our sense of adventure and any desire to continue driving in these conditions; we just couldn’t envisage turning off the road we were already on and go another bone jarring seventy kilometres for the privilege of being able to go fishing.

Five hours after leaving Calvert River we reached Borroloola and bitumen, and another sign attesting that it was aboriginal land, to respect their land, don’t litter, and so on. Feeling somewhat like a James Bond Martini “shaken but not stirred” being prepared to the song "Shake Rattle and Roll" any thoughts of continuing further north along the Savannah Way visiting Lorella Springs and Limmen National Park were no longer being entertained.

With that Leigh refuelled and re-inflated the tyres while Mita went to a local shop replenishing a few essentials, we checked our emails, and then turned for home relishing the bitumen road.

Nine hundred forty kilometres and three days later we arrived in Mt Isa where we’d decided to stay a few nights in a caravan park giving us the opportunity to do a spot of shopping, dine out, have a bit of a clean up, and generally “put our feet up” and relax before continuing on our way.

Leaving Mt Isa Sunday morning the only “side trip” planned for our return journey was a visit to Lark Quarry and the Dinosaur Stampede, basing ourselves at Bladensburg National Park just out of Winton. Two days later we arrived in Winton, refuelling, visited the local Tourist Information Office, and then headed out to Bladensburg setting up camp in an open area not far from Surprise Creek – and no surprise, there was hardly a drop of water in the creek.

One of the annoying things we regularly encounter when trying to ascertain if we can access various National Parks is the lack of credible camping information and in the case of Bladensburg it was no different with advice being that it was only suitable for camper trailers or tents, and that there were only two sites available; the only criteria we now use is whether the park is worth visiting or not.

And by the onset of evening there were a total of four caravans, two motor homes, two camper trailers and one tent.

With a drive of some ninety kilometres ahead of us supposedly all on dirt road we left Bladensburg NP around 10:00am exiting via the Opalton Road requiring us to cross the bone dry Surprise Creek before eventually joining up with the road out to Lark Quarry. Surprisingly this route was in far better condition than the access road within the National Park, and even more surprising was when we joined the road out to Lark Quarry, it was bitumen on and off for fifty kilometres.

The Dinosaur Stampede at Lark Quarry Conservation Park, is the site where over 3,300 dinosaur tracks mark the site of the only known dinosaur stampede on the planet. About 95 million years ago, a herd of over three hundred dinosaurs, some as small as chickens (called Coelursaurs) and some about the size of an emus (called Ornithopods) were drinking on the muddy shore of a lake. The herd panicked and started a mad dash to escape when a large meat-eating dinosaur appeared close by.

Eventually returning to our campsite around “wine o’clock time”, we sat under the trees enjoying a Taylors Pinot Noir while enjoying the sounds and sights of flocks of budgerigars.

We left Bladensburg relatively early (by our standards) Wednesday morning stopping briefly in Winton to refuel before commencing the last leg of our journey home. While at Bladensburg another couple who were camped nearby recanted their experiences after spending a night at the Apex Camping Area located beside the Thompson River at Longreach. Although we had heard various stories about the camping area we decided to do a “drive by” to see if there was any validity to the various negative comments we had received over the years.

A picture tells a thousand stories. Other than being free, Mita and I can’t for the life of us see why you would want to camp here when barely thirty kilometres on the Dar River was beautiful camping.

We eventually spent the night camped twenty kilometres south of Ilfracombe at Twelve Mile as it was known in its heyday, where you can see a truly magnificent example of nineteenth century Stone Pitching; Twelve Mile was a watering stop for Cobb & Co stagecoaches and the site of the now non existent Royal Mail Hotel that operated between 1893 and 1916. Thousands upon thousands of naturally formed flagstones were carefully sorted and then meticulously placed together to form a leak-proof reservoir to retain water. This particular stone pitched overshot which still stands erect and solid as the day it was build was constructed laboriously by hand in the early 1890's and is one of the oldest types of building techniques used in Europe and China.

Leaving the Twelve Mile site and continuing south we eventually stayed overnight beside a river at Tambo, a town whose main attraction is the “Teddy Bear Factory” that recently made headlines in Australia, England and Denmark as the source of Teddy Bears gifted to the royal infants of those Nations by the State Government, and not surprisingly following all the media exposure the shelves of the shop were all but empty as “Tambo Teddy’s” suddenly become “in-vogue” across the nation.

Following a pleasant nights sleep we moved on from Tambo stopping at Augathella for morning tea where we were joined by another couple with their new Bushtracker and a thousand questions; ninety minutes later we left Augathella.

Nearing Mitchell we decided to take a chance and camp overnight beside the Maranoa River at the Fishermans Camp To our surprise there were only two other campers there which of course allowed us to set up on a slight rise with views along the river. However it wasn’t long before two other couples arrived, one of them also in a Bushtracker and as is the norm with most BT owners introductions were made. Talk about a small world, it transpired that the parents/in-laws of the Bushtracker couple were past neighbours and whom we had also met into earlier in the year on another of our trips.