Hi everybody! It's Mingo here - I'm back!!
For those who don't know the story of Swifty Mark 2, (Swifty Mark 1 having met a nasty end on the way up to Cape York last year...). We had taken him on a 4 week, 10,000km maiden voyage over Xmas: Townsville to the Victorian High Country via the Red Centre and back. Unfortunately, things started falling off him, pretty much as soon as we left home; the beds warped and bowed so badly, they wouldn't roll in and out; the body was so far out of alignment that it wouldn't pack down properly and the roof wouldn't close over the top. The door wouldn't shut and practically every screw in the whole van fell out, taking whatever it was supposed to be holding in place with it. We had no choice but to admit the worst - Swifty Mark 2 was basically a lemon.
We still had an absolutely amazing trip (read our Blog for all our adventures), but we only just made it back into Townsville by the skin of our teeth. Poor old (aka brand new!) Swifty Mark 2 was sent back to the Dealer on the 9th of January for extensive repairs and we only got him back on the 11th of March.
However, it was worth the wait, and when we took delivery of the new, improved Swifty Mark 2.2, after a long 10 weeks, we were thrilled. He'd had a total rebuild from the chassis up. The whole body had been removed, replaced and put back together - so this time he was actually square instead of some weird geometric shape out of a Grade 8 Maths book.
The beds, which had been complete warped and useless, were now straight as a die. They had been over-engineered and reinforced with extra strong angle brackets and the rolling mechanism had been replaced too, so that both beds now rolled in and out with hardly any effort at all. We had new walls, cupboards, new sink, new stove and a new table. Everything worked perfectly at last!
We were very excited to take him out again.
So we decided to spend the Easter Long Weekend at Kooroorinya Falls, a nature reserve on a permanent billabong about 400km southwest of Townsville.
It felt like years since we had packed or set up and we were all fingers and thumbs to start with. But we soon got back into the swing, and we set off on Thursday morning, the 24th of March, aiming to get there just after lunch.
The dogs were keen to get into the car; sadly, since our last trip, poor Spike had been diagnosed with end stage prostate cancer, so we knew this was going to be his last trip :( We had to stop every hour to let him out, but it was worth it to see how much he loved coming with us).
We drove west through a much greener landscape than previously, although it was still very dry. There had been some rain, but nowhere near enough and everybody was saying it was the fifth failed wet season in a row. Those poor farmers :(
We filled up with diesel at Charters Towers and only just managed to resist the lure of the Truckin Sausages...
We next stopped off at the White Mountain Lookout and marvelled at the views and some interesting rock art...
"The Prairie" is famous for its quirkiness and it didn't disappoint. The faded exterior featured a dozen or so old saddles sitting along the front veranda rail complete with the original tie up rings for guests arriving on horseback. There were also two well-dressed Cowgirl mannequins enjoying everlasting fake beers as they leaned on one of the huge oak barrels out front. As with everything around here, it was kinda weird, yet somehow seemed normal :)
The interior looked as though time had come to a grinding halt in 1900 except for the fact there was a Harley Davidson motorcycle parked in the middle of the bar! We met Tom the owner, a salt of the earth Aussie, and his traditional Outback dog... A teacup poodle called Mia..,!
We then turned onto the Prarie Muttaburra Road with its famous signpost, for the final 54kms.
It was an easy drive and we turned off onto the final km of gravel road before arriving at the campground which is actually part of the Racecourse. Yes, there we were, hundreds of kilometers from anything and there was a fullsize Racecourse, complete with race caller's box, Ladies' stand, holding paddocks, bar and all in the middle of absolutely nowhere!
As we looked around, we also saw a number of corrugated iron sheds and various rusty iron structures and star pickets. We poked around inside a few of the sheds, which initially looked totally abandoned until we saw they were actually kitted out out with ancient rusty iron beds, mattresses, tables and chairs, with hessian curtains at the doors.
We wondered what these were for until suddenly we realized that they were the bones of what would be transformed into a bustling mini city when the annual Race Day rolled around on Mothers Day! Each shed was owned and built by a local family who would "move in" for one weekend a year in early May, just for the Racing Carnival. The rusting metal structures and pickets would support marquees, housing temporary bars and betting shops. It was quite a stretch to imagine how this slightly spooky place would come alive once a year for an event which no doubt brought the whole community together from far and wide.
We chose to set up camp adjacent to one of the iron shade structures, with a nice big concrete slab, long table and bench seat. There was a ready made firepit close by, a water tap and a nice view towards the river.
Once we set up, we followed a path through a gate and took a walk down to the river across the basalt and volcanic rock formations (which were very uncomfortable to walk on, especially for the pooches!)
INSERT PIC OF ROCKS
We made it to the dam wall and walked across. There was lots of muddy brown water in the dam, but not quite enough for it to cascade over the edge to form the Falls we'd read about. Still, there was a fair bit of water still flowing on both sides; definitely enough for swimming, fishing and trapping for Red Claw (freshwater lobster).
INSERT PIC OF DAM
It had warmed up a fair bit so we thought we'd go down river and find a suitable spot to swim. We had packed Fleur, our huge inflatable flamingo and we wanted to get her out if at all possible. She hadn't been out of her box since early January when we'd shot the rapids in the Victorian High Country, and it was about time we gave her another whirl :)
We spotted a signpost indicating the way to "Little Bondi", so of course we followed it. Well, Bondi it wasn't (little or otherwise), but we did find a good sandy area which gently sloped into the caramel coursed river. Definitely Fleur-mingo friendly!
We splashed around a bit with the dogs having a rare old time and then headed back to camp. Steve decided to take a nap and Laura went exploring. She discovered a library in one of the sheds which also contained some old photos of the Racecourse in its heyday, together with explanations of how it came to be.
She then went for a walk around the property and discovered some more cool stuff around the place - including a frog down the toilet!
The next morning we woke to a mid 30s day again and also our friends had arrived and had set up camp nearby.
After brekkie we inflated Fleur and we all took her down to Little Bondi. We had an awesome time going up and down the river on her, the dogs loved it too!!
After a good muddy session we pulled Fleur up onto the beach and went off for lunch. However it wasn't long before one of our friends alerted us to a possible Flamingo-napping incident! We ran back down to the river and sure enough, the local bogans had taken off with her. Laura asked them very nicely if we could please have her back and they begrudgingly complied. They did just chuck her roughly in our direction and then walk off, so Steve had to swim after her against the current! But anyway, the crisis was averted and we brought her back to the relative safety of our camp where she proceeded to deflate rather rapidly, since she had sustained a small flesh wound during her period of captivity!
Steve and Laura left her to recover and drove upstream for a couple of kms to where some of our friends had found a rope swing. It didn't take long before they'd both had a go and were nice and wet and muddy again!
By now everyone was pretty tired and so we settled in around the camp just to chat and eat some nibbles and have a couple of beers :) For dinner we had grilled reef fish, which Steve seasoned with herbs and garlic. Yum yum!
Some more people had turned up to the campground by now and they were pretty rude and obnoxious; they obviously wanted the spot we'd chosen and were not happy that we'd beaten them to it. They were also pretty drunk and made some nasty comments during the day to our friends. Plus they insisted on traipsing right through the middle of our camp every time they walked down to the river! So we were expecting them to be pretty rowdy that evening but luckily they'd all gotten drunk so early, they'd crashed by midnight!! Before we went to bed, we strung up a washing line to stop people walking through our camp and then we hit the sack.
Next morning we were woken very early by the sound of footsteps approaching our camp. Laura looked out the window and saw about 5 people starting to walk through our camp again. So she sang out "can you please go around instead of through our camp?". They seemed quite surprised to be asked but altered their route nevertheless!
We spent the day swimming, reading and just relaxing. After lunch Steve and one of our friends drove the 55km back to the Prairie Hotel to replenish our rapidly dwindling grog supplies! Unfortunately, being Easter Saturday, it was shut, so they had to drive a further 42km to Hughenden! After restocking at Hughenden, they drove back and unbelievably, the Hotel was now open!! Nothing like driving nearly 200km for a carton of beer; especially when 90km of that turned out to be unnecessary!! Ah well it was all part of the fun! We subsequently found out that our friends had already done about 360km more than they needed to, because they missed the turning to Kooroorinya Falls and ended up in Muttaburra!! Oh dear!.
That night we had Silverside and veggies for dinner - yum yum. We could see a lot of lightning and black clouds way off the the south, towards Longreach. It was a spectacular light show. Pretty soon after, the wind suddenly got up, bringing with it the scent of fresh rain. After awhile it settled down as darkness fell. We gathered around the fire and solved all the problems of the world for a while - as you do! About 10pm, a second storm front came through, this time the winds were super strong. We sprung up and started battening down the hatches and securing everything that wasn't bolted down. Lucky we did, because within minutes, the rain started pelting down. We rolled the awning in, zipped up all the windows and we all dived for cover. The wind howled and blew at about 100kph all night. Our friends' tent collapsed so they moved into the shed! We were perfectly fine in Swifty and slept soundly all night. We knew we'd be fine since we'd withstood winds twice as strong at Archer Point near Cooktown last year.
Morning came and we were fine. Our friends were fine too and they just repegged their tent before heading off for a swim. We were happy just reading at our site, so they tied their dogs up and left.
About 3 minutes after they disappeared from sight, Laura heard a strange noise coming from their campsite. We quickly got up to investigate and as we rounded the corner, we saw their dog, Benji, ripping a huge hole in the corner of their tent with his teeth! As soon as he saw us, he stopped, wagged his tail and happily ran over to us, with a very pleased look on his face! We had no doubt it was planned along as we untied both dogs and took them back to our campsite for the rest of the morning!
When our friends came back and saw the damage, they weren't too happy to say the least! (Funnily enough, not two weeks after this trip, our friends upgraded to a camper trailer, so maybe that was Benji's plan all along!)
The rest of the day was spent relaxing and swimming and we all had an early night as we were heading home the next day.
The next morning, we got up, had our usual cuppa and packed up. We were ready to head off by mid morning and we set off for Prairie with our friends behind us. The trip home was uneventful and we were back home just after lunch.
We didn't know then, but that was to be Spike's last camping trip. He had been getting more and more tired and had a fair bit of difficulty getting around, although he still absolutely loved being with us and being able to sniff around and wade in the creek.
We would like to dedicate this trip to Spike and all the times he made us laugh with his antics. The thousands of kms he travelled both with Laura and then with Steve and what a loyal companion he was for the 12 years Laura had him. He won't be forgotten and in fact one of Laura's wonderful camping friends painted a stunning portrait of him which we look at every day.
RIP Spike
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