From out bush to the “Outback”

Okay, before I start here, I need to let you know that while we were in Undarra last night, I’ve written 5 postings, so keep scrolling down to the next five blogs.  This one is the latest news in what’s happening.

We landed at Undarra Lava Tubes last night.  We had a good meal and headed back to the carriages for a restful sleep.  These carriages contained two single beds.  There were no coffee facilities or bathroom facilities.  The bathroom/toilet were in a separate carriage.  We could have gotten ensuited rooms, but I’m not sure what happened there.  But it was a unique experience at any rate.

We were all up early in the morning and packed the car before having this “bush’ breakky.  There’s nothing better than bacon and eggs on an open grill in the bush.  And we had plenty of coffee to go around.  You just had to watch out for

these guys as they will take your bacon or sausages away from your plate in the blink of an eye.  They also operate as the morning alarm to let you know what time it is.

 

Once we finished breakky we headed off on our tour through the lava tubes.  We took the two hour tour because we had such a distance to go to.

 

 

 

 

As we walked down in to the cave, we prepared to get wet.  With all the rain they’ve had in the last few weeks, the caves had knee high water in one and in the other, it was shoulder height.

 

Here’s Chris and Pam in ankle high water listening to the guide talk about the lava tubes and how they were formed.

 

 

 

 

The view as we made our way back out of the cave.

 

 

 

 

Well, we finished our tour and started heading to Hughendon for a layover stop.  This road is a “development” road which means it’s being developed.  So there’s part tarred/bitumen roads, part dirt road, and part boggy mess road.

We even crossed a few creeks that were overflowing with water.

Einasleigh Station creek.

 

 

 

 

The view from the other side of the creek.

 

 

 

But we did see a bit of life along the road apart from the guys who were working on the road.

 

 

Just before we landed in to Hughendon, we stopped in at Porcupine Gorge to have a “sticky beak”.

The river above is Gregory’s River which cuts through the station.  And this little guy was just ‘hanging’ around.

 

 

 

 

 

Well, it’s been a very long day and a tiring one too.  The driver is having a sleep and the others are resting before their dinner at the local pub.  Tomorrow we’ll have to see if the road out to Larke Quarry is open as we saw a couple this afternoon who booked in as well and said they couldn’t get out there because it was too wet.  It could be that we go straight to Longreach in that case.  We’ll see.