Heading up the Cape

Our destination today is Coen we took the road through Mareeba and stopped off at Coffee works for a cuppa and lunch. The dogs were able to come with us to Coffee works as they have tables at the front with dog beds and water, my kind of people. The dogs all loved the attention they got from the passers by. Michelle and I went in and had a look around, lots of lovely mugs and all at good prices, of course I bought myself one. They sold all sorts of coffees and coffee liqueurs, the liqueurs were a bit too exy. We did get to taste them, the young waitress brought us over a taste of all of them.

We did not quite make Coen, we stopped at Lakeland opposite the pub, it had been a very long day and we all went to bed early. We have hit dirt tracks and the corrugations are really bad which we were expecting but still it shakes you about a bit and makes for a tiring drive for Jock. We pulled in to the Hahn River Roadhouse for a break, here they have a resident Emu called Aussy. There is a warning for the campers that he likes to pinch shoes left outside caravans. Jock got stories of a man catching lots of fish here so we will be coming back to stay on our way back down

Archer River Roadhouse

The road went between tarmac and dirt, there were lots of picturesque creeks to cross, some with a fair bit of water on the road and others with a trickle but still it was a bumpy ride. Our stop for the night was at Archer River Roadhouse, we got there a little late but still managed to get a good site down the bottom away from the crowds. We kept smelling this awful smell and could not work it out, we had the generator on trying to charge the batteries in the van they have been playing up. It was a while until Jock realised it was actually the batteries themselves causing the smell, they were bubbling. Thats all we need in this heat, no battery power going to the fridge and freezer. This was just an overnighter for us our aim is to get up to the tip as soon as we can and do anything else on our way back down.

On our way out the next morning we saw people swimming in the river, some of the waterways here are safe to swim in, others not. So we all decided this had to be a stop on our way back down so we could relax in the river. But for today we were heading for Bramwell Roadhouse.