Dig Tree to Quilpie - 28 July 2014

Robyn and Neal followed us out the back way from the Dig Tree to the main road. They were saying the dingoes were at the Creek near their tent last night.

The gibber plains cover most of the area of Nappa Merrie that we drive through to get to the main road. The gibbers are so widespread out west. It would be partly why they need such huge properties to have a chance of surviving.

We saw about 6 B doubles this morning on our trip carrying demountables for a mine somewhere out this way. Obviously the mines out here are growing or they would be moving the demountables from one site to another.

We have hopefully finished travelling on dirt roads for this trip. So far this trip, we have done 900 km of dirt roads. Mind you, when we moved to bitumen, the road is only one car wide so you have to get off to pass any traffic. We passed a couple of wide loads this morning, which makes it interesting.

We actually saw a dingo feeding off a carcass. It was sharing the feed with some crows. The dingo just looked up at us and went back to what he was doing.

The trees have started getting a bit taller. We are seeing lots more road kill - roos, emus, wild pigs - than we have seen since before Noccundra. But this has a bonus. It brings out lots more wedge tail eagles, which we love seeing. And they aren't scared off as far when a car comes along.

We stopped at Eromanga for fuel at $1.65.9. Eromanga's claim to fame is that it is the furthest town from the sea in Australia. But they have also had some dinosaur bits and pieces found in the area. They are all sauropods (large herbivores). They have just had approval to build a dinosaur centre at Eromanga which will take about 18 months. We decided not to stop this time and come back then.

We ended up doing 460k today, a really big day. We checked into The Channel Country Caravan Park at Quilpie and I must say it was lovely to have a lovely shower and access to water on top, as well as mobile phone and internet access. We are back to the Artesian Basin. And there is actually grass and not red dirt, although that is still around.

When we arrived we found out that there was a camp oven dinner on tonight, so we thought it was a terrific idea. We had curried sausages which was very nice. The dinner was followed by a movie - Kings in Grass Castles. We are in the area where the Duracks first settled at Thylungra Station. I had read the book and I think I had seen the movie, but it was a long time ago.

Bruce checked his footy tips. As he hadn't been able to put his tips in, with no internet access, he got the away games. He ended up with 7 out of 8 games. He was rapt, and is in second place!