07 July 2011 - Gulf of Carpentaria, QLD Australia

Gulflander train



Purple Pub at Normanton

 Caravan Park at Normanton for two nights, a tiny little town just a 45 minute drive to the Gulf.  Has a couple of very old pubs, a couple of  stores which sell general goods including food (neither very good), a doctor's surgery,  a  government health clinic, very nice schools, both primary & college, a couple of fuel stops ( fuel back to $1.55 now) & the widest roads imagineable, not uncommon in these little old towns.  A fairly large aboriginal population all welldressed & clean. This area has a lot of artesian bore water which was established in 1896 & used to supply the town with up to 300,000 gallons of water per day.  Some experts  believe it takes 100 years for it to reach the surface, arriving at a scolding temperature of 66 deg Celsius.   There is still a town well in the middle of the main street which was the main source of water before reticulated water was introduced in 1965.  It still has the original gas light next to it.  The towns biggest attraction now is a crocodile named 'Krys', after one Krystina Pawlowski, a well known crocodile hunter in the Gulf region, who shot this largest of estuarine crocodiles in the world, measuring 8.6mtrs long.  The life-sized replica on display in the main street is enormous & unimagineably large - a real monster from the deep!


Krys the famous croc




Toe dip in the Gulf of Carpenteria

 We took an afternoon's drive out to the town of Kurumba, on the Gulf of Carpentaria where the aforementioned croc hunter & her husband were based for many years.   Several little wetlands on the way at which we spied more brolgas.  It is the only sealed access to the Gulf & is a commercial fishing base & very popular with recreational fisherman after the famed 'Barramundi', Australia's favourite fish.  The 3 caravan parks were jam-packed like sardines (don't know if jam & sardines go too well together)???  All for the fishing as there isn't anything else of interest in the area at all.  They go out there in little  tin dinghys etc among the crocs - don't like their chances if a large croc comes up under their boat.  There are signs all along the beachfront warning not to swim or even stand on the waters edge, but there are fisherman doing just that!  Must admit we took a photo of each other just dipping our big toe in the water extremely quickly.  I got stuck in the mud a little with my jandals so a quick takeoff would have been very difficult if a croc came up, but to be honest, the water was not deep there & was so clear you would see it coming.  Nevertheless we didn't hang about.  For a treat we had a beautiful but cheap  meal of freshly caught 'barra' on the waterfront then adjourned to the 'beach' to watch the sunset before driving back to Normanton, 45 minutes away.  It is the first time we have driven anywhere at night & were both too aware by the number of dead wallabies on the roads of what can happen in the dark.  Luckily we have an extra set of lights on the Landcruiser which gives a much longer beam than normal, so with that & extreme care, we managed not to hit anything though we saw many tiny wallabies on the side.  Because of the long beam I think the light hit them much sooner & they were stunned enough to stay still or turn the other way.  I'm not sure what type of wallaby they were as they were a lot smaller than I had seen before.

Next day, next little town is Croydon, where the general store has been running continuously since 1894 in the same building.  It is still set up with the shelves of goods behind the counter & lollies in jars etc.  Was really neat.  Of course it had a pub, though not much else.    The roads have been extremely good, but do have some more patches of one lane seal which is still to be widened.  Not much traffic here so it's fine as everyone does the right thing so the only problem is dust when you have to go off to the side, & also some of the edges of the seal are quite high & sharp so it's necessary to be choosy where you go off & on that you don't damage your tyres.  Road trains have the right to stay on the seal & make sure that you know it!