June 2021
Yeppoon (41km NE of Rocky)
Yeppoon is where the three families merged again – the Streets (Hobart), Coopers (Warilla) and Bradleys – all staying at the NRMA Capricorn Yeppoon Holiday Park. The kids loved the jumping pillow, swimming pool and water slide. The park also hosts outdoor movies on a weekend, so we all watched Toy Story 3. It was rather chilly though, so we all had our winters woollies on, quite a surprise this far north.
I squeezed in an early morning MTB ride at Rockhampton’s ‘First Turkey MTB Park’ having organised to join the Saturday morning ladies social ride. It was wonderful to finally ride with some company other than myself. The ladies were wonderful and the trails were great fun – some nice flowy downhill trails, some jump runs and simply lovely scenery.
All three families spent the morning at the Yeppoon Lagoon, a wonderful resort style swimming pool right on the foreshore. Tourists were clearly the only one’s swimming as 18 degrees was a bit cold for the locals.
Yeppoon is also where we bought the largest Avocado we have ever seen. It was as big as a large mango and tasted amazing! I have a pretty big head so the picture below might help with perspective.
On our last day Craig and I invited the Streets and Coopers to join us on a trip to Byfield National Park (about 40 mins north of Yeppoon) for some exploring and swimming in water holes. We were not entirely sure how adventurous we would be as we heard that the Big Sandy hill was difficult to drive. We met a young crew at the bottom of the hill, and we must have all looked a little nervous with 6 kids at our feet so one of them took Craig up the hill for a crash course in sand driving a large hill. He came down pretty confident and filled in Nathan and Sean with some tips. Off we went, up the hill, and made it unscathed. We checked out the views at Stockyard Point and then drove down along Nine Mile Beach and enjoyed lunch and a fish at the south end out of the wind. Thank god for the kid’s walkie talkies which we used to warn each other of the obstacles along the tracks. However, one of us still almost got bogged on the drive back. It was an awesome day for everyone. To see more photos and videos go to the 3willroam facebook page.
Clairview (226km north Yeppoon)
We all headed 226km north and stopped at the Barracrab Caravan Park, literally right on the Bruce Highway. We managed to secure three sites in a row right next to the beach. As we are now in North QLD many beaches consist of tidal mud flats and mangroves with very low gradients so there wasn’t much water to swim in. The tide did come close but most of the time it was about 200m out to sea.
The Caravan Park lived up to half its name as Craig caught a decent sized mud crab! Yummo! I am sorry to say Dad, but I prefer crab meat to lobster meat. It was so big he had to cook it in a pot in the van and stunk the joint out. The kids were all walking around blocking their noses and pretending to spew. We spent two nights enjoying Sean’s roaring fire and Laura, Elka and Mali put on a dance show after hours of practice (see the video on the 3willroam facebook page).
Jarradale Alpaca Farm Stay (~40km west of Mackay)
We headed out to Jarradale on the search for a better farm stay than Alkoomie and we were pleasantly surprised. It was a lovely place with Alpacas, baby goats, parrots, chickens, rabbits, guinea pigs, pigs and deer. It was also a cane farm. Josie and the caretakers were so lovely, and Mali and I helped them move the baby goats into a shelter for the 4-degree mornings predicted up here. Yep, we got the cold weather too folks. However, the day warmed up pretty quickly afterwards and we were back in shorts and t-shirts. We hoped to see a platypus in the billabong and sat to watch for a while, but they didn’t show up. We only saw a few turtles popping their heads up in the water.
I managed a ride at the Mackay Mountain Trails at Rowallan Park whilst Mali and Craig shopped at Kings in Mackay for some caravan gear. Again, I rode alone but the trails were fantastic – not too much climbing, lots of rocky, technical sections and a good little pump track where I could practice by berms and pops.
Oh Deere Cane Farm Stay (60km NW Mackay)
The next day we headed 30 minutes north to Oh Deere Cane Farm. This was our shortest stretch so far – just long enough or Mali to do her spelling words in the car. We met up with the Cooper’s again and spent a nice afternoon watching the kids play and chatting about life on the road. The owner’s invited us, and 11 other caravan visitors to join the convoy driving cross country to the local Bowling Club (St Helens) for $7 handmade burgers. The Barramundi Burgers were awesome, but the dust was so bad driving along the cane farm I nearly lost the car in front of me – and they were only metres away from us.
We visited the giant thong at the Calen Pub down the road.
Craig got some great drone shots of the farm. We are well and truly in cane farm territory now - Mali keeps saying 'we are in Cane World now'. Our van is NW of the house near the red water tank.
Tomorrow we are heading up to Airlie Beach and have decided to treat ourselves to two nights in a resort at Hamilton Island. See you in the Whitsundays!
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