It was Regine’s Birthday and we decided to
have a bit of a rest day. We stayed at the Bedrock (Yabba Dabba Doo) Caravan
park in Mount Surprise. The birthday started with breakfast at the caravan park
café (real coffee), then we played a round of Putt-Putt (Minigolf for our
German friends), tried our luck with fossicking for gemstones at the nearby
gem-shop (instead of driving for 1.5h over gravel road and get sunburned sieving sand, rocks and dirt, getting the same result: nearly nothing) and had a stroll to the nearby Elizabeth creek. For dinner we enjoyed
lovely home-made pizzas out of the big wood fired oven and a cold beer. Who could ask for more?
Georgtown – Forsayth
Today was another driving day. We left Mount Surprise and headed towards Georgetown (92 km). Soon the countryside got dryer and in parts the road was now single lane bitumen. If you have oncoming traffic you have to move a bit to the side onto the gravel so that the roadtrains can stay on the bitumen. We crossed a little mountain range and stopped for some great views over the surrounding Savannah.
We can only imagine how much water there is in the rivers during the wet. Some of the bridges are more than 100m long and several meters high, yet there is no water, or at best maybe a puddle left at the moment. Apparently they haven’t had a decent wet season for 3 years now.
After lunch in Georgtown we headed towards the old gold mining town of Forsayth. There were about 15 km of gravel road, so we stopped and let the tyre pressure down. This helps for a much softer ride on the rough sections.
Forsayth has about 50 inhabitants, one caravan park, a school with 11 students, a library, a Pub/Store/Post office/Petrol Station and a train station.
Sarah is getting better at making new play-friends and soon she was playing with some local kids. Turns out the weekly attraction for the kids in town is The Savannahlander – a tourist train which takes two days to get from Cairns to here. As Forsayth is the end of the track, they have to turn the train around. Once the tourists have left the train, the local kids - and we - were allowed to go inside and stay as they turned the train.
Most people in the caravan park are here to fossick for gold with detectors. And some locals can find enough gold to live of their finds. But I don’t know if I would like to do that. During summer it can get to 48C. During winter (as in now) it’s a pleasant 29C.
The Silver Bullet, the pub/store/PO/petrol station and great sunsets in Forsayth