Richmond to Mt Isa

We made good time to Mt Isa and came a little further than we had anticipated.  Mt Isa, on water rations, is now receiving light rain.   We are glad to be off the road for four days rest.  Graeme has taken the car in for service.  This van park offered us an en-suite bathroom, which in effect doubled our space, so its very nice.  The best feature of all is that we have two resident frogs who live under the rim of the toilet.  Graeme first spotted the beautiful green one with red around his lower body, legs and feet.  I spotted a much larger light brown one.  He often hangs his legs way down, after a flush to keep hydrated.   I think they may have been a couple.  When they were ready, they headed off for other peoples bathrooms.

 

We drove to Julia Creek from Richmond.  You want to make sure you never get left behind there.  However the folks were nice and one man told me that nobody has to lock their houses and nobody would follow you home on a dark night, so it obviously has more advantages than I first saw.  The shop assistants were lovely, one Aboriginal and the other from England, but she keeps coming back to work at Julia Creek.  The scenery was light brown grass with a few low shrubs for the first 2 hours, but lots of crossing of water ways, which makes for a bumpy ride, as the road gives out where the waters rush across the country in beds or out of them and degrade the earth under the road.

 

After Julia Creek the scenery totally changed and as we left Cloncurry for Mt Isa, it is totally different again and turns into these fabulous mountains which are probably full or ore, they just look so special and the soil is deep, lush red and it is very scenic.  I did a swap from driving with Graeme not far out of Mt Isa and went to sleep, but Graeme called out "camel" and there he was, running in the opposite direction to us, but quite close to the car.  He was a big, fully grown fellow of light grey and streaked past us, on the grass, fortunately.  Yesterday we also saw many birds of prey including an Eagle, about 50 cm high, just sitting in the verge beside us as we drove.  A fabulous specimen in light brown and grey.  O for a picture, but nowhere to stop for about 150 ks.  We saw dozens of Black Falcons and photographed a couple of Aboriginal boys on motor bikes moving a mob of cattle across the road - from one boggy paddock to another.  They gave us a big grin as they moved the cattle so swiftly.  Lucky to have the camera in hand for that pic. I was also happy to see a lone emu.

 

The church in Isa was having a baptism and we met many lovely people of various nationalities.  The African women were very slender indeed and dressed in their best "African" clothing. There were 20 young children in the group.  They gave us lunch and I was able to cuddle one of the cute little African babies.

 

Later on we visited Moondalla Dam where the water is stored for Mt Isa. There is a beautiful contrast between the blue of the water and the red of the cliffs. A big grey kangaroo hopped in front of us out there and we saw 30 or more very tame peacocks.

Abigail's Baptism at the Seventh-day Adventist Church on Sabbath 2 June 2012

Resident green frog in our toilet, sitting on the toilet roll.

Lake Moondarra at Mt Isa

Lake Moondarra at Mt Isa

Lake Moondarra at Mt Isa at sunset

Mt Isa at night

Pam with a baby at the church lunch