Just Keep on travelling: dinosaurs

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Going through the Simpson Desert - By Jake Lumsden

Jake Lumsden is our nine year old grandson who lives in New Zealand with his parents and younger brother and sister. The photos below are of Jake and his brother, Tim aged 8, preparing to leave their mum and sister at the Auckland Airport.

They travelled the trip from Melbourne to Townsville via the Simpson Desert with us and this is Jake's account of his trip.

Jake and Tim at Auckland Airport
Prior to departure

Little Sister Zoe there to supervise

A snack before they board

Zoe watches them leave -
no she doesn't turn around
Zoe they are out of the window

Going - Going Gone

Getting ready to go

Today my younger brother Tim and I travelled on our own to Melbourne. Our plane arrived at 5.30pm in Melbourne. The air host came and got us through customs and through the final doors to where Nan and Grandad were. The air host checked Nan’s ID so they could tell she was the right person to leave us with. Finally we could go to bed we were really tired. The Patrol was partly packed already we just needed to finish it in the morning. Connor arrived late tonight once we had gone to bed. Connor is my cousin that is going to be travelling with us turned up.

The next day we are packed ready to go. Today we are going from Melbourne to Mildura it was 545 km’s. About 20 km’s out of Mildura we had to throw all of our fruit out because of the risk of spreading fruit flies in the area because of the excellent citrus fruit grown in the area. They grow lots of grapes, limes, mandarins and oranges.

Having our first meal in Australia

27/5/2013

Today we travelled 380 km’s to Burra. At Burra we saw some fossils at the town council building. There was the skull and part of the spine.

Burra is 150 km’s north of the Mildura and the Murray River. Also known as the mighty Murray, because when the settlers came to Australia they used the Murray for food E.G fish, transport and water from the river to water their crops but they couldn’t drink it because it is so muddy so they had to find fresh water lakes that leads to the Murray.

Our cabin

A steam paddler on the Murray

28/5/2013

Today we travelled 380 km’s to Leigh Creek. Did you know that Leigh creek was built for the excellent coal mining, they fill a 2.8 km train every day and that makes up 50% of South Australia’s power?

29/5/2013

Today we travelled 365 km’s to William Creek. William Creek only has one pub and no shops. Tonight is our first night in the tents and in the tent it will be for the rest of the trip until we get to Townsville. Today I used my fly net for the first time on this trip.

30/5/2013

Today we travelled 380 km’s to Oodnadatta.

The pink roadhouse

Our plans were to stay at Oodnadatta but we continued on to Hamilton station. The flies there were so annoying.

The flies at Hamilton station

31/5/2013

Today we travelled 255 km’s to Dalhousie Springs. At Dalhousie Springs there is a billabong that is 38 degrees hot. In the billabong there was a little type of goby that only lived in that billabong called the Dalhousie goby that nibbled at the dead skin on your feet and when you ran your hand over your feet it was so smooth. During the day the flies were all over you but at night there were mosquitoes which were all over you!

1/6/2013

At the beginning of the
Simpson Desert

Today we travelled 150 km’s to our first night in the dessert bypassing Purni Bore. The bore at Purni Bore is 3-5 km’s deep and 85 degrees hot and is filled with mud and animal droppings. After lunch we headed into the Simpson Desert.

2/6/2013

Today we travelled 50 km’s to the second night in the desert.

Me on the sled

Tim playing with the whip

Me playing with the whip

3/6/2013

Today we travelled 115 km’s to Poeppel’s Corner. Poeppel’s Corner is where the Northern Territory, South Australia and Queensland all meet.

4/6/2013

Today we travelled 120 km’s to Birdsville. We went over Big Red. Big Red is the largest sand dune in the whole of Australia!!

Big red!!

In Birdsville there were lots and lots of road trains!!!

One of many road trains

5/6/2013

Today we travelled 380 km’s to Boulia. We also saw some small planes that look a lot like the Royal Flying Doctor Service but sadly they were not the Royal Flying Doctor Service.L When we were nearly there we saw a man rounding up his horses and in among all the horses we saw a camel!!

6/6/2013

Today we travelled 380 km’s to Winton. At Winton there is the Waltzing Matilda Centre.

At Winton there is also the Age of the Dinosaur’s museum. There are two main dinosaur’s named Banjo and Matilda. Banjo is a small carnivore and Matilda a large plant eater. Matilda and Banjo were buried together. They think that Matilda killed Banjo with her tail.

Banjo

7/6/2013

Today we travelled 420 km’s to Campaspe River. Tonight we used the brazier for the first time on this trip!! (It wasn’t the best of fires) Grandad thought that the road trains were going through the middle of the two tents! Because we were camping right next to the road and the road trains were very noisy through the night.

Tim enjoying poking the brazier

8/6/2013

Today we travelled 250 km’s to Townsville! Tonight we are staying in a camp ground at the camp ground there is a swimming pool and a jumping pillow. The camp ground we stayed at was called Big 4. I highly recommend it if you have children.

9/6/2013

Today we travelled 15 km’s to the house that Nan and Grandad are house sitting for the family that live there who are going to America for a month. They have one dog named Jessie. Jessie is a white and brown Dalmatian.

12/6/2013

Today we travelled 450 km’s to Cairns to catch our plane home to New Zealand. On the way to the airport we had to stop for a sugarcane train. It went 0.5 km’s an hour that was so slow that it took 10 minutes to pass. By 10.00 o’clock we were at the airport and checked in and were sitting down waiting for the air hostess to come and get us so while we waited we got a pie to eat. When we were finished the air hostess came and got us.

We arrived in at Auckland at 6.30 pm.

I’d like to say thanks to Nan and Grandad for giving me this opportunity to go through the Simpson Desert. I know not a lot for people get to go through the Simpson Desert.

Thanks a lot. J

By Jake

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Bedourie and Boulia

Bedourie

We hit the road around midday heading towards Bedourie which is another small outback town about 190 kms north. The road from Birdsville to Bedourie is a mix of bitumen stretches and good quality gravel/dust. It was such luxury after both the Oodnadatta Track (which seemed ages ago) and the sand of the desert. Tim was delighted to see three kangaroos sitting erectly in the scrub back from the road watching us as we moved along.

We passed a Council worker picking up rubbish along the highway – all three boys were surprised that someone was prepared to do that as a job. Seemed sad that the local council had to put their limited finances into financing collection of rubbish which travellers should not be throwing out on to the sides of the roads.

I-pads, I-phones and I-pods have definitely been a feature of our travels and can be either documented as a benefit or a pain! One person was threatened with removal of their item for a day if they couldn’t answer a simple quiz question. We have had round robins of quiz questions everyday covering the geography and general knowledge of the areas we have travelled through and then Australia in general – this trip is all about the experience and learning from it. The quizzes have been a fun time and it has been amazing some of the questions asked and the recall from signage etc – well done boys. So back to technology. Keeping all the gadgets charged has been challenging with me constantly have a line-up waiting on one of the two chargers in the car. Still they have kept the boys entertained during many hours of travel and so have been very beneficial as well. I think Peter woke most mornings to “Grandad, can I have the I-pad?”.

So about seventy kilometres into our trip towards Bedourie one of the boys asked after a certain item which turned out not to be in the car but with after a process of elimination was determined to have been left at the bakery. So although far from impressed, we had to make a U-turn and return for another visit to Birdsville and found the item.

So we made another start on our journey – somewhat a little quieter for a few kilometres! Mid-afternoon we arrived at Bedourie which is a small (142 residents in the town and surrounding area according to the 2006 census) outback town with a roadhouse, a very small school and local council buildings. Apparently there is an artesian spa at the small caravan park but unfortunately we didn’t have time to stay overnight – our only stop was at the lovely and clean public toilets.

We continued north making a constant watch out for cattle on the road. The roads are unfenced so the cattle wander across the road – the Brahman (or Brahma) cattle are widely farmed in Queensland and the Northern Territory and are quite different from the cattle seen in New Zealand and Victoria. The breed has a distinct large hump over the top of the shoulder and neck and a loose flap of skin hanging from its neck. It also has long floppy ears. They are farmed as they have greater capacity to withstand the hot conditions.

As we drove we saw signage about horses and as we went around a corner we passed the only farm workers we had seen during our travels and they were herding a large group of horses. But a surprise was in store for us all, as we saw a camel wandering off. We had no idea if it was wild or farmed, but assumed that it was wild and had been mustered in with the horses. We were all pretty excited to see the camel.

We finally reached Boulia (380 kms from Birdsville but we had the additional 140 kms return trip also) by after 6.30 p.m. and it was dark. Boulia was bigger than we expected (has a population of 230 in the 2011 census) but did have a motel and a caravan park. We decided that as it was only a quick overnight stop and everyone was tired we would forget tenting and stay in the motel with the luxury of a proper bed. Unfortunately the motel did not have any cooking facilities so to avoid unpacking too much gear and with the roadhouse offering some takeaways (a real luxury) we had a really easy night. The aboriginal children we met at the roadhouse were really friendly and loved chatting to us.

There was a large road train parked up in the town overnight – they travel huge distances across Australia every day and it is unusual to see them actually parked up.

The housing in Boulia was newer Queensland style – reasonably basic homes built on stilts. We avoided taking any photos of the more run down homes as it would not have been culturally sensitive.