Everyone sleeps in a bit more than would be expected. Up and breakfast and I take the short walk up to the dam wall. There are a huge number of birds here, I guess it is the only permanent water for a while around.
We have about 90km to get to the next town, Croydon. We stop briefly at the Gilbert River, as much as anything this is the only river we have seen with any water for ages. That and there are wikicamp comments suggest there may be a freshie or two here. We walk down to the “river” but no crocs today.
On to Croydon and we head out to Belmore dam for lunch, again it is a hot day and the car is currently reporting about 35. In the shade by the dam water is nice, in the sun it is just damn hot.
We head back into town and visit the “oldest general store in Australia” (or QLD Depending on who you believe). They have a museum (of sorts) and an operating general store. I find it both interesting and a bit sad at the same time. I’m just not sure how these small towns really survive. It must be difficult, or more accurately, challenging to live our here.
We notice we have Telstra coverage, so I think it’s about time I swap out our Optus Internet sim for our Telstra one. We find that while there is Telstra Mobile, there is no Telstra data. Damn.
There is not a lot on this road, so we elect to push on to Normanton, about 70km from the Gulf of Carpentaria. There are two van parks to choose from, but one is advertising wifi and we haven’t had internet access for two days and I’m getting DTs. Guess which one we pick. As we arrive on the outskirts out phones go “bing”, they have Optus coverage…..Yay. Two days of email and news to catch up on.
But they also have an absolutely fantastic pool, and we all cool off from the 39 we saw on the way in.
To top things off we have spotted out 2nd Wonderland Caravan, and the owners are in. We have a great chat about the vans and our travels to date.