Wednesday, July 31, 2019

Quilpie via Adavale

After our short visit to Blackall, we were now on our way towards Quilpie. This road passes through Adavale 220 km south of Blackall.

Its one of those roads I've always wanted to take and had planned to do so last year, but due to reasons beyond our control we were unable to do so.

The Adavale road conditions posted at Blackall for 'caution', had us wondering if there may have been damaged from the recent rains so we were unsure of what we may find.

The first 15 km are bitumen with the remainder of the road dirt. Our progress was halted about 5 km outside Blackall with cattle being fed whilst walking along the sides of the road.

We were accompanied by Glenda and Steve in their Bushtracker. Once we reached the dirt we could see that the graders had been working on the road and we did, in fact, come across the grader a further 20 km down the road.

The road conditions continued to be better than we had expected and we sat comfortably on 70 km/h for the first 120 km.  

One or two of the creeks we passed by still held water from the recent rains and this spot would have made a lovely campsite.

The road conditions changed just over 100 km north of Adavale and started to turn stony, as we passed through a series of hills.

The remainder of the trip into Adavale consisted of a hard-baked clay-like surface that was quite rough in places. It was also a welcome sight to see wildflowers on the sides of the road from the recent rains.

Our plan was to spend the evening camped in Adavale after lunch at the pub which consisted of a cold beer and a steak sandwich. 

The publican suggested we camp along Blackwater Creek but neither of the areas we looked at was very appealing, so we continued on for another 100 km to camp just outside Quilpie.

We have camped at Lake Houdraman before but in those days camping was free and there were no facilities. Now it's known as 'The Lake' and its $ 15 per night whether you use your own facilities or theirs. There are also six powered sites near the office.

We chose to camp right on the lake edge and just use our own facilities like we always do.

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