Day 26 - Merluna Station to Weipa (Sat May 19th)

Sunrise at Merluna Station

It was a chilly dewy morning in the country side. We only had a short drive today, so we were in no rush packing up.

The road was pretty good except for one section that was quite bumpy, we bounced along for a while. Damon was finding it hard to see the potholes from all the shadows of the tall gums on either side of the road. The road crews were working on this section as we bounced past.

We were listening to John Williamson on the way, it was very aussie passing the forest of gums, and seeing kangaroos bound across the road up ahead.

Passing York Downs Homestead and Station we saw they have signs advertising meat/beef for sale, this would be a good place to stock up on meat if needed.

We passed the mining area as we came closer to town, it's interesting seeing how it all operates. We kept an eye out for the huge hauling trucks, but didn't see any, only this guy flying towards us.

We arrived by 11.30am, it was a nice 2 hour drive to the Weipa Camping Ground, where we picked ourselves a perfect camp spot.

The view from our bed

If anyone is coming to Weipa, ask for site UP5, its right on the beach, over looking Albatross Bay. It has nice green grass and some afternoon sun. A few people that wondered past mentioned we had the best site in the park, and we agreed.

We paid $24/night for unpowered, and as seems to be the norm, kids under 5 are free

After lunch we went for a drive around town, the coastal drive from Evan's Landing back to Nanum and the Weipa Camp ground was nice. We ducked down different beach tracks, came across 2 lakes, one was called Patricia Lake and had day use facitlites and a playground for the kids. There is no motorised craft allowed on the lake, but it would be nice to take a canoe or kayak out.

Patricia Lake

Trunding boat ramp - looking back towards our camp

Loading wharf at Evan's Landing

Back at camp, after some grocery shopping we all had a swim in the pool.

A few people have told us not to bother coming to Weipa, as there isn't much here. We're glad we didn't listen to them and came to check it out for ourselves, as we really like it here.

We have a resident Jabiru out on the flats catching fish, the kids had a nice play on the beach, then we enjoyed another awesome sunset. 

It felt a little like Darwin, at Mindil Beach, where everyone comes down to watch the sunset with their sundowners. We all looked like statutes when taking our pictures, everyone came out of the wood work to watch the sun go down over the ocean.

Day 25 – Captain Billy’s Landing to Merluna Station (Fri May 18^th)

There were a lot of sandflies here this morning, unfortunately the kids now have a heap of bites on their backs L

Good morning - from Sienna

It’s high tide, so the caves and headland we explored yesterday are inaccessible now. We’re glad it wasn’t high tide yesterday arvo, as we wouldn’t of had our fun walk.

Sand dune climbing

Beach treasures

 

It took us an hour to do the 27km trip back out to the southern bypass road this morning.  You certaintly don’t get anywhere fast up here, well we don’t anyway!

The kids have been travelling really well in the car, as long as I keep feeding them, haha. The dvd players have been a godsend, and we also play fun kiddie tunes when they get restless. Even good old John Williamson gets us all singing along.

We’ve seen 7 snakes on the roads so far, 4 of them were today. We came across these 2 mating today, they put on a good show for us. At least that's what we thought they were doing, maybe fighting. The kids loved it though, just as much as we did.

 

We stopped at Bramwell Junction RH for fuel and iceblocks, then continued onto Moreton Telegraph Station for naughty pies and sausage rolls for lunch. They have camping here, which looked quite nice and green with plenty of shade. There is also an STD pay phone out the front, telephone cards are available at the office.

We came across this guy on our travels today, as you can see the anthills up here are quite friendly.

About 1.5km south of Moreton Telegraph Station, on the left is a rubbish tip. We found this handy as I was carrying our rubbish bag at my feet until we found a bin. We needed to take our rubbish with us today from Captain Billy’s Landing.

We’ve noticed a few dams along this stretch of road, and stopped at one to take some pics of the Jabiru’s. The birds we’ve seen the most up here are the blue winged kookaburras, they’re everywhere.

One of the dams along the road

The road crews have now gone, well they have along the section of road we drove today. We saw a lot more cars today than we have yet since our whole time on the Cape. They will be coming in their droves soon!

That's us comin down the Track

We arrived at Merluna Cattle Station about 3ish, set up camp, took the kids to see the pigs, and enjoyed a swim in their pool.

Merluna Station is a working cattle station, and covers 416,00 acres. Camping is $25/night for 2 adults, and the kids are free as they are under 5 years.

Dallas, the lady running the camping side of things, came and grabbed the kids when she went to feed the pigs, which was nice.

Here piggy piggy

We are the only ones camped here, and the first ones here for the season. They have only opened the camp grounds a few days ago for this season.

It's known as a bird lover's paradise here, we've seen flocks of galahs, blue winged kookaburras, dollar birds and more, it's lovely listening to them all around us. The kids also loved watching the little wallabies feeding in the paddocks.

It’s another beautiful starry night, I’m going to capture this beauty one night with my camera.

Tonight we are going to sleep with the sound of crickets and frogs in the nearby pond.

We’re  off to Weipa tomorrow, which is only 100km down the track.

Day 24 – Loyalty Beach to Captain Billy’s Landing (Thur May 17^th)

were on the road by 8am, heading south for Captain Billy’s Landing. We arrived at this rugged wind swept coast about lunch time.

The road in to Captain Billy’s is 27km, off the southern bypass road. The track is sandy with lots of big speed hump and a few little creek crossings. We saw some wild black piglets running through the bush on our trip in.

This area is within the Heathlands Resource Reserve, and a permit is required to camp here. This permit needs to be orgainsed online, which can sometimes be difficult as there is no mobile or inet reception here or most of the Cape.

The afternoon was spent exploring the beaches, caves and rock pools. We all enjoyed our walk along the beach and around the sandstone headland. We found bats in caves, crabs and star fish in rock pools, and Sienna even found some treasure. Well that’s what she calls it anyway. J

The shaped wood from the water at high tide

Sienna and her treasure

Cam and Sienna - Cape York 2012

We are the only ones camped here tonight, which we love! It was great to have the beach to ourselves this arvo. This is another place I find hard to believe that there are crocs, it looks more like the beaches of Victoria, with the headlands and white sand.

Sundowners while watching the kids play on the beach

 

The remains of the Landing that they used to load cattle for transport to Bamaga and Weipa

We have a pit toilet, and a nice big shelter shed with timber tables. The shelter shed has been good to protect us from the strong south easterly winds that prevail here.

Tonight we have the sound of the waves crashing on the beach, gotta love it!

Sunset at Captain Billy's Landing

Day 23 – Day trip to the WW11 plane wrecks & Mutee Head (Wed May 16^th)

Today is our last day here at Loyalty Beach up near the Tip of Cape York, we head south tomorrow for Captain Billy's Landing.

We were blessed with sunshine, and lots of wind, which made for a perfect morning to start our pack up. The sun and wind dried everything out nicely. We were starting to get worried about packing everything up in the rain, but luck was on our side.

After lunch we drove back out to Bamaga Airport, which is where the Jackey Jackey Airfield was during WW11. Here we saw some WW11 Plane wrecks and a heap of discarded 44 gallon drums of old wartime fuel dumps.

Not far from the airport is the Fishbone Ck Boat Ramp, this creek runs into Jackey Jackey Ck, which is a large ck that runs out to the east coast, and is good for fishing and croc spotting. Damon couldn’t help himself at the boat ramp and had to flick a lure, but to no luck unfortunately. We had our eyes peeled for the salties that live around here, but they must of been hiding.

Then we shot across to the west coast of the cape, to the beautiful white beach of Mutee Head. During the last war, Mutee Head was an important landing point for all forms of military supplies, and a large military camp was based here. We found it really hard not to dive into the blue waters at Mutee Head, the water looked so inviting. Today has been our nicest day. weather wise on the cape, once that sun is out it has a real bite! It’s hard to imagine our friends and family are getting chilly down south.

 

It was quite deceiving here, as it really didn’t look like croc country. But being so close to the mouth of the mighty Jardine River, they are here for sure!  The beach has good grassed areas for camping, but you need to be self sufficient, as there is no water or any other facilities.

There is a sandy, boggy road that takes you down to the Jardine River mouth, with more camping spots along the river bank. We started to venture down this track, but ended up turning around, it was getting late, and with 2 little kiddies in the car we didn’t want to get stuck!

Back at camp we all helped to get the fire going. Damon and I then had our sundowners whilst watching the kids play on the beach with some little friends they had met. These guys have been travelling around Oz for 17months, they have 1 month left of their big adventure.

Another sunset gone, kids in bed, we then had spag bol by the fire and enjoyed a starry starry night.

We’ve really liked it here, it’s been so nice to kick back in one spot for 7 days. Some days we do day trips, then other days relax at camp. We had a magic spot right on the beach, and have enjoyed listening to the gentle lap of the ocean each night and morning.

We’ve been amazed at the lack of mozzies and sandflies here. These pests love our kids, so it’s been great to give their little legs and arms a chance to heal from all the bites. 

Day 22 – Loyalty Beach (Tue May 15^th)

It was a quiet day today, I did a bit of handwashing, reading, and walking on the beach.  Damon went fishing at the jetty in the morning, and again in the arvo. He caught 2 GT’s which he gave away to one of the local Islanders.

We had a little sunshine, with quite a few showers. 

Day 21 - Punsand Bay day trip (Mon May 14th)

Another overcast, showery day today :(  Although it's been a little annoying with the constant showers of rain, at the same time its been nice to experience the rain on the cape. To get a little of the wet season feel.

Today we made it out to Punsand Bay! We crossed Laradeenya Creek, it was still flowing fast, but had gone right down. The drive out to Punsand Bay was really nice, with lots of little creeks rushing out from the scrub like vegetation. We took our time, the road was a little washed out, but not a problem.

The resort at Punsand Bay was a little run down, although we could see how nice it could be. The camp sites were set back a little from the beach, which was really nice.

On the way home from Punsand Bay

On the way home, we called into Seisa to check out the jetty which is a well known great fishing spot! The schools of bait under the jetty had Damon pretty excited. He could'nt wait to get his fishing gear and try his luck.

The seisa jetty is where the ferry from Thursday Island comes in and departs from. It is also the port for the cape, where all the goods, stores and supplies arrive on the barge. People can travel on this barge to and from cairns with their cars and caravan/campers. The butcher just before Seisa has a good reputation, so we stopped here also to stock up on some cryovacced meat. They sell ice here for $3 bag, which is a lot cheaper than anywhere else in town.

After lunch Damon went back down to the Seisa jetty to catch us some dinner! He had a ball down there he said, and came home with a Mackeral!  It was superb, you cant beat fresh fish in the pan.

He even got the fire going this afternoon with our wet wood, which he then used to roast some potatoes to go with the fish.