Tablelands to Townsville. QLD.

Moving from Mareeba to Yungaburra, (Big drive I know). I found Bonadio RV & Nature Park, this was a fabulous park, great walks, excellent wildlife, we were able to feed, possums, Bandicoots & pademelons. We may have spotted a Tree Kangaroo on our night walk, but will never know for sure. We had a good fire each evening, wood was supplied and this was a great location to explore more of the Tablelands.

New Year's Eve, Golden Drop Mango Champagne & dinner cooked on the open fire - Perfect!!

Glen & Jane.

Bush television.  

This cheeky possum, trying to get in the tin of peanuts.

Cute Possum.

Pademelon.

Yum, yum peanuts in my tum!

Watch the claws Stevo.

A relaxing walk along the Barron River.

Gallo Dairyland .

This farm has been a dairy for many years and was only opened to the public in 2007 as an integrated educational dairy experience. The farm has over 1000 acres and also grows sugarcane.  At present they make 16 different types of cheese. Chocolate tasting is another pleasure at Gallo.

The Gallo Cheese factory.

Cutting the cheese.

Tempered Chocolate. 

Look at this pair of Turkey's!

Holstein Friesians waiting to be miked. 

Milking is under way.

A few facts-

> The first cattle, 7 cows & 2 bulls arrived in Australia in1788.

> Holstein Friesian's produce the most milk.

> Gallo Farm milk 300 cattle twice a day.

> It takes a cow 60 hours to turn grass into Milk.(With the help of 4 stomachs)

> It takes 10 litres of milk to make 1 litre of Cheese.

> A cow needs to drink 5.5 litres of water to make 1 litre of milk.

What are you looking at? 

Very cute.

Making Bacon or Passionate Pork.

A Hairy Goat.

How different is this. 

I had to have a Milk Shake at the Dairy.

Me at the Curtain Fig Tree. 

The Big Fig Tree.

Historic Village Herberton - depicts the life style of the early settlers.

An excellent day out with a saw mill, school, Blacksmith's, John Deere Tractor display, Herberton Times,Rail Ambulance, Day's Garage & coach house, The toy shop, Martins chemist & suspension bridge to name a few. We have been here before, so I kept photographs to a minimum.

$5 got us a ride on the railway.

Herberton station - restored by volunteers.

This carriage is in the process of being restored.

Will we fit under the bridge.

Our train ride.

Steve with some old cars.

Jane & Glen.

Steve at Elderslie stately home of the 1880's.

Herberton High Street.

Grassy Hill wind Turbines.

The blades rotate 6 rpm in low winds & up to 36 rpm in higher winds.

Wind turbines start operating approximately 9klm an hour and reach maximum power output at 49klm per hour. When the speed reaches 122klm per hour, the turbines shut down to avoid damage to any equipment.

Innot Hot Springs. 

Hot water up to 75 degrees - bubbling up.

Steve & Jane paddling in the thermal springs.

We did a free camp at Fletchers Creek, where we were still able to have a dip in the creek.

The drive from Ravenshoe to Charters Tower, was very scenic, with horses, bustards, Emu's, Eagles, cattle, cattle & more cattle. We also traversed the single lane road - a bit scary when meeting a road train.

Charters Towers to Townsville was a very pretty drive.