Warm Temperatures are Nice ……… But!

The usual wake-up time and we provided out own breakfast today! It seems most motels provide a kettle, microwave, fridge and toaster which means we can do our own thing and remove the temptation of larger, greasier more “interesting” breakfasts.

Today was planned to be one of our busiest to date. We headed off to a local heritage village. It was a little more modern than expected, based on life around 1875-1915. Again, a picture is worth a thousand words.

A family home:

The school room had some math questions on the board that would challenge any modern kid, e.g. add 3 yds  2 ft 6 in and 1 yd 1 ft 11 in

Outside were a couple more classrooms, and a game chalked on the floor that I hadn’t seen before.

On to the engine shop where there was an assortment of engines to power generators, shearing equipment and a host of other mechanical beasties.

Being a workshop there were a few cartoons around, one caught my eye.

Next to the workshop was the fire hall

There were also some ponies wandering around.

For a Sunday morning the place was deserted, we saw less than 10 visitors. Hopefully that is not typical as it would be a shame to see the place close down. We got a good work out walking around in the 35C heat (it would climb to 40C/104F later in the day!).

Next stop for the day was the Capricorn Caves. We arrived a few minutes after the scheduled tour start time and thought we may have to wait around for the next tour in an hours time. Luckily the tour hadn’t started so off we went. Again, a small crowd of only 7 people.

These caves were different to any others that we had been to in that they were dry. With Queensland’s dry climate, the only time the caves get wet is after the December rains. Again, here come the pictures.

The trees on the surface have roots that go down hundreds of metres through the cave system to find water.

The Caves also have a chapel which is used for weddings, it is also used for an event called Opera in the Caves. While we were sitting here the guide turned off all the lights, there was absolutely no light leaking in …. very eerie.

The caves are  home to some animal life:

Unfortunately we missed yesterdays guest, a large python! Also the caves are home to many thousands of bats. In fact the floor of the caves are solidified bat “poo”! We saw a colony of bats covering 10 Sq. metres of the roof, the “poo” underneath them was NOT solid. Each square metre of the colony will house 1800 bats, they huddle together for warmth. Talking of warmth, the cave was a pleasant 22C! The python was in the cave to replenish his/her food supply, they love bats.

We exited the caves via a very swingy suspension bridge

Our next stop was Mount Archer, a climb of about 1500ft to an elevated walkway and view points. Again, there was just about nobody there. 

Unfortunately it was quite hazy, so the views over Rockhampton didn’t turn out too well

I mentioned yesterday that fires are quite common in wooded areas. Below are some pictures showing the results of these fires, and also the plants ability to recover.

By now we were feeling the effects of the heat, so we decided to head back to the hotel via the tropic of Capricorn. Yesterday I said this was our first time in the tropics, I was wrong. A quick look at an atlas shows most of Cuba and the Caribbean Islands lie in the tropics.

The last picture suffered from sun glare. Tomorrow is another longish haul up the coast to our first Airbnb and hopefully some kangaroos and wallabies on the beach.