7.7.15 - Eulo to Tuen Creek

Up at 7.00 ish after another freezing night, we both actually felt the cold last night, so will have to get more bedding/clothing on tonight.

We packed up slowly, burning the last little bit of our wood for warmth.

There was some nice morning light on the river/trees, so I was out to practice the picture taking (have been on manual settings for 99% of the trip)

Highlight of the pack up was trying to wrap the toilet tent up, it just wouldn’t fold back into its little circular shape. The lady camped across the river, actually walked to the bridge and around to assist, as she had been watching us struggle. Just as she approached we managed to get it in. She gave us some tips and told us she had to consult Google on more than one occasion to conquer her tent.

We travelled the short 68 kilometres into Eulo and stopped at the Queen of Eulo Hotel for a $5 shower. Very nice it was too. The Queen of Eulo, was a woman who traded in Opal and run a hotel, she was commonly known and was the self professed Queen of Eulo.

We travelled 86 or so kms into Cunnamulla, where we did a cruise around town before dropping into the visitor centre, which had a pretty good little museum for $10. The museum was created by the Cunnamulla Historical Society and they had a bit of everything. Also included was the Artesian History tunnel, which began with a weird ‘ride’ that took you back 50 million years, and you departed into a tunnel that told the history of the Artesian Basin. 

There was also a short movie, also focussed on the Story of the Artesian Basin, really very interesting and worth a visit, if you are ever through this way. In short, when Australia separated from Gondwanaland, pretty much all of Queensland and some of NSW/NT was lower than the rest of the country, so during ice ages and ice melts, the rising sea flooded the whole area….then other stuff happened and eventually the Artesian basin was formed. The water from here was tapped by many, many inhabitants, the aboriginals used the natural springs and soaks for years and years. The white explorers were a bit more perplexed by it and found it all a boggy mess and counted it no good. Later on many, many bores were put down to exploit the resource that enabled stock to survive, cotton and wool to be washed and harvested. The bores flowed freely and the landowners ‘delved’ channels to run the bore water across the land for stock and agriculture. Of course, lots was lost to evaporation and it also meant that noxious weeds and feral animals thrived. Now with Government assistance, most bores have been capped and water is piped to wherever it is needed – an important move to conserve this natural resource.

We wandered up the street, past the Cunnamulla Fella- made famous by Banjo Patterson and Slim Dusty, for a coffee, and very nice it was too. Can highly recommend Boulders Café.

We stopped at the butchers to buy a small lamb roast, just in case of a roadside bush camp with fire. Then walked a bit more of a very historic old town.  We popped back into Visitor Centre, as we forgot to look at the art gallery, exhibiting some photographs by a woman called Amy something, from Cactus photography, all photos of outback QLD life, quite good too.

Then we choofed out to the Alan Tannock weir for a squiz and lunch. Then off to fuel up and get some cooking oil.

Finally on the road about 2.30ish or so, heading for Bourke. We found some wood along the way and then 66kms from Cunnamulla we crossed the Tuen Creek and drove into to scout for a campsite, nice and early about 3.30 or so. Came across an Echidna, so some (many) snaps of him, before setting up camp beside the dry Tuen River.

We established a nice fire, set up toilet tent, I set up my tent and Dad prepared the camp oven for the roast. A lovely sunset, the wind has dropped off and lamb and vegies sizzling nicely on the coals in the hole beside the fire, gravy made, greens ready to boil and we are all good to go.