Day 23 Karumba

This morning we went to see “Bunratty Castle”. It was built by a local man, Johnny Walker, using bricks from the town’s old meat works. He carried the bricks home on his pushbike, four bricks at a time so it took a while to build his place.

A later owner is said to have picked the winner of the Caulfield Cup in 1968, the horse’s name was, “Bunratty Castle” maybe he used his winnings to buy what has become known as, “Bunratty Castle”.

Apart from visiting a castle our day has been unremarkable. We did our laundry and unlike last time when the clothes came out far worse than they went in this time they came out clean! Fergus has also come out clean and bright after a visit to the Doggy Wash. On the way back from our dry-the-dog walk Fergus pounced on a locust that landed right in front of him and before I could get to it he had it in his mouth. I’m sure the thing gave him some nasty whacks with it’s legs and eventually Fergus did spit it out. Yesterday when we were near the Sunset Tavern one flew out of a tree and whacked Alex on his top lip, that made sure Alex didn’t open his mouth again for a while!

We went back to the Boat Ramp at Karumba Point and watched people fishing, a tourist boat go out, boats being launched etc. We heard one man being asked if he’d caught anything, his answer was that he’d been there for a couple of hours fishing, caught nothing and it was a perfect way to spend his time. We didn’t see anyone catch a keeper.

The tractor came down from the Caravan Park and filled tanks with water to spray around the Park to settle dust.

Alex saw another of the vehicles that just about make him salivate!

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I saw some interesting shells and rocks that looked as though they were covered in bird droppings but it was actually tiny shells.

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Brolgas and a Jabiru put in an appearance today and I also managed to catch a Kite in flight. The Campground seems to be the place for the little Wallabies at dusk.

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There’s only one road in and out of Karumba so tomorrow we’ll go back to Normanton before heading towards Burketown but we might stop at Leichardt Falls for the night, where I expect there will be no mobile coverage so no internet.