We started out at our normal time. Glenn had suggested our destination for this
trip. Definitely worth a look as it’s
the largest 4WD park in the Great South East.
Heading north along the Bruce
Highway
Traffic is moving well at all stages, but about 2k’s
before we take another right, we come to a complete standstill. It seems that there are some road works
halting our progress. Expected delays
are 15 minutes says the sign. And it’s
right. We pull up in line and wait.
Roughly 15 minutes pass and suddenly people are
getting back in their vehicles, me included.
Shortly afterwards, we are under way again. It seems that they are repairing Sandy Creek
2 kilometres later we turn right just before the
meatworks. We have no need to enter
Kilcoy, so deviate. Normally this way
takes us to Yandilla, but we bypass the next turn and continue across Kilcoy
Creek. A few k’s later, we take another
right and start heading away from Kilcoy.
The road narrows and twists and turns it’s way to the bottom of the
range. This spot also denotes the
beginning of the Jimna State Forest
and Conondale Range National Park
As we head up the range, we note that the road is
diminishing in spots, so if you are coming this way please take care when
turning blind corners.
Once at the top of the range, we pass the Jimna
turnoff. Jimna itself is only about 1k
off the road. We lose the bitumen
shortly after the exit. Another 1k or
so, brings us to Peach Trees turnoff, but we keep going. An even shorter distance brings the Jimna
Fire Tower in sight. This time it’s
completely surrounded by fencing to keep people out. Next time you are up this way, drop into
Jimna itself and donate some cash to assist in keeping the fire tower there for
generations to come.
We still have about 20k’s to go and we now have to
keep a good eye on the road and we also slow down and drive to the road
conditions.
Eventually, we spot a sign and take a left. According to my directions, we have about 6
more k’s to the office.
We pull up in the car park at 1030, but by the time
we’ve paid and returned to the car it’s nearer to 1100 and we still haven’t
found a campsite yet.
We hit the road
again following the map we’ve been given.
It seems that we have the choice of 3 campsites so we head to the first
one to check it out. We find a suitable
spot when carloads of young people move in very close to it … so we move on to
the next campsite. As it’s getting
rather late, we don’t bother even looking at the third one … just find a
suitable spot to put up the camper.
Turns out the spot we pick is really nice and has water views.
Once the camper is up, we notice the dreaded canvas
tent owner’s worst nightmare … mould.
Must have been that last camp in almost torrential rain. Damn!
I make a mental note to find ways to combat this and quickly. (It turns
out that one of the blogs I’m subscribed to beats me to it having found mould
themselves and they even provide me with a solution).
We settle into camp and study the 4WD-ing map laid out
before us. Lots of extreme stuff which
we don’t want to do. Lots of steep stuff
which I’m not keen on. Lots of in
between stuff too, but not much lame 4wd-ing to be found without a long
drive. We settle on doing a track to the
head waters of the Brisbane
River
Since it’s taken so long to get here and then setup
we’ll save the drive for later. I feel
the need to check out our surroundings first.
I take the dogs for a walk downstream whilst Glenn sits back and enjoys
the comfort of his chair.
The day is really warm, so I spend some time in the
creek. So does Telashi. I end up lobbing the ball from my comfy chair
to the other side of the creek for her.
I note as I have nibbles and drinks that all the
vehicles going past are going full pelt and bucking up heaps of dust. The track they are taking is fenced off from
the camp ground, but it’s also along the fence line, so we will still cop the
dust regardless.
The creek is cold, but not cold enough to stay out of
for too long as the day is very warm. Or
rather the sun is very warm. At least
being in it for any length of time sure does make you realise your 30+
sunscreen has no hope of saving your skin from the inevitable. Our comfortable chairs follow the shade as
much as possible.
We think about dinner now and getting a fire
started. We search out some wood from
around the banks of the creek. Of course
we find other fire pits filled with the labours of idiots who don’t care or
know better. It’s disappointing. Once we find enough wood to get a fire going,
we do so. Stew is the order of the day
and what better way than on coals in the camp oven? I’m even doing up yoghurt bread patties to
have it with as they are just so nice.
We’ve been scanning with the hand held CB all day,
with not much interesting on it.
Our closest neighbours come down to check out the
creek and go for a walk along the bank after saying hello.
I start preparations for the stew whilst Glenn gets
the fire going. Not much too dinner
really. Chop everything, then brown off
meat with onion and capsicum, add everything else, some water, herbs and
spices, put on the lid, add coals, walk away for ½ hour or so. One of the easiest camp meals ever I
think. Very filling and always providing
left overs for breakfast.
As night falls, we sit by the fire and discuss
tomorrows drive around the countryside.
As mentioned before, Glenn wants to head to the headwaters of the Brisbane River
We eat dinner and sit back to enjoy the almost
serenity. Camp cake is now on and we
are awaiting it’s perfection.
One lot of our neighbours are a bit on the noisy side
for awhile. Once they start to settle
down a car comes down the hill at a million miles an hour and comes to an
abrupt halt in their camp. He yells out
that ‘the Toyota
This taken the next day.
About an hour later as we are heading to bed, about 8
or 9 vehicles parade their way back down from whence the last vehicle
disappeared. A few head into the other
camp, but most head back towards the entrance to the camp site and disappear
from view. It’s hard to tell if any of
these are the rolled Toyota
11 AH
17.03.13
The next dawns brightly. We reheat some stew for breakfast. I take mine with bread, but it’s not as nice
as the yoghurt bread patties.
Today we are going for a drive. I’ve charged up the GoPro, but we’ve got no
way for hooking it up to the bulbar – none of the components one can purchase
is large enough apparently. I can hold
it still on the dashboard.
We do the dishes and load up the puppies and head out
onto the tracks. Navigating is
relatively easy as most paths are sign posted, but we do come across a few that
aren’t. I manage to keep us on the right
tracks, as well as passing heaps of other potential camping sites.
We make our way along tracks that have me gripping the
vehicle … I’m not so keen on how the vehicle leans over in places, but we are
still on 4 wheels when we make our way down to the banks of the Brisbane
River. Unfortunately there is no chance
of us crossing over, so we do a 3 point turn and head back along the same track
we came here on.
Along the way, we see another vehicle coming along a
more extreme track and we follow him for a short while before he races
ahead. When we catch up, he’s flexing
his car to it’s limits across the track ahead.
We don’t have that much flex due to some technical thing, but it’s
interesting to watch.
Taking a slightly
different exit to the other fellow, we head into a spot that would be great for
camping. It’s time to let the pups out to stretch their legs. We check the creek for depth here as well and
find it disappointingly shallow, but of course, Telashi can always find a small
spot to get her feet off the ground and let out a high pitched yip or two.
Back in the car, we head for camp. It’s getting towards midday and we don’t want
to leave too late as we still have road works to get through.
I’ve been taking a GoPro movie through out our journey
so it will be interesting to see it once back home. Might see how it goes on the trip home too. Sorry you won’t see the movie as I’m not that
crash hot with the program that turns it into a net viewable product. It’s pretty lengthy as well which doesn’t
help me much.
Once back in camp, we eat some lunch and start the
pack up process – this weekend the canvas is perfectly dry. Once completed, we head for the office so we
can sign ourselves out. It’s one of the
conditions on entry.
That done we head for home. I run the GoPro whilst charging it. The trip home is long, but nothing really
exciting happens.
20.2 AH
Trip Kilometres:
394
Trip Duration: 48 hours
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