We are nearing the end of our epic trip now and are only a couple of weeks away from our starting point at Maroochydore.
After leaving Carnarvon Gorge we carried on southwards passing through Injune to the town of Roma, a large Outback Queensland town. This is cattle country and Roma boasts the largest cattle sale yards in the southern hemisphere. We made a point of going along to the sale yards on a sale day and it was truly fascinating, a really entertaining free day out! We got talking to an old fella who told us he was a hobby farmer, meaning he only had a small property and only about a hundred head of cattle, which is considered small by Aussie standards. He was there to sell some of them. He used a local agent who handled the sale for him and his sale took barely a minute or two. It is all very fast and furious and the auctioneer walks on gangways above the cattle pens and before you know it another herd is sold.

From Roma we made our way to Toowoomba up on the Darling Downs, and after a couple of nights there we finally returned to the very first campsite we stayed at right at the start of our trip ten months before, at Crows Nest. When we checked in there we told the manager the story of our epic trip and that we had started and finished at their campsite, and that evening in the communal camp dining room we got a round of applause from the other campers amid shouts of “well done to the Poms who have just completed a circumnavigation of our wonderful country”.

From Crows Nest we decided to take a few days R & R at the beach and headed for the wonderfully named Tin Can Bay. Three nights, and a couple of days lazing on the beach watching the fishing boats, we finally headed off back to our son’s home in Maroochydore, job done, we had successfully encircled the whole country. What an epic adventure, the memories will stay with us forever, and also the many friends we made along the way and are still in touch with to this day.

Some statistics:

• We traveled a total of 38,000 kilometres.
• We used 4,850 Litres of fuel
• Which cost Au$ 6,800
• It took us 10 months, and, apart from when I played golf, we were together 24/7 for 10 months, a true test of any marriage!

So that’s the end of my reminiscences, and as they say Downunder, “catch ya later”.