3rd August Tambo

Kms today  490          Kms to date 9580

I was woken in the wee hours by the sound of rain and wind!  I looked out the window and sure enough it was pouring.  I was meeting Jamie at the café at 7 so I got dressed and went down.  I had a good chat and Jamie suggested I visit the Mechanical Museum and wait for the rain to clear.

The museum was full of big trucks, so not very interesting for me but there were some notable items.  There was a history of electricity generation in Winton. In the early days they gasified wood to run the generator.  There was a huge container with a standby diesel generator. There was also a strange Mini with two front ends welded together so it always goes forward. I went round the back to have a go at the Musical Fence.  This was just  wire fence which you could tension to make different pitched sounds: not very exciting!  The airfield at the back of the Musical Fence was where QANTAS started operations. 

Double ended Mini

Musical Fence

Winton is where QANTAS all started.

I left at 10am heading for Longreach.  The country was mostly Mitchell grasslands and very flat. I went straight to the QANTAS Founders Museum to have lunch and check out any new aircraft.  There was a Super Constellation, which was the aircraft that QANTAS used to establish itself as the first long haul airline after WWII.  With the Superconnie in 1958 it could fly to London, LA/ New York and Johannesburg.  They also introduced pressurised cabins air hostesses and economy class, though the fares were still very high.

QANTAS new international routes 

This is the plane that made it possible - the Lockheed Super Constellation

Qantas started its overseas flights to Ceylon during WWII with this Catalina flying boat.

I left the tour early as I had to get going to Tambo over 300kms away.  I stopped at Barcaldine for fuel only and kept going, aware that it was getting late and wildlife could become a collision risk and there was more road-kill evident.

I arrived at Tambo Mill Motel at 5:30 just before sunset. The room beside mine was used by a couple of men who's business was training Kelpies as cattle dogs and they had four in a cage at the back of their ute.  They were heading back to Cairns.  I had dinner across the road at the Tavern and watched the wall climbing event from the Olympics- strange sport but does meet the higher faster mantra!

Interesting poster in the Tavern in Tamb, which I sent to Morag.