Day 50– Friday 5 August 2016 – Julia Creek - Hughenden

Just outside Julia Creek we spotted a huge freecamp with dozens of vans and motorhomes.  There must have been a number more who had moved on as well.  We would have loved to have joined them if it weren't for the battery issues which continue to get worse.  We now have absolutely no battery power unless the van is hooked up to the car.  

Not quite such a huge drive this morning with just  264km to travel although that equated to over 3 hours as the road were awful and the roadworks were almost non-ending including three of these traffic lights, all of which catered for little old ladies driving to church on Sundays - they were soooooooooo slowwwwwwwwwwwww.  In the process - poor Shane was a bit bored again.

We've also watched many train services pass by, or mostly we've passed them by as they appear to be going very slowly and so far only one passenger train amongst the many freight services we have seen.

This one clearly didn't know if it was coming or going!

Arriving at Hughenden and being very grateful for booking ahead while others were turned away having no powered sites left, we found the caravan park rather cramped with angle parking of vans to maximise space and absolutely no room to put out the awning on our site.  Fortunately there was a shady tree but not much room for the dogs to relax outside the van.

We decided since it was necessary to detach the car from the van to take off and have a tour around the area.  The Showgrounds just down the road had a huge turnout of campers - again though - without power.  I had to get out and take some photos in a nearby park of these awesome fish and thought the dog memorial was pretty cool as well.

Centre parking again here in Hughenden but I wonder how many issues it creates for people turning corners as almost every block it was next to impossible to see oncoming traffic.

We headed out of town and turned down yet another "Scenic Road".  Maybe it's me, but I'm just not feeling the love.  The conspiracy theorist in me thinks they are created by local petrol station owners to make you drive more so you spend more on fuel.........  I rarely find these scenic routes any more scenic than the highway.  But you can always rely on a dead tree to make a statement and so it wasn't a completely lost cause photographically speaking.

One particular part of our discovery tour this afternoon was a rather amusing way of identifying a huge bump in the road along with a speed reduction sign.  Judging by the gouges in the road on the other side of the bump, not all travellers heeded the 80km sign or the XXX's.  It begs the question - why not fix it?