Any travel through this CoVid time is a challenge, but we had decided that we did need a break but we would need to stay within Queensland.
We chose Rockhampton as it had been a long time since either of us had been in the area. A quick “Google” showed lots to do and see, but on further investigation we could not find accommodation. I knew Yeppoon is the beachside locale of Rockhampton so decided to look there… Still not a lot available but I knew Easter would be a very busy time. I finally found “Salt Yeppoon Apartments“, a newish resort right on the oceanfront. It promised that every room has an ocean view. A few clicks and we were booked in a 1 bedroom apartment for 5 nights.
This holiday is going to be a little bit of a different “foodie adventure” I found lots of interesting cafes in Yeppoon, so we have chosen not to take too much in the way of food with us. Normally we tend to self cater (especially breakfast) and take food from home to cook in the apartment. This trip we are only taking milk, bread, butter, tea and condiments. We have packed a full day’s food for Good Friday as we know that most places will be closed.
The week prior to this trip saw 2 CoVid clusters form in Brisbane and a subsequent 3 day lockdown of the greater Brisbane area. While we do not live in the lockdown area, there was a chance that the area may be adjusted to include the Sunshine Coast if more cases emerged. This would have meant that we would be unable to leave 🙁
Through the week there were no Sunshine Coast cases, although a couple of concerning reports of a man who had tested positive had visited premises on the route we were due to take. As we were due to leave on Thursday morning and the Chief Medical Officer was to due to give her recommendations as to the lifting of lockdown at 9:00am Thursday we decided to risk it and go, knowing that we would only be a couple of hours away from home when the news was announced. and if we needed to return, it was not too far to go.
Thursday morning we left early as planned and were on the road just after 7:00am. It is an approximately 7 hour – 650km drive to Rockhampton/Yeppoon but as we are very familiar with the road for the first 300kms between the Sunshine Coast and Childers, the plan was to stop at the roadhouse at Gunalda, get a cuppa and wait for the news at 9:00 then head straight to Childers for morning tea, then we would “amble” the next 350kms, stopping if we saw anything interesting.
We arrived at Gunalda at 8:50, just enough time for a stretch of the legs, a bathroom break and a hot drink while we waited for the 9:00 news. The news was GOOD!!! The Premier announced that Brisbane was allowed out of lockdown early at midday and Easter is “good to go!”
This news was indeed good, and I felt much better knowing that we were not likely to have any issues, and the mandated mask wearing for the next 2 weeks is not a big problem.
Our next stop was the Childers Bakery Sandwich Bar for an early lunch. M stops here most weeks on his delivery run to Bundaberg, so I thought it was about time I experienced their food 🙂 I had a bacon and cheese sausage roll that was indeed VERY good 🙂 We also bought a loaf of fresh bread and a couple of HUGE sandwiches that would be dinner.
Travelling north, we passed through the town of Gin Gin. We did not stop as we had been here not to long ago. We thought we might stop at Miriamvale but decided we did not need to so kept going. A little way further north we came to Bororen and a “Big Giraffe” The cafe must be good as the carpark was packed as was the road in front 🙁 We pulled over at the park across the road to use the amenities and kept heading north. I am hoping we can check out the “Big Giraffe on the way south.
We stopped for a “driver reviver” free hot drink at Calliope. This stop was in the Calliope Historic Village. I dropped a few coins into the donation box and we sat and enjoyed our cups of tea. The men in the kiosk asked where we were travelling to, and when we said said Rockhampton, they asked if we were coming for the “Rocky Nats” We said no ( as we had no idea what that was) They explained that there was a huge car show and race meet thing happening. When I looked it up I understood why I was not able to find accomodation.
As were were having our drinksI could see there was a number of caravans down by the river to the west, so when we were back in the car, we went to have a look. We duly found the Calliope River Campground. This is a such a lovely spot and I would imagine it would be a relaxing spot for a few days.
A bit further north we passed an intersting looking sign that alerted us to beware of trucks carrying explosives?? In the distance to the west we could see a number of buildings and a very secure looking fence on the highway. Google told us that the area is the site of a Queensland government explosives reserve. (Who knew)
We rolled into Rockhampton around 3:00pm (right in time for school pick up time) Traffic was quite heavy but we made it through Rockhampton and on to Yeppoon. We made a quick stop off at Woolworths to pick up some provisions and we checked into our apartment just after 4:30. We had a quiet night after our big drive.
Our Christmas Roadtrip was a practise run to see how we would go for space with a proposed new car. Our previous car was a BMW Sedan, and while we did enough room in the car, we knew that upgrading to an X5 would be a good move.
We collected our new car this week and are looking forward to our next adventure.
We will probably RoadTrip at Easter, but we have not yet decided where our destination might be.
Click on any of the images to see them full screen.
Today we are heading home. As with any holiday, our time away has been lovely, but it is always nice to get home.
We had gone to bed early last night and we woke up early at 5:30am. At least we are getting back to work routine 🙂
After showers and a couple of cups of tea and we went down to the buffet for our final breakfast. It has been nice to have breakfast cooked every day and not having to do the dishes 🙂
After breakfast, we had time to relax ( finish this blog post) and finish packing before checking out. Although we have a 12:00 checkout, we will leave earlier. We are going to visit our daughter on the way home and will have morning tea there before travelling back up the highway for the hour or so trip home.
Once we are home, we will need to do a quick shop for essentials for dinner tonight. We will do a “proper” shop in the next day or so.
We have had a great holiday and now it is time to plan for the next adventure……….
A quiet start before we ambled across to the Qld Museum. The Museum does not open until 9:30 so we had plenty of time.
I started organising our things ready to pack tomorrow morning. I had done a load of washing the night before, so all we will not have just chore to do when we get home.
The Museum was very interesting. It is not the largest museum but had a large collection of Australian animals and dinosaurs.
I am not quite as old as a dinosaur ?
On the first floor is a very good exhibition called ” The Anzac Legacy Gallery ” It tells the story of the First World War and how it changed the face of Qld and how those events have shaped our life now.
We spent a good while at the Museum before catching a bus to Bowen Hills to see a new dining precinct that has been built on part of the Brisbane Exhibition Grounds. We have seen TV segments on the “King Street” area and thought it would be a good place to get morning tea.
Well, it did not turn out quite as I planned 🙁 Firstly we had to wait 10 minutes or so for a bus, then when we did get to King St, most of the cafes were closed. It is obviously a “night venue” Then I looked for a bus to get us back to SouthBank and found that we had just missed one and the next was 30minutes away.
This was not ideal, as we had a restaurant booking for 1:00 at Riverside with the daughter.
I made the decision to walk up to the next main road where I was sure there would a lot more buses passing. It was a 500m walk and it was hot 🙁 We did manage to get a bus and were back at the Mantra in time to have a quick shower to freshen up before getting the City Cat to lunch.
Daughter had given us a voucher for Kingsleys at Riverside (our kids know we like eating out, as they both gave us “food” 🙂 ) The food here was simply sublime. We decided it was possibly the best restaurant we had been to. Sadly we forgot to get a photo of our mains – (Eye Fillet and Waygu Pappardelle.) Good food, Good wine, Good company – Great day!!
After lunch we were VERY full, so we spent the afternoon relaxing in the room and further sorting out packing for the next day.
We had been told to do a day trip out to the Moreton Bay Islands – Russell, Lamb, Macleay and Karragarra. All these islands sit in the Moreton Bay and are easily reached with a short ferry ride from Redland Bay Marina.
I had researched the routes and determined that to have lunch at the recommended spot of the Bowls Club on Macleay Island, we needed to catch a bus from the Cultural Centre at approx 9:30 this would take us to Carindale Shopping Centre where we would transfer to another bus which would arrive at Redland Bay Marina to meet the 11:30 ferry to the islands.
We left the Mantra with plenty of time to catch our bus, and when we go to the Cultural Centre a bus arrived earlier than the bus I had scheduled that said it was going to Carindale, so I said we should catch it as it was better to get to Carindale and not be in any risk of missing our connection to the ferry.
We had a pleasant ride on the two buses to Redland Bay, taking in suburbs that neither of us had been to in a long time.
The ferry was waiting for us when we arrived at the Marina and we were soon underway on the water. First stop was Russell Island, then Lamb Island and then our destination of Macleay Island.
There was a courtesy bus from “Club Macleay” waiting to take us to the club for lunch.
We had a nice chat with the driver on the trip to the club and then had a lovely bistro meal while admiring the view over the bay back toward Redland Bay.
Tempura Prawns & Garlic Bread
Chicken Breast with Camembert and Garlic Prawns
Crumbed Lamb Cutlets and Chips
I did notice why the Bowls Club is so keen to provide a Courtesy Bus to meet each ferry. Just a very short walk (approximately 50m) up the hill and just out of sight of the ferry stop, is the Macleay Island Pub. I am sure that many tourists like us do not know the pub is there and are whisked away to the Club. Smart business decision 🙂
On the way to the ferry, we noticed that the bus stopped at Cleveland Railway Station, so we decided that on the way home, we would get off the bus at the station and get the train back to the city. We thought it would be quicker and also we would see some different scenery than the trip out.
We got back to Southbank Train Station a little after 3:00pm and walked down the hill to the Mantra a little tired but happy that we had a good day.
A light pizza from the hotel restaurant, delivered to our room was all that was needed for dinner. We watched a little TV and were off to bed by 9:00
We planned a day in the city today to do some sightseeing and then later in day meet our daughter for an early dinner.
We decided on a Brisbane City Hall visit and perhaps a trip up the clock tower. Tours do not start until mid-morning, so we had a relaxed start to the day.
We arrived in town just before 10:00 hoping to do a clock tower tour, but sadly they were full until much later in the day. We may try another day if we have time. We did have a walk through the Museum of Brisbane on the third floor. When we had finished browsing the exhibits at the museum, we went downstairs again and saw a group who were just starting a tour, we asked if we could tag along.
The tour was very interesting and there were a couple of funny stories along the way. We all laughed about how politics has not changed much when we were told that the building took 40 years for council to make up its mind to actually build the thing. Then, because it took so long, they just wanted it done and of course, the budget blew out dramatically. What was supposed to be a 250,000-pound project ( when the average house cost 300 pounds to build) ended up costing just shy of 1 MILLION pounds !!
Another story was of the metal sculpture on the top of the clock tower. In the original plans of the City Hall, there were a few sculptures planned than were not included as they just did not have the money for them. To this day there are sculptures missing from above the side entrance doors.
A planned sculpture for the top of the clocktower was also out of the budget, but the council really wanted “something” there to finish the tower.
They decided, that instead of commissioning an outside artist, they would look within and find someone who was employed by council already. This meant they did not have to pay anymore than materials.
They settled on “Fred – the plumber” to create something (because plumbers are great artists 🙂 ) Fred was given 5 Pounds to complete the work. This was about the equivalent of one week’s salary for him at the time.
Fred thought he would keep the 5 pounds and set off to see what he had lying around. He found two large basket frames which we welded together to create a sphere. He found an old lamp post which he placed within the sphere. Visiting a scrap metal yard he found a slightly bent bedframe that he could use and finally the small sphere at the top of the piece is the ball from a toilet cistern!! And that is the story of the “Metal Lattice Work” that finishes the clock tower.
After the tour, we had a look into the Shingle Inn that has been rebuilt on the ground floor. We have both been to both the original cafe in Edward St and the re-creation in City Hall, but is always nice to have a look.
I decided that in keeping with the theme of “historic Brisbane” we would take a short walk to MacArthur Chambers to see the Douglas MacArthur Museum. We have not been there, so I thought it would be interesting. When we go there, there was a sign announcing that it was closed until the end of January 🙁
It was getting close to lunchtime, so I had a look at the Entertainment Book app on my phone to see what was nearby. We discovered that we were just a few doors away from Jamie Oliver’s restaurant “Jamie’s Italian”.
We had a delicious meal of fresh pasta before making our way back to the Mantra for a quiet afternoon.
We had a relaxing afternoon before heading to the river to catch the City Cat up to RiverSide where we were meeting our daughter for dinner at The Riverbar.
After a big lunch, we chose a lighter dinner and had a nice time chatting. Before long it was time to board the City Cat back to Southbank and fall into bed.
Waiting for the ferry, we took in the views of Brisbane’s Storey Bridge lit up in blue. Further up the river, we noticed that even the cranes on the new constructions sites were also lit up to make an almost pretty display.
