Day 50 Funnel Creek

Saturday 5th June, 2021 27.4km

1342.5 / 3756.4km

Continued on the old telepraph line

Today I was to continue following the bearings of the old telegraph line. Whilst it's slower than walking a track or road I found it pleasant. I slept in this morning. Considering the early stop and early bed I am surprised, but I do feel a lot better than I have for the last couple of days.

So it's back past the windmill and I stopped to have a good look. It looks like it has been disconnected but is still used when required. That's when it struck me. Maybe I'm in some cosmic adventure game. I had been picking up spanners and toolkits and gloves. What if my inventory was building up and I was supposed to repair the windmill. Use bolt, use spanner, fill water etc but I had just sent my inventory south in a box. Was I now in danger from a Grue (Zork reference for you real adventure gamers out there. When the adventure took imagination not finger skills) I could only continue and see. So S, S, S, I went. (another text based adventure reference)

The windmill

Funnel Creek

The instructions in the book took a little turn for the worse when I hit the entrance to Hamilton Park Homestead and a new fence but I climbed under and continued the bearing and the old poles would make an appearance every now and then. It was when I came across the service road for high voltage power line it went haywire for me. There were three lines running across my path with a road then a new fence and then another high voltage line was further but at an angle. My bearing was supposed to change 200 metres after the service road. I did this but nothing made sense after. I saw no evidence of the old telegraph line and run into real old fences that probably had been there 20 years. I maybe should have ignored the 3 high voltage lines and kept on the 110 degree bearing to the 4th line running more at the angle and changing to 130 after that. In the end I just took a beeline to Funnel Creek. I found a fence line I liked and got to the road.

Funnel Creek was indeed running and would have made an excellent camp. But it was a long day, so I filled up and moved on.

The paddocks are looking dry

I was back on a gravel road until I cross the Sarina to Marlborough road. This was the old Bruce Highway and in the 70's we were warned about "The Marlborough Stretch", don't stop or break down, strange things happen, people disappear. In the end I drove this stretch to and from Brisbane about 5 times. Once sleeping in a ditch beside the road with 3 Army buddies because we had hit two kangaroos and the lights on the Escort were skewed to the heavens and we couldn't see where we were going. That and those one lane bridges where there were planks lifted out and we pulled the exhaust off. Maybe the local hillbillies lifted them out on purpose to trap the unwary. I think Frank who owned the car regretted the trip especially as we were classed as AWOL as we went further south than Rockhampton without a leave certificate and were confined to barracks on our return. I wasn't heading down this road but into the very country all these supposed nasties lived. Yeah me.

Old pole

Anyway, I crossed the highway and the road is bitumen all the way to Tierawoomba Homestead. I couldn't get over the amount of traffic on the road, car after car, caravans and horsefloats making me step off the road. The country was dry but I knew I could pick up water at the homestead (invited). I stopped at the designated camp spot and found a cattle trough and settled in for the night. It's about 2 kilometres from the homestead but about 8 pm I hear music blaring out, it fades in and out so it's not close. It is still going at 11pm. Who do I call to make a noise complaint? At 12 it finally dies off. I'm thinking is it a B+S ball or kids further up the creek.

Old wooden posts

I'm finally drifting off when the sound of wild pigs digging their way through creek. It's getting very cold and I have everything I can have on. I even pull a garbage bag over the bottom half of my sleeping bag as my feet in socks are still cold. Not a good sleep listening to pigs and freezing.

The dam is empty

Brolga in the scrub

Sarina-Marlborough Road

50 Days of walking (Blue) Day 50 in red.   Bus (Green)