Winter 2018, Midge Point, Qld

Leaving Ayr we stop for seafood at Arabon Seafoods on the wharf in Bowen then scoot down to Proserpine. From there it’s only a short drive to Midge Point which we are assured is not named after sandflies.

There’s a take away store, a tavern and a lot of well mown lawns, a few hundred neat holiday houses with tractors out front and tucked into paperbark bushland is an oasis of a Caravan Park.

We have a large site with views across paperbark and palm studded lawns to the beach. Overhead the kookaburras laugh a lot and we can hear the sea. The wide flat beach stretches forever and islands dot the horizon. It has to be a half kilometre walk out to the surf even though it’s nearing high tide.

This is a fishermen’s paradise and around the fire pit the regulars have their favourite spot we feel a little like the new kids in school. Especially as we don’t even fish. But they are a happy bunch and everyone has a story of a big Mackerel.

It is a pleasantly warm evening and there are no insects so with the ritzy tablecloth out and candles lit we eat our prawns and Moreton Bay bugs under the awning, a perfect end to a perfect birthday, but where on earth did Woody find that bottle of French champagne?