Day 38 Thursday 16/6/2016, Charters Towers to Ravenswood, warm overcast with much talk of rain.
We’ve turned south again just to see what is there. Little old Ravenswood is about 80kms south east of Charters. There’s not much out here but cattle that wander about the road and dry creek beds. An enormous mullock heap is a dead giveaway that there’s mining going on though. Small mullock heaps and old brick chimneys dot the landscape and a handful of interesting old buildings.
We camp in the Showgrounds just behind the town. “Park anywhere, the caretaker is under the shower, he’s only got one leg so he’ll be a while”. There’s power and water, clean amenities and level sites so it’s good value for $15. Not to mention the free entertainment provided by the brush turkeys.
A post office / general store, a museum, hall and two live pubs. We choose the Railway Hotel, the pub that advertises the coldest beer in Qld and we are not disappointed. Hey, they use glycol as a coolant which means a lot to a Victorian beer drinker! Even red wine is kept in the fridge up here. The locals reckon that their fridge temperature is room temperature in Europe anyway. I reckon they may be right. Charlie the pub owners’ Dad is a Victorian too so that explains the ice cold beer. Anyway Charlie and the barmaid both like a chat, lunch is good and the three storey pub is as close as you could get to original condition. During the war it housed a Townsville boarding school, to keep the young girls out of harms’ way while the real boarding school became a barracks for troops.
There are about one hundred people living around here and several hundred fly in fly out miners working for Carpentaria Gold.
Towing Kms: 89kms
