Day 51, Wednesday, 29/6/2016, Rollingstone, 22 degrees

There’s seven of us now and we decide to drive over to Fisherman’s Landing cafe at Balgal Beach for lunch. If I haven’t already mentioned it, the cafe is a few hundred metres from our van, we can see it from our kitchen window, but it is a 14km drive owing to the resident croc in the creek. The cafe is priceless. I doubt they’ve spent anything in maintenance on this place since Queen Elizabeth took the throne. It is two storey and built of breeze blocks and it overlooks the creek. Inside the colourful tablecloths came from somebody’s grandma and two equally colourful ladies run the fryers. Damp tea towels flutter from the window the view from which is stunning. There’s the creek below and out to the east, the Coral Sea and the islands that adorn the Great Barrier Reef.

We choose to eat outside on the tired old wooden deck that comes with a view, of course and sand flies. We order beers that are held in styro foam stubby holders marked “Fisherman’s Landing” in black marker pen, marketing is not one of their strong points. Wine is on a help yourself basis from the cask over in the fridge and poor Elle tries three blends declaring each as long gone before reverting to a beer.

Gee the mackerel is good.