We packed up our camp site at Loyalty Beach this morning and
were feeling a little sad that we had to farewell our lovely new friends. We needed to go and check out of the caravan
park (and pay the bill seeing as though they haven’t been ready to accept money
the past few days). Whilst doing so we
farewelled Chook & Teresa who will be working there this season and also
bought a little gift for Cedar, she has been a gem to have around. After delivering the gift back to Ben and
Jenna we said one last farewell and went on our way. We were still in two minds whether to go to
Weipa (a fare way south on the western side of the Peninsula ) or to skip this 120km
detour and just continue towards Cairns.
We stopped at the Bamaga bakery whilst trying to make a decision and I
had a crayfish roll – it wasn’t cheap but it was so good! Whilst driving Josh made the decision to go
to Weipa to see what it was like, the extra mileage was not going to put him
off. As we approached Weipa we saw one
of the mining trucks driving alongside the road… and a lot of red dust
surrounding it. Weipa has one of the
world’s largest bauxite mines and it’s owned by Rio Tinto Alcan… money to be
made. We checked into a caravan park at
Weipa but decided that we weren’t tenting it tonight – we just couldn’t bear it
for another night so we got a cabin for the night – easy to pack up quickly
tomorrow morning. After taking the kids
for a swim in the pool here we were back in the car having a look around
town. There was a shopping centre nearby
which even had a Woolworths so we picked up a few things. We drove further and crossed over the bridge
of Andoom Road, which is a one way bridge and goes on for what seems like forever. I don’t know how long this bridge really is
but I don’t know how they expect you to see another car coming from the other
end? It also has a railway track run along
it for the mine’s use. We ended up down
a dirt track that took us to a small beach called Red Beach, apparently good
for crocodile spotting. There was an
aboriginal family down there with some hand reels and they waved us down. We went back to see what they wanted – their 4WD
was bogged. Josh got to work with our
winch to rescue them out of their rut.
Thankfully we didn’t see any crocs while doing this. We had a quiet night in our cabin tonight
ready for a long drive home tomorrow.
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