Today started as our shortest trip so far, probably less than 100-metres. The reason? Our campsite for the past two nights has a delightful cafe serving great coffee. So, once on the road we pulled straight over for a morning brew.

Heading further West

Refreshed, we set-off for our next stop of Longreach in Central West Queensland and even deeper into the Queensland Outback. As we joined the Lansborough Highway we checked the road conditions warning sign. The sign indicates if the roads are open or not and in our case OK with Caution. It’s not that long since the Wet closed many of these roads and it was good to see things had cleared significantly. The Caution warning ahead now related to the condition of the road surface.

What lay ahead of us on this relatively short drive was some of the longest, straightest roads we have seen. And what a change in scenery, dead flat in every direction, anything green has now become a rarity, all grasses are brown, the soil is red and there’s very little sign of life other than the sad sight of roadkill kangaroos. And it was one large roo on the road in the opposite direction that got us onto the VHF radio to warn oncoming traffic. Hitting that would have done some serious damage. Strangely, despite the straight roads they weren’t that flat instead undulating and more so on the floodways that regularly caused the road to dip.

What really surprised us was the number of trees. We’re really into the Western Queensland Outback but it’s not as baron as you might expect. Apart from the occasional road train and an increasing number of caravans, mostly heading east, there was little traffic on the road. What we were seeing more of, though, were the aerobatic Black Kites that fly around the roadsides looking for fresh roadkill.

A Mile of Machinery

Before long we were arriving at the tiny town of Ilfracombe and, like most towns in the outback, there was a reason to stop. The attraction this time was the Great Machinery Mile. It’s actually 1KM long but hey. This unusual collection of historic tractors, diggers, bulldozers, earth movers and carts were all recovered from within a 100-mile radius of town. They show the technological progress from the earliest mechanised machines used as the region was developed since the mid-1800s.

Opposite the attraction is the Wellshot pub, a great place for a bite to eat and look around the bar – especially the barstools!

The last short leg brought us to the outback town of Longreach – somewhere I have been wanting to visit for a long time. Longreach is home to the Qantas Founders Museum and you certainly cannot miss it on arrival in town – a 747-800 ‘Jumbo’ jet is sat right next to the road with its six-story high Kangaroo tail towering high above.

So many trees

Just like Barcaldine’s penchant for naming roads after types of tree, Longreach isn’t missing out on the game but has stepped it up a level. All roads are named after birds – waterbirds for east-west and land birds for north-south roads.

But more about Longreach tomorrow…