The Big Lap - An Eventful Day

Well, today was eventful.

We left Townsville as planned and headed towards ChartersTowers. 

The next leg of our journey is along the Overlander's Way.

We started to see termite mounds in the paddocks. 

We were also entering road train country. 

After going over a range we finally entered big sky country. 

We knew we were getting closer th Charters Towers when we crossed the Burdikan River.

When we came up here in 2008 we took a picture of this sign. The second highest flood ever was in 2009. It is hard to conceive how much water there was, when you look at the size of the river which is well below this sign.

Charters Towers has a really historic town centre, which is all heritage listed. 

We had a good look around here last time we were up this way. 

We were surprised to see cattle trains. Apparently they are a new government initiative. 

About 80kms west of Charters Towers we called into a rest area at the little village of Homestead for our morning tea. 

When Mick hopped off the bike he said "Ooh!  We aren't going anywhere!"  The sides of the rear wheel were coated in oil from the diff! That is not a good sight. 

Fortunately, we have premium cover with the NRMA.  Several long phone calls later, after explaining where we were and what we were travelling on, the RACQ from Charters Towers was dispatched. 

We had to wait a couple of hours for them to arrive, but it wasn't so bad. We had our morning tea and lunch with us, there was a table and chairs under a shady tree and amenities were just there.  We had good mobile coverage to make those necessary calls for help and quite a few people called into the rest area so we had a few chats while we waited. 

We also saw a road train go by from the same company that our mate in Rockhampton drives for. 

When Jay and Brian arrived with the tilt tray they had things organised in no time. 

I must say our little trailer looked really little behind the truck. 

They got us delivered back to Townsville as there is a BMW motorcycle place here. We had stopped for morning tea at 11.30am and got here at about 6.00pm. It has been a long day. We can't say enough good about the RACQ fellows. 

All things considered we are very fortunate. As there wasn't oil splattered all over the place we think the damage had only just happened. We could have had a major incident on the bike if it had let go while we were riding. We weren't too isolated.  Imagine if it had happened further west. 

We are now settled in a motel in Townsville and will look at our options tomorrow.