Day 3 was, for the most part, less eventful than the previous 2 days. We had a bit slower start to the morning but still got away about 9.30. We drove to Bourke, and learned that it was named after the governor of NSW in 1835, Richard Bourke. The surveyor and explorer, Thomas Mitchell, had founded it at this time and originally set up a fort (Fort Bourke) to guard against the tensions that had developed with the local aboriginals. We also learnt that it is located on the Darling River, which Hannah excitedly announced she was learning about at school (the major Aust river systems). Despite an interesting history, there wasn’t a lot to see in a quick visit, so we mainly filled up with petrol and continued north. After about another hour of and a bit of driving, we entered Queensland, stopping to get a photo of the sign (which was in the middle of nowhere – halfway between Bourke and Cunamulla). Then it was continuing north towards Cunamulla. It was certainly long, straight road territory, surrounded by semi-arid mulga landscape. We didn’t see much live wildlife, but there was certainly more dead wildlife on the road than we would normally see. And therefore a lot more vultures and other birds of prey. On average, we only passed another car coming in the opposite direction every 20 mins or so.

These kinds of long drives were a good opportunity to do schoolwork with the kids. I would sit in the back of the car amongst 3 of the children and Lauren and Sam would take turns in sitting in the passenger seat. Lauren and Sam were able to do their work mostly by themselves. So I would help Hannah and Beth. I would read their spelling words to them and check their markings etc. and I would set them their maths sheets and help if they needed help. Hannah would sometimes write a page in her journal about something that stood out from that day or the previous day and do a drawing. I would get Bethany to narrate some sentences about what she wanted to say about the trip (usually prompting with some ideas). The only problem with doing schoolwork in the car was that it led to bad handwriting, with all the bumps – but I had to overlook this if we wanted to get some done.

We reached Cunnamulla about 2.30pm and stopped there for some afternoon tea and a play at the playground. The park was right next door to the Shire Hall, which had in the front of it the statue of the ‘Cunnamulla fella’ – the subject of the song by the same name, made famous by Slim Dusty. The song was a tribute to outback stockmen. Because this was probably the first ‘tourist attraction’ that we visited, it was also the first place were we noticed at least 4-5 other caravans parked in the same spot. We were about to join the tourist throng, rather than feeling like we were on our own like we had at Molong and Byrock.

After about a 45min stop at Cunnamulla, we got back in the car for another nearly 2 hr driving stretch to Charleville. We reached Charleville at around 5pm and stayed at the Cobb and Co. Caravan park. The owners were a lovely couple and the husband showed us to our site by driving Hannah and I (who had gone into the office) on his golf buggy, with Dad and the others following in the car. Once we pulled up, he said he’d better give the other kids a ride also, so they piled on with him and he took them for a ‘spin’. We had another one of the frozen meals I’d made back home, and then Michael and the 3 older children went off to a night time session at the Cosmos Centre – an observatory which has very high-powered telescopes. There had been some doubt over whether it would go ahead or not that night, as there had been some cloud build up during the afternoon. We had rung ahead to check. But the cloud lifted and they rang us back at 7pm to say it was going ahead. I stayed back at the van with Bethany, as she was usually worn out and asleep by 7.30. I told her she would have a special walk with Mum and ice-cream the next day. Michael and the kids got back around 9.30pm and reported that they had all enjoyed it, especially when they got to see Saturn and its moons through the telescope – they took a photo through the telescope lens in which you can see the planet with rings around it. They had also got to see other stars and constellations – a good science lesson for them.

Day 4 was another day of lots of driving. We got away from Charleville a bit later than we should have – but I let Michael sleep in a bit, knowing he was getting tired from the driving. We had some DVDs on iPads for the 2 younger girls to watch if they woke up early – and had earphones for them so they didn’t disturb anyone else. Bethany and I got up around 7am, but the others (including Hannah) slept longer, which I think they needed. I did a bit of grocery shopping in the main street of Charleville while Michael took the kids to a park. It was nice experience the relaxed shopping in the main street of an outback country town – I visited the IGA, the bakery and the butcher – and there wasn’t a shopping mall in sight. The others picked me up from the side of the main road, I loaded the groceries in the caravan fairly quickly, and then we were off, heading towards Blackall. It was the usual drill with schoolwork again once we were on the road. Lauren and Sam weren’t too happy about how much schoolwork I was asking them to do, but Michael and I both reminded them, it was best to get it done while we were just sitting in the car for long periods as we wouldn’t be doing as much once we were out and about sight-seeing. And they weren’t able to do much more than about an hour’s worth anyway, as we couldn’t acces their maths on the CD ROMS yet.

At Blackall we stopped at the monument to the “Black Stump” – early surveyors in the region used the stump to sit their equipment on to read the stars etc. The colloquial saying “beyond the black stump” seems to be traced back to the stump here at Blackall – everything west of Blackall was “beyond the black stump”. We also briefly stopped for a photo of the monument to Jackie Howe – the shearer who set the world record for hand sheep-shearing. In ? he sheared 325 sheep in 8 hrs ? mins.

Next stop was at a little village called Tambo which is an the Barcoo River and it has a lovely rest area and picnic spot near the river. We had lunch there and the kids rode their bikes and had a play.

Then it was back in the car for another hour’s drive to Barcaldine. I drove this stretch (the first time I drove during this trip – Michael wasn’t as confident of my driving with the caravan in tow – but since it was mainly such straight roads, and he relished the rest, he passed it over to me. I think it was about half an hour before he started to relax though – still, I’d rather he was on the cautious side than being too overly relaxed about the care needed when driving with a caravan.

At Barcaldine, we got out for about 20 mins to see the site of the first artesian bore which successfully drew water in western Qld. And just outside the train station is a memorial to the ‘Tree of Knowledge’ – a tree which marked the site of an historic gathering of discontented stockmen and pastoralists in ? – they were unhappy with wages and conditions – this gathering was the beginning of what became the union movement and ultimately the Labour Party. It was a very unique kind of memorial – the stump of the original tree was still in place, but surrounded by glass pavers in a way that you could see the roots underneath. Hanging over the tree, making a type of roof canopy, a whole lot of timber reeds, forming an interesting pattern.

Once again, back in the car, and this time headed west for the hour’s drive to Longreach. It was going to make it a late setup, but we really wanted to get there, so we could set up and stay there for 2 nights. We arrived about 6.15pm, Michael, Lauren and Sam set up while I drove the couple of blocks to get some pizza for dinner. This was dutifully demolished and then Hannah and Beth had quick showers and off to bed, followed not too long after by the rest of us.