Well as it turned out we ended up staying at the van park during the morning and going out in the afternoon. There was an issue with one of the children that needed sorting out and we decided it was best to take the time to do that properly. Then we thought it best for the kids to have some ‘down time’ at the van park while I caught up on the washing that needed to be done. We seemed to be averaging about a week between washing loads – and then there was at least 2 loads to do. So Michael supervised the kids on the jumping pillow and then swimming pool, while I caught up on housekeeping. (Michael didn’t mind supervising as the kids were old enough that he could read a book or his iPad most of the time and just keep an ear out and look up every now and then). I didn’t mind doing the housekeeping as it meant some time on my own, which I needed every now and then.

The kids really enjoyed their morning of play and swimming and were very hungry by lunchtime. I’d preempted this and prepared a big lunch with cold meats, salad and bread. We discussed the things we were going to see that afternoon.

Our first stop was the information centre in town because I’d read where you can hire a CD audio tour of the town for $5. We got the CD and it also came with a laminated map to show you all the points of interest you’ll be visiting. I also wanted to ask which school used to be the old Mount Carmel Christian Brothers School which is where Dad attended for a while. I found out it is now the Columba Catholic School inner campus, right near the centre of town and it is still a boarding school as well as day school. Having done these things, we went into the next room and watched a short video on the history of Charters Towers – how it was an accidental find of alluvial gold by an aboriginal boy (named Jupiter) which started the gold rush in the area. Jupiter had been a helper in a white person party of prospectors who had been moving through that area. This event happened in 18? and by the late 1800s Charters Towers was the 2nd largest city in QLD, and had given itself the nickname of ‘the World’ as it was thought that anything a person could ever want was found there. There was a lot of opulent buildings and residences built there by those businessmen and entrepreneurs who became wealthy on the gold. By 1930, most of the gold had been found and the town’s population decreased dramatically.

Next door to the information centre was the old stock exchange arcade. We heard a talk about the ‘calling of the cards’ which occurred 3 times a day during the gold rush period. There was also a miners museum and assay room nearby which was free and had just a few tools and things from the mining days.

We hopped back in the car, put on the CD and started following the tour. It first took us towards Towers Hill, just a few kms from the town centre. At he base of the hill was the monument to Jupiter, the boy who first discovered gold. Near this was a seismological building, as Charters Towers is one of a handful of towns/cities in Australia which collects data on earth tremors etc. As you drive up the hill you can see many of the WW2 bunkers which were used for storing reserve ammunition for the squadron at Townsville. Up the top of the hill was a good view over the town at the lookout. There was an amphitheater up there as they put on a sound and light show at night about the history – called ‘Ghosts of Gold’ – needed tickets and we weren’t overly interested in this. There was a short walk to the ruins of a pyrite tower which had been used for getting the gold out of the quartz using a chlorination process. It had been built on the hill as the gold quartz had had to run downhill during the process.

We followed the next couple of places on the tour which were pioneer residences which had been maintained or restored. We drove past the Charters Towers hospital which had been built in around 1890. I figured my grandmother, Nanny, must have been born at that hospital because she was born in 1902. I also found the street, Farrelly Street, where her family had lived for the first 6 yrs of her life before they moved to Brisbane. 

We then went past the Columba Catholic School inner campus and found the older section which would have been where my Dad  boarded. It was just diagonally opposite the hospital. This part of the school had a wrought iron archway with St  Mary’s School embedded in the archway. I think mum had told me this was what the school was called after it amalgamated with Mt Carmel. I took some photos – perhaps they will bring back some memories for Dad.

We were about halfway through the self drive tour at that stage and it was about 4.15. We had seen a shop advertised in a tourist brochure that we were interested in looking at. It was a toy shop which sold olden days toys. We thought we had better go there next in case it closed at 5pm. It wasn’t far from where we were so we drove there and went in. It had the types of toys that I hadn’t seen in a long time, some which I remember having as a child – like a spinning top. The kids all enjoyed looking at everything. The lady who owned the shop