Charters Towers is a real 'must see' place with its fantastic architecture and old buildings. Charters towers in its heyday had nearly 30 000 people living and working in the town. This was in the late 1800s when they had discovered gold. As with any gold mining town, there were 37 pubs but only a few remain and fortunately the facades and buildings have been retained. The first Australian stock exchange operated out of Charters Towers which was connected to the London Stocke Exchange. The world gold price at the time of the gold boom was set at Charters Towers.

The World Theatre is a magnificent building. The main theatre where live shows were and still are shown seats 600 people. There are also 2 picture theatres attached to the building.

We had the opportunity to go through one of the private hotels that now only provide accommodation where they have a honeymoon suite with a four poster bed that they decorate in white for weddings - also have a spa unit and family units upstairs.

We took a trip out to the Burdekin weir which is about 15 kilometres north of the town.

We were camped out at Macrossan Park on the Burdekin River - a really great camping spot with plenty of room, the regular train coming through (as usual!) overlooking the river. We stayed here for 3 nights with Fran and Bert going into town one day and us going in another day.

On leaving Charters Towers we travelled back to the coast through Ayr to Home Hill. What a fantastic free camp they have set up here! You park along the road (next to the railway line of course!!!) and they provide new toilets and hot showers for travellers to use. We wandered through town which unfortunately like lots of the small towns over here are suffering economically and there are many shops closed. However, their supermarket is by far the cheapest we have come across so we stocked up.

From here we stayed at an overnight stop, Guthalungra, and then it was on to Bowen. We camped at a fantastic farm stay - Glen Erin Farmstay - out in the paddock for $10 a night. The farm was about 17 kilometres from Bowen but it enabled Burt to have someone look at his vehicle and fix the problem. The lady who owns the farm, Lynn, made everyone feel so welcome and each evening all the campers were invited to have happy hour around the camp fire where Lynn made her outstanding damper. She served it up with golden syrup. Yum!

After such a great stop at the farm we were in for a couple of forgetable camping stops. But you get that on big trips - as Tony would say. One was behind a BP service station along with Brahman cows in the paddock next to us and trucks coming in at night. The other was the General Gordon Hotel just outside of Mackay. They hotel looked pretty good as you drove up to it and we impulsively booked in. Not the brightest pencil in the pencil case! Up stairs were the toilet and shower and I could have picked up some lovely free maggots to take fishing with me but we didn't stay long enough.

Stay tuned for the next episode in our journey.