On The Road With H and L

Monday was a very wet day in Tin Can Bay, but we had books to read and a sudoku or two so a day inside passed quickly and then dinner at the local pub. Thankfully when it was time to pack up and leave the rain had stopped and since then it has been sunny.

We have found on our travels that people are very friendly and happy to share their experiences. For example when we said we were headed for Tattum Sands, several people said that there were problems with sand flies there and so we changed our minds and here we are in Seventeen Seventy - a funny name for a town but it is named in honour of the year Captain Cook came ashore here from his barque Endeavour. The town is on Bustard Bay which reputedly refers to Cook and his crew’s dinner of an Australian bustard which they surprised and shot on the beach. The story goes that given that Cook and his men were the first Europeans ever to set foot on the Queensland coast this was definitely one unlucky bustard!

Seventeen Seventy has very much the feel of a resort/holiday town with cruises to Lady Musgrave Island, scuba diving excursions and reef fishing etc etc on offer and lots of young people and backpackers about. We are noticing that most people are in shorts, T-shirts and thongs or bare feet - we are still finding it too cold to strip off but it won’t be long as it is slowly getting warmer. More people about too, but school holidays here next week and we are leaving here Sunday heading further north for Mackay.

The surrounding countryside is very lush, although we have seen large areas planted with sugar cane, macadamia trees and pineapples, there are also huge stretches of dense bushland with tall trees and the creeks and rivers are much larger compared to those we see in South Australia. Some of the so called “creeks” we have passed over are about the size of our River Torrens!!