Sprung Chicken Ride 2009

Home | Daily Reports | June | Day 091

Mount Surprise to Georgetown

Distance travelled – 99.1 km
Avg speed – 18.4 kph
Max speed – 43.8 kph

We really enjoyed today. The scenery was lovely, going over the Newcastle Range was spectacular. We started at 8.00am and the road was very quiet for the first hour and then got a little busier – I think everyone had just woken up! All day the traffic was really not that busy and we only saw 2 road trains – perhaps because it is Sunday. The majority of the traffic that passed us was towing a caravan and it is very clear that the grey nomads are very active out here.

We saw lots of red tailed black cockatoos and a dingo this morning. Many of the trees and bushes are flowering so there are a lot of other birds around as well. We stopped for morning tea under a tree that before we pulled up was full of red tailed black cockatoos. We were interested to see what they were eating. The eucalypt had just finished flowering and they were eating the immature seeds inside the green gum nuts. The empty gum nuts on the ground looked like they had been simply peeled open with a ring pull like a can of sardines. When we tried to open one we found that we had to use the saw blade on our leatherman knife to cut through the gum nut’s outer casing. This gave us a good appreciation for the power behind the cockatoos’ beaks. After testing the inside for palatability we decided that we would not rely on this form of bush food for any future meal as well as being damned hard to get at it was very bland.

We arrived in Georgetown about 3.30pm

Zoom into the map and use the 'Satellite' layer to see our new location.