Emerald

Hi everyone, we arrived in Emerald on Friday after a 5 hr trip due west from Rockhampton, right on the Tropic of Capricorn. It was a very interesting trip, seeing the countryside change from tropical to scrubby bush & fantastic mountains.  We saw lots of coal trains  some of them over 2 kms long, pulling 85+ coal containers with 4 massive engines. Also stacks of road trains, 3-4 trailers long.  Below is a photo of me behind a huge truck carrying earth moving equipment. We leave tomorrow to stay 25 kms east of Longreach, for 5 nights. Our caravan park is about 15 kms out of Emerald, on Lake Maraboon, & the dam wall, a lovely spot & very social. Our site is close to the amenities block & everyone stops & has a chat.

Lake & dam wall with water being released

The lake is 3 times the size of Sydney Harbour

The Big Easel-a massive reproduction of Van Gogh's painting "Sunflowers" The easel is 25 metres high with four 7x10 metre panels and weighs 4.5 tonnes.

Yesterday we went to the Gemfields area, and the small villages of Sapphire & Rubyvale. People come here to fossick  for precious stones. There are lots of gem shops selling jewellery made from local stones. We stopped at one of these places for lunch, you could buy a bucket of "wash"  wash it & then pick over it for gemstones. We had a great time watching people doing this while we ate our lunch,picture below.

Pub at Rubyvale

Driving to Sapphire we were amazed to see 4 wild boars stacked neatly by the side of the road! Recently there was a cull of feral pigs (around 600, on 5 farms)