Alice Springs & Lawn Hill Trip - Day 22

Day 22 - 23/6/2016 - Normanton to Cobbold Gorge

Before leaving town we took a few photos that we didn’t get a chance to take the previous afternoon.  It also helped that it was a bit cooler, but it was warming up fast!

Packed up and ready to roll!

The Albion Hotel where we watched the State of Origin

Krys - The Savannah King - I wouldn't want to be fishing in a tinnie with that around!

The Purple Pub

Our first stop for the day was at Croydon.  We had passed through the town on a previous trip but didn’t have time to stop and explore the township.  It is known for its historical buildings that are well maintained.  Last time we didn’t get a chance to have a wander around the buildings so this time we made sure we did.  It was certainly a lot drier than when we came through about 7 years ago.  We were a few months later in the year so that could be expected.

Inside the old Town Hall

The old Court House and the lamps in the street

I left this image a bit larger so you can click on it to get the bigger version. There are some funny stories there!

Inside the old Court House - It would have been enough punishment just being in this court room for a few hours!

Old Court House

From Croydon it was onto Georgetown.  Along the way there was a single lane bridge crossing the Gilbert River.  It was amazing how wide and shallow the river bed was.  We hoped we didn’t meet any road trains heading towards us!!

The Gilbert River

We stopped at Georgetown for lunch and to refuel before heading towards Forsayth before heading to Cobbold Gorge.  There was about 14km of dirt road on the way to Forsayth and it was absolutely brilliant.  It had just freshly been graded.  The scenery was also starting to change and we were starting to get back into the rocky country.

The freshly graded road was nice smooth

We stopped in Forsayth to stretch the legs and also let the tyres down as it was a longer stretch of about 40km of dirt road into Cobbold Gorge.  We had heard that it was also a bit rougher. Forsayth is a good place to stop for those that don't want to take their own vehicles into Cobbold Gorge.  There is a regular transfer service from Forsayth to the Gorge to allow people to do day tours or stay in the on site accomodation at the Gorge.  

Forsayth

The Forsayth train station - Still in use by the 

The Savannahlander

The road started off in good condition - not as good as the first leg but not bad, but the last 20km or so were very corrugated and rough.  We put the roughness down to the volume of traffic of tourist busses, campers, supply vehicles and also the cattle trucks from all of the stations in the vicinity.  There were a lot of them!

The landscape was also changing and there were quite a few interesting rock formations.

We stopped along the way for a quick break just to let everything cool down because the ambient temperature was still pretty high and the corrugations would have been working the suspension harder than normal.

On arrival at the reception area, it was pretty much chaos.  There were about 3 tour buses that had just dropped off people from their day tours and they were all heading into the reception building and the bar.  With the limited parking by the building I found a spot to park up out of the chaos to wait for Jodie to return from trying to check in.  The eftpos was holding things up as they only had limited internet connectivity for the eftpos to run over and everyone buying souvenirs and buying drinks at the bar and paying by eftpos.

While I was waiting I also found someone else just patiently waiting.

It looked like it was waiting for the chaos to also disperse so it could cross to the other side of the carpark.

After eventually getting checked in and setup we explored the grounds.  We found another great deck to sample a few coldies and take in the views.

Nice spacious campsites 

The deck and infinity pool overlooking the dam 

The deck

That evening I also had a chance to take a few night shots.  It would have been good for a GoPro time lapse but there was no good vantage points from our campsite.  I also didn’t want to leave the GoPro hanging up in a tree where I couldn’t keep an eye on it.