Up to Merluna Station

We zoomed up the nice wide road and pulled into Archer River Roadhouse, hoping to get info about the road to Weipa. Rio Tinto had helpfully provided a roads adviser who gave us plenty of info. She said that Piccaninny Plains where thought we might volunteer at for a couple of days, probably would be deserted because the owners would be out working, so we decided that we’d try to phone them on our way south to see if we could help and see what they were doing in terms of conservation. As predicted, we did pass 8 triple quarry trucks carrying gravel from Archer River to Boyd Bay, near Aurukun, approx. 150-200km away, for a new mine with Rio. A long way to carry gravel.

We decided to camp at Merluna Station for the night and as hoped, we were able to have dinner with the owners and other station staff. Cameron was very quiet but opened up after dinner and told us about the new horsemanship of an American horse whisperer that he was trying to emulate with his horses. Michelle was also interesting and told us about the internet and phone complexities of a station. We discussed the 4 corners documentary on the 88 days that backpackers have to do to get an extra year on their visa with the 3 backpackers. One had experienced poor pay and conditions in SA planting strawberries.

We were thrilled to see the Palm Cockatoo again and also the Papuan Frogmouth.

Papuan frogmouth

On the walk around the 3 tracks, there was a dam with lots of birds

Striated  night heron

We were also thrilled to meet Rob, Mel, Jacinta, Mikayla and Aaron Naismith who we had breakfast with, before setting out together for Weipa. Mikayla caught a little lizard that she became very attached to.

Cameron on his runabout

Old Mapoon Back Beach

In Weipa we drove around and Russ fished at the promising Weipa jetty and I read everything at the Cultural Centre. Russ waiting hours to get the washing dried and we then had desert (my apple crumble) with Mel and Rob and kids.

We all set out for Cullen Point and the road was amazingly good. The camp ground was windy and not there were no shady spots left so the boys drove to Old Mapoon Back Beach. Russ reported that there was about 150m of soft sand and we may have to winch the van in….but it was paradise at the camp area. I couldn’t not agree but wasn’t looking forward to the trip in. I offered to go ahead to take photos and Russ quickly agreed – probably to avoid my wincing and sharp intakes of breath while he tried to get the van in. Fortunately he got in first go, but he managed my expectations by saying that we’d probably have to winch to get out because it is uphill.

We let the tyres down quite a lot

Mel and Rob got in with no problems

 and so did we!

What a beautiful camp site - right on the beach with lots of big paperbarks shading us. And we're the only ones here.

We drove along the beach and its so beautiful – blue water for ever and it looks very fishy, so all very excited! Aaron caught a tarpon which was very exciting. The boys went out in the tinny and Russ caught a small coral trout and a monster that pulled them for hundreds of metres and then broke him off. Fish for dinner around the camp fire while fending off hoards of mosquitoes – better plans for tomorrow hopefully, as the kids got badly bitten.

The birds are fabulous here - thousands of terns and a good diversity of other shore birds including many pairs of pied oyster catchers, white faced heron, pelicans, black fronted dotterell, sea eagles, brahminy kite and we see a Jabiru most days.We also saw frigate birds although not sure which ones they were

Its high tide at night and then low tide through most of the day. We have to keep reminding ourselves that we're in the gulf so the tides can be quite unusual. Our camp faces north and the sun sets over the sea and rises over a tiny strip of land which is the other side of this enormous bay.

Aaron was very pleased with his big catch

The kids loved lighting the camp fire and we all enjoyed it

Next day we drove about 12k down the beach to Janey’s creek and Russ caught 7 queenfish, including 3 in the bait net and Mikayla caught one too. With my enormous stash of Panko breadcrumbs (1kg bag from Coen General Store) we prepared a very tasty lunch for all. Russ, Rob and Aaron went out in the tinny again and came back at sunset saying they’d had a frantic fishing frenzy, getting hits every 50m on the red and white lures and also loads of sharks eating their catch before they could get it in the boat. They were just outside the reef in front of the campsite. More fish for dinner and this time Mel, Aaron and Mikayla had dinner inside their van to avoid getting slaughtered by the mosquitoes. Most nights we have several episodes of killing mozzies in our van and the ceiling looks disgusting and is cleaned off the next day. They're not bad enough to stop me coming here again but they are bad.

The lovely Naismith family from Melbourne. Rob, Mel and Jacinta at the back and Aaron and Mikayla in front.

Although a few cars go up and down the beach each day, we do feel very privileged to pretty much have it to ourselves.

Janey Creek mouth at mid tide, where we caught all the queenfish

Our trip up the Janey Creek wasn't as fruitful as expected, but still enjoyable and great to fish in the sort of places that ET and IFish rave about.

Definitely croc country.  People who often camp at Janey Creek said there was a big 4m one that moved around but didn't come too close.

Various birds flew over at sunset - magpie geese, radjah shelducks and frigate birds

Russ making the easy trip out on the soft sand.

Silver crowned friarbird at Weipa Camp Ground

Fashion parade on the beach - Radjah shelducks on the wind

Pied Oystercatcher

Beach Stone Curlew

 Sea eagles

Male Olive backed Sunbird

Sad that Mel and Rob are leaving today after a quick buzz up to Janey Creek for a last go at the queenfish. We took some photos and they got out very easily over the soft sand. We went out in the tinny although I was a bit nervous about the sharks. Russ caught a dog mackerel and I caught a nice big queenfish and forgot about the sharks.

Next day we did a whole day of fishing – I’m beginning to look like someone to enjoys fishing – the things you do for love! We caught 3 queenfish at Janey’s Beach but nothing to keep when we fished from the tinny and went a few km up Janey’s Creek. We threw back 2 cod, a mangrove jack and a GT. Interesting to consider that we payed $2500 3 years ago to fish the mangroves like this and this time it was free! We chatted more to the old guy we’d been communicating with over our 4 day stay at Old Mapoon Back Beach. He drip fed us some info about local fishing while carefully looking over our car and canopy and saying he wanted one just the same. At the boat ramp at the Jane’s Creek camp we got some great photos of a male Olive Backed Sunbird that seemed quite happy hopping around another fisherman’s car.  We’ve also seen lots of bee eaters, a brahminy kite, sea eagles, white headed stilts, pelicans, little terns, black fronted dotterels, pied oyster catchers (there are loads of oysters on the reef rocks), white headed heron, striated heron, radjah shelducks, frigate birds flying past (not sure if they’re lesser or great).

After considerable planning, we set off Monday morning to traverse the 200m of soft sand between our campsite and Cullen Point. Russ leveIed out the dips in the sandy track with the shovel and I scraped dead leaves and grass onto the track for added traction. We let the car tyres down to 25 and the van ones to 15. We expected the first 100m to be the hardest because it was uphill. Russ happily agreed for me to be out of the van getting photos while he drove. We were so relieved that he got out without having to use anywhere near all the power in the car to get out. The car did bounce a lot which we hadn’t expected. This made the van bounce too, but it didn’t cause any problems in the van (yet). He said, in retrospect, that if we hadn’t been with Mel and Rob, he probably wouldn’t have gone into this site, but now we know we can do it, this gives us confidence for other similar ventures. Great!! The drive back to Weipa was uneventful – it’s a great wide gravel road. We have 2 nights booked in Weipa so will do some cleaning of the van, car and clothes, shopping and get my blog up to date.