June 1 – 2, 2019
When we crossed the Tropic of Capricorn a few hundred of kilometres I anxiously awaited the change to more tropical scenery. I understood that we were coming into Australia’s winter but Australia is not know for Nordic conditions. Sure, they have snow and even ski resorts in their southern most regions but we were well north of that. Additionally, they had recently experienced two cyclones that drenched much of northeastern Australia to the point where roads had been closed for long periods due to flooding. What I experienced was something completely different.
Aside from the landscape being much greener and with far more vegetation, the look was not exactly what I pictured as tropical. The landscape was still mostly flat, the trees relatively stumpy and most of the rivers and creeks just rocky, dry beds with maybe a small pool of stagnant, green water. Not exactly Gilligan’s Island.
One thing that did appear tropical was the proliferation of large and numerous termite mounds. While we had been seeing these for many kilometres before crossing the tropical line, up here they appear far more numerous and far larger. I would expect that anything made of wood might want to keep moving along at a fast pace.
We are heading to Normantown the last stop before our last day push to the coast at Karumba. We are camping one more night along side the highway before having the luxury of a caravan park in Normantown complete with hot spa and large swimming pool. As we get closer to the ocean things are looking a bit more tropical. Rivers actually have water and that water has crocodiles; big saltwater crocodiles. No skinny dipping for me as I want to make the final ride to the ocean tomorrow.
