Gismo Queen and her King

Day 20 - Burpengary East (QLD) to Ewingar (NSW) - Saturday 18th May 2024

 An even earlier start as we all planned to depart at 9am for our various destinations- Garry and Julie heading north and us heading south to my brother.

With a bit of manoeuvring, we were out of our campsite right on 9am and said our farewells. Our drive through Brisbane and Gold Coast was trouble free and we were pleased to stop in Tweed Heads for elevenses. 

A bir further down the road and we turned off to head west, aiming for lunch and fuel stop in Lismore. Finding a suitable servo (that can fit us in) took a bit of time. Andrew had warned me that finding lunch spots in Lismore can be tricky but we settled on the Coffee Club in Lismore Square and were very impressed with the quality of the food. However, time was ticking on and we still had two hours to go so we hit the road again. Some distance down the Bruxner Highway we turned south down the Clarence Way and observed some pretty black clouds in our direction. Ten minutes later, the heavens opened - the hailstones were the size of macadamia nuts, there was thunder, lightning and then rain. Our first thought was for the new bits and pieces on the roof of our caravan - what was going to get damaged?! We must have driven through it as by the time we turned off the Clarence Way, it had eased to a light rain. But as we descended to cross the Clarence River, the rushing water was lapping the sides of the bridge and water was spurting up between the bridge boards!! We made it across and headed up to Andrew’s, arriving just on dark. Setting up is always tricky here as it is quite a hilly and involves some digging out on one side. We got the Phoenix set up reasonably quickly as it started to rain again but the Bushtracker took a bit longer. Andrew had very kindly lit a campfire for us but the rain was settling in and it became apparent we wouldn’t be sitting around it. Jude was on dinner duty so after farewelling Andrew for the night, we all piled into Cafe Bushtracker for dinner. We are confident the rain will pass and the sun will be out tomorrow!!

posted by Tracey @ 6:23 pm