Day 13 - Chinchilla

A 2 hour ‘happy hour” last night around the campfire - interesting discussions on trips/vehicles/etc. The owners of the camp ground which is on Clover Hill Station own 4 properties & have 1,000 wagu beef cattle and 90 horses which they breed. They sell wagu beef - but too expensive for us!

A slow start to the morning & did a loop drive to see a Cactoblastis Memorial which is on a farm where the Cactoblastis cactorum moths were bred and released in 1926 to combat the prickly pear. At that time 60 million acres in Qld & NSW were covered by the prickly pear & unusable. The moths came from Argentina & at its height 14 million eggs were bred here & sent around both states. By 1933 about 80% were cleared of the pest so was very successful.

The prickly pear you still see on roadsides are a different species.  

Then onto Chinchilla Weir which is on the Condamine River.

Then back to town for a devonshire morning tea. And then a look around the Chinchilla Botanic parkland…

There was a Naidoc week  activity going on and we had a good talk with the guy making didgeridoo’s.

You can see there is always a watermelon theme going on!

Leaving here in the morning and will go along the road to Wallumbilla and camp somewhere.

You may have noticed that we are taking our time and that is because we are due to be in Wallumbilla on Thursday. Faye is involved with KYB at Warners Bay and they have a city/country relationship with a small KYB in Wallumbilla and Faye is to visit them on Thursday.  We have been there previously 5 years ago.