If you were to draw a line from Rockhampton to Yeppoon and then to Emu Park (and Zielzie) and back to Rocky, you’d have put a border around some of the most scenic and interesting countryside in Queensland. There are a number of geological features called ‘plugs’ where rocky outcrops appear to have been forced out of the ground. They look almost like pimples on the landscape. These were created by volcanic activity millennia ago.

I am constantly amazed by the foliage. There are many spectacular species of old trees like the Fig tree below. The area is very easy on the eye. One bay follows the other as you head south from Yeppoon. There are at least 15 bays and headlands. One never tires of walking on the beach at any tide. As the bays are very shallow you can walk into the sea forever it seems. Every day we have 23 degrees C. Only a slight breeze…  Yeah I know, it is really tough to endure!!

  and another tree:

However, I am really surprised by the interesting history of the area as some of the links below might indicate:

The town of Rockhampton was created in 1853 by the Archer family. Soon gold was discovered and a 50 year gold boom endured. The largest mine was at Mount Morgan. Initially sheep were farmed and these were later replaced largely by cattle. This area still is a major cattle area. These industries attracted the populations in the early days. These days there is a substantial coal mining industry as well. In the process Rockhampton has become the capital of central Queensland.  The wealth from the gold boom resulted in riches that afforded the building of the many beautiful buildings that have been preserved and adorn the town and river frontage.

In the early days roads were constructed to Yeppoon and Emu Park. There was no road from Yeppon to Emu Park as the Causeway lake at Kinka beach presented an insurmountable barrier. A railroad was built to Emu Beach where the wellheeled had their coastal homes in this slice of paradise.

Some of the history at the link below:

http://library-resources.cqu.edu.au/cqcollection/manuscripts/short-manuscripts/rockhampton.pdf

This summarises some of the main industries of the early days like Beef, gold mining and natural wealth. Gold was found throughout the region and in places was very lucrative like at Mount Morgan.

Some old images showing early Rockhampton at:

http://www.themorningbulletin.com.au/news/old-images-show-how-much-rockhampton-cbd-has-grown/1894214/

A summary of early development can be found at

http://ajthompson.com.au/capricorn-coast/history-rockhampton-environs-early-settlement.htm#.VcHpAfmqqkp

The history of Yeppoon is similarly interesting:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeppoon

A quick summary can be found here:

http://queenslandplaces.com.au/yeppoon

Further info includes Emu Park where we have been a few times now:

http://www.cqhistory.com/places/yeppoon.html

I have just had a look at a list of shipwrecks to be found off the Qld coast. There are literally hundreds of them. In some cases Queensland towns derived their names from the name of a shipwreck in their vicinity, for example: Coolangatta at the Gold Coast

http://oceans1.customer.netspace.net.au/qld-wrecks.html

Needless to say the above is just the tip of the iceberg.

I spent some time on top of Mount Archer. The hill overlooks the city from about 9 km  away. It shows off the big Fitzroy river snaking through then landscape. There are some stunning views for 360 degrees.

Views from Yeppon!

Yeppoon is built across a number of hills. They offer excellent views in many directions; see below.

Rosslyn Harbor, where the ferry to Great Keppel departs.

The Great Dividing Range snakes its way up the Australian east coast 50 – 150km inland. Close to Rockhamton a few tentacles separate and reach towards the north east. They reach the coast in the Yeppoon region and disappear into the Pacific Ocean. This makes for a hilly coastline with lush vegetation and grand vistas as far as the eye can see. The ranges do surface out of the sea every now and then as a myriad of islands, the best being the Great Keppel island. Wherever you look there are islands of varying sizes.

Great Keppel island

The name ‘Yeppoon’ is aboriginal for thunder or roaring noise. See early history at:

http://ajthompson.com.au/capricorn-coast/history-capricorn-coast-early-settlement.htm#.Vbca3vmqqko

We have been here for a week now. Done some driving around Yeppoon and the coast south. Great place and beautiful with more than 50 island visible. It’s called  the Capricorn coast as it is just north of then tropic. As a result it is beautifully warm here in winter. Temparatures range mid to high twenties every day and in the afternoon the cool breezes start.

We are staying at the Coolwaters  Holiday Resort. They have cabins and powered/unpowered sites. There are some permanents as well. They are located around 12 kilometers south of Yeppoon. I can strongly recommend this place. It is very well run and looked after. It has a mini Water World for the kids and the older kids (:-)  There are the other usual entertainment assets like Jumping Pillow, Tennis Court and even a BMX circuit for the slightly older kids. They have a number of fire pits where residents can light a fire to share with others and have a yarn. The resort borders the Causeway Lake and inlet and the fishing is good.

The staff are very friendly and the park is well run being constantly maintained….Do I need to say more?? Great place to stay, especially at weekly rates!

We will remain here for a good few more weeks.

Crab Art or Aboriginal Art

We love going for beach walks, Dawn, Lexie (dog) and I..It imbues you with a sense of freedom and calms the spirit. All over the beaches up here there is this beach art visible at low tide, see pic below. It is caused by the tiny Ghost crabs coming out of their holes as the waters recede. They then filter the surface mud for food and leave behind these round little balls of mud that radiated in all directions from their hole in the beach. The high tide then comes and washes it all away. The next low tide sees the play being repeated. It is just beautiful.

Now if you just zoom a bit into the picture it seems to me that I am looking at a piece of Aboriginal art. Many or most Aboriginal paintings use the myriad of little balls/dots to make a larger beautiful picture. Often the theme of the picture is circular in nature. Could it be that our ancient people got their inspiration from natural events such as this Crab Art???

Happiness is;

Happiness is a beautiful view, a thumping southeast wind banging into the hills and a bum firmly lodged into a sling as you ride the airwaves like a bird. Doesn’t get much better!!

Chilled out camping.

Looks like Hippies staying overnight at the resort.

Green palm tree stumps

Interesting to see that trunks of Palm trees generate a sugary sap once they have been cut down. This attracts the fruit flies a lot of which get stuck in the goo.

Waiting for fish to jump out of the water and surrender.

The cake and tea shop

The Lady of the Manor;- I mean Caravan!

Mangroves everywhere

If you look around south of Yeppoon there is a swag full of bays and little townships. Most of them are attractive. Most have great beaches and they are not overrun.

When I came around the corner on this beach I was startled by what I saw. At first glance it looked like a heap of skulls lying on the beach, A second look revealed that indeed it was coconuts that had been deposited here by the currents over time.

Some  of the houses are not too shabby!

!

After a week out in the sticks at Baffle Creek we were ready to move on to our next destination. This was Yeppoon 330km further north. We had enjoyed ourselves in Baffle Creek, walking along deserted beaches and living in a quiet caravan park. The beaches were cluttered with trees from the recent cyclone. This had also eaten away at the dunes and caused substantial erosion in some places.

We left for Rockhampton in the early morning and headed north along the Bruce Highway (A1). Rather disappointingly the road was in very poor condition at times. There were ruts in many places for kilometers at a time where the years of heavy loads had squashed the road surface to create humps in the bitumen which made it look like a track. That is very disappointing for a state freeway.

The way it affected me is that my truck would sway from side to side and the caravan would do its own thing and sway in a different beat. This created some tricky driving. I had to wrestle the rig many times to make sure it did not wander onto the wrong side of the road. I was pretty much exhausted by the time we got to Yeppoon.

The way it affected Dawn was that there were many loud screeches of panic as she reached for the ‘Jesus’ bar and of course there is no such thing in the Navara.  The  “Jesus’  bar was a large handle on the passenger side of the dashboard of the Nissan Patrol.  People could hold on to this as they got into or out of the vehicle. It was used mainly by frightened passengers to hold onto as the vehicle bounced around rocky mountain peaks whilst 4wdriving.

Rockhampton is a town of more than 85000 people and is well laid out. It’s a pretty place and I look forward to exploring it in the next week. We continued on to Yeppoon which was only 36 km away. I was glad to book into our caravan park and get organized with setting up every thing. I look forward to a relaxing few weeks here at the Capricorn coast.