It felt very good indeed to be leaving Rockhampton and heading west along the Capricorn Highway. The relief is in getting away from the heavily populated East Coast. We haven’t travelled very far today, only about 111 kms, but the vegetation has changed and the air is dryer, so it feels more comfortable. We thought it might be warm, but there was a cool breeze when we arrived at about 12.30 p.m. and it felt about 15.

We chose this place due to recommendations on Wikicamps. It is a free campground with toilets, hot showers, and outdoor area for washing up, and drinking water and dump point. They ask for a donation, but we will have to do it in the morning as the volunteers had gone home by the time Stephen got there.

We have a question mark about our DCtoDC charger to follow up. There is an auto electrician place in Emerald, the next town on our route, that gets very good reviews by travellers like us who end up with a van or car electrical issue. There is also a supermarket and we really need to stock up on fresh food as the pantry is looking a bit sparse. Stephen couldn’t carry very much when he went shopping yesterday.

We spent one more night on the road at the Boyne River Rest Area close to Gladstone. It was memorable for a flat parking spot, a retro mobile coffee and donut van, and some cattle coming to visit near the fence and staying long enough for me to photograph them.

We arrived in Rockhampton yesterday and are staying at Kershaw Gardens free camping spot, along with many others, of course. We rested, then had a walk around to see what is here. at Anaconda I bought walking sandals and Stephen bought some light trousers.

This morning we went to get fresh water, then to Bunnings for portasol and Autobarn for sunscreens for the car. We stopped at a very busy laundromat to do a load of washing, then back to the free camping area. We couldn’t get our good spot on the fence overlooking the park this time, but we can’t complain, it’s free and well located. Stephen just walked over to Coles for a few essentials.

We’ve had quite a busy time here getting some important things done, but we want to start heading west tomorrow.

Without the photo of the 18th century glass making towers the name doesn’t make much sense. Lt James Cook was looking through a telescope from his ship.

Gin Gin in Queensland should not be confused with Gingin, WA. I find I am elaborately saying Gin Gin as two separate words. In the town some signs wrote it Gingin, so maybe even they are undecided.

We had a slow day of travel yesterday due to extensive roadworks. And we were worried about the busy highway! At one point we had been stopped or travelling very slowly for so long that everyone needed the toilet and the first service station was very busy as it was the first time anyone had been able to pull off the road. We took advantage too.

The Adria appeared briefly on our dealer’s website, no photos but priced at $99,000. I just checked this morning and it has sold already. Karen, the manager, said she turns over the yard full of campers in a month, but that was very quick indeed. A new owner will now have to cope with all of her quirks, sticky window blinds and insect screens, a heater that puts most of it’s heat into the storage area under the bed, a button on the hot water system that stops working and has to be removed and reset, the list goes on. Still, I imagine it looked really nice with the professional cleaning. We watched him working whilst we were in the yard and he even knows how to clean the insect screens, though he said they are very delicate and you have to be careful.

We enjoyed our day of exploring the Glass Mountains area, but I’ve not yet processed the photos. I don’t think they will be great, but will give a sense of what it is like. Steve Irwin’s Australian Zoo is also in that area but after viewing the website we didn’t feel it was something we needed to do.

In the morning we went to one of the lookout areas and started to climb up to it. I gave up when the steps stopped and it was a matter of scrambling over stones. I just seemed to be losing my balance a bit. Stephen also found the climbing hard going. We had brought lunch with us to enjoy at a viewing point, so we humbly went back to the camper to enjoy it there.

Our next stop was the Visitor Information Centre. We felt self concious putting on masks for this, but were pleasantly surprised to find the volunteers working there were wearing masks.

By then we realised that there was a viewpoint we could drive to, so that is what we did for the rest of the afternoon before returning to the campsite.

Yesterday we decided to make some more progress north. We arrived at a possible overnight camping spot, had lunch, then decided to go further. There was a lot of road noise from the highway, plus we still had energy to tackle driving further on the A1. The M1 has morphed into a two lane road, fortunately it has frequent overtaking lanes and a lot of the time passing is not allowed. I gather it’s a pretty dangerous road and they are trying to tame the wild Queenslanders to follow rules, quite hard I think. There are a lot of road works happening and although we had no stops it allowed us to travel at 80kms, which feels safer. We are hoping the road West from Rockhampton will be a bit less frenetic!

Wikicamps found us a number of places to be overnight, but this little country pub seemed a nice option. They even have pensioneer style meals (smaller and cheaper) as though they’ve seen our sort before. There are fewer people staying here than we’ve seen at other places, so that is nice as well. We are on a bit of a slope, but decided to live with it as the bed is in the correct orientation (higher at the head than the foot) and having the evening meal out meant I didn’t have to try to cook on the angle. We could have levelled up, but it would be our first time in this camper (see how I’ve adjusted to the NSW/QLD language) and I felt a bit nervous.

We are still having mostly cool nights snuggled under the doona, but it was still comfortable to sit outside for our evening meal. We were able to keep an eye on the camper as I had left the windows open and even in this quiet place I was a bit worried.

Yesterday we didn’t plan to drive all the way to the Glass House Mountains, but our stop on the way (a showgrounds) wasn’t available due to an upcoming event and as I had had a coffee at lunchtime I felt able to continue for another 50 kms even though it was late in the day. We arrived at our new camping area (a sportsground In Beewah) at about 4.15 p.m. This is $20 per night with power, water and nearby flushing toilets. There is a swimming pool that offers cheap showers as well. We had a bit of a battle with Google Maps to find the correct entry (wrong street name, correct instructions), but with help from a local we made it.

The drive here was partly on the M1 and partly on the M3 and we may have incurred some road tolls. The licence is still in the dealer’s name until we get back to WA, so I’m sure she will forward the bill to us. I didn’t plan it exactly, but we ended up driving through Brisbane along the river and got to see the places we had been from the perspective of the motorway. It was a nice farewell.

We’ve found that whichever way we go, leaving here and heading west, or going up to Rockhampton, then west, is about the same distance to Mt Isa. Rockhampton offers free camping in the town, which makes it seem traveller friendly, and at the moment that is our preferred option.

For today we want to do some sightseeing. The Glass House Mountains were given that name by Captain Cook as he found it reminded him of his home. The mountains look interesting in photos as they have high points due to volcanic activity thousands of years ago and stand out from the rest of the landscape. I haven’t used my real camera for a while and looking forward to having landscapes to photograph.

Driving at speed can feel a bit ‘floaty’. The camper is much more affected by wind and passing trucks than the Adria. The suspension upgrade also contributes to the ‘float’ as we have a far more comfortable ride. The house box is well protected against jarring shocks, a side effect, the upgrade is necessary for this vehicle to be able to handle the load. We went to a weighbridge first thing yesterday and found we were just within the weight limit. It was reassuring that we still have so much onboard without going over.

I’m looking forward to going on our first gravel road. The Adria couldn’t handle it at all really, we had to creep along and there was no chance of going fast and smoothing out the corrugations. I am hoping for the same experience as the Subaru, that is, we can travel comfortably up to about 60-70kms ph on most gravel roads.

We don’t expect it will have the same beautiful ride experience of Marie and Geoff’s Ford Territory. That has exceptional suspension and we have travelled on a gravel road in the Adria and then been driven on the same road in their car, and it was like being on a completely different road.

We don’t have the upgraded wheels and tires that were on the other Sherwood in the sales yard. Ours look like normal car wheels and tires. Another pointer to not being a fully off road vehicle. So, we won’t be driving on beaches or through deep water crossings or really rough roads that need a very high wheelbase.