Sun, 23rd Nov, 2025 Balonne Minor Bridge camp, Dirranbandi to Apex Park RV Stop, Kumbia, Qld (exploring)

20.8 degree min, blue sky with little puffy clouds - no nasty ones. Light breeze. Amazingly there was no damage to the solar panels or the truck at all. Everything is nice and clean though after the rain.

The Apostle birds dropped in to say good morning. A frog is croaking from inside the picnic table so the name is right - Dirranbandi - Land of the croaking frogs.

We had picked up the rubbish left behind by other people so we can drop it off in town as there are no bins here.

Back through town and headed towards St George on the Castlereagh Highway. The wind is back.

Continued through grass plains and black cattle. Goats on the road but they are smart and get out of the way quickly.

I keep seeing big Prickly Pear plants as they are a pest I wondered why they are left there. When I got signal I googled it and found out that there is a Prickly Pear cactus (Opuntia) that is ok. The pest is ‘Opuntia monacantha’ that was native to North & South America and was brought here on the First Fleet Shop in 1788 from Brazil. Governor Phillip intended to use them to start a cochineal (red dye) industry but it got away and became a problem. Eventually the ‘castossblastia cactorum’ moth was introduced in 1926 and the larvae quickly ate and almost wiped out the prickly pear. Terry has a spear that a chap made before the moth arrived as they used to inject asenic pentoxide into the plant to kill it but that was very labour intensive.

Grain fields now. Spotted more emus and a bustard near irrigation channels for the flood irrigation needed for the cotton fields as we near the Balonne River.

Left turn at the Barwon Carnarvon Road to go into St George.

Topped up the diesel (197.9c/l) then into town which looks neat and modern. Along to the Jack Taylor Weir for a cuppa. Mitchell crossed here in 1846 and called the crossing spot, St George’s Bridge which explains where the town name came from.

This bridge and weir were opened in 1953.

Nice fish in the park.

Walked across to the upstream side.

Lots of info, murals and big trees in the park.

We drove along to the boat ramp for a cuppa and watched the boats zoom about bringing back memories of our water skiing days.

Continued along the Terrace - nice mural, pump station and flood height marker.

Passed the Australian Hotel, lovely Queenslander style homes and the Court House.

Back onto the Carnarvon Highway then turned onto the Moonie Highway to continue eastward. A map showing where we travelled from Wentworth, along the west side of the Darling River to St George.

Passed a big cotton farm then back to grazing country.

Across the Moonie River - just a couple of puddles at the moment.

View through the trees to the south - the land goes on for miles.

Into the Westmar Rest Area for lunch - great info board about the Moonie Highway. We complain about bumpy bitumen roads but at least they are bitumen compared to the dirt tracks in the beginning. Still a couple of houses, a school and the roadhouse here.

Only a light breeze blowing now. There are puddles of water here so they must have got some of the storm that hit us.

Continued eastward. Passed Stephens Creek with water - lots of things with his name, not so many Sharon things - there is a Sharon Street in Smithfield near Cairns though.

Those puffy white clouds are building up again!! Don’t need to be in another storm - we mightn’t be so lucky next time.

More big Prickly Pear Cactus by the roadside. Five black pig carcasses spread across the road - were they all hit by a truck or shot!

This section of bitumen is very bumpy. Into Moonie.

This is the end of ‘new road’ travelled as we stopped here on the way south in Sept 2023 and checked out the info boards etc. I didn’t notice these art bits on the shop though - looks like those pigs we just saw on the road.

Big area of trees have been burnt of the Kumbarilla State Forest.

Through all the machinery sales area and into Dalby to top up with diesel (179.9c/l). Along to the Myall Creek Park for a cuppa.

Back to the turn off onto Condamine Road then continued onto the Bunya Highway which is different to the road to the Bunya Mountains which we came down after visiting Roald, Joan and family there. This section is a new one to mark off in my map book.

The Bunya Mountains stand out in the distance.

Grain silos stand out against the hill in the township of Bell.

Big wind turbine blade, Bunya Pine & Bottle Tree as we continue along the highway.

Continued on rolling up and down the hills with nice views of the mountains. The sky is looking quite nasty to the west.

Wound our way through the hills to 714m elevation at Coopers Gap as we cross the Great Dividing Range. 

Then down the other side to 600m.

Across the Boyne River - upper reaches of course. Full of grass so we couldn’t see any water as such.

Still Prickly Pear Cactus by the roadside.

Through the little township of Kumbia (est 1912).

We turned off to check out the free camp by the Stuart River. Only a little bush area off the road and it’s quite wet.

Turned around and headed back to the free camp at the Apex Park in town. A couple of other people are parked up here. Playground, picnic area and toilets.

Steve read his book so I went for a wander. Across the road is a very tall pine and the Memorial Hall (1922). 

I met Sandra and her husband who were doing the mowing. Lots of history outside.

Sandra invited me to have a look at the hall. They are part of the hall committee and have been fundraising to restore it. The stumps needed replacing so they had a ‘buy a stump’ fundraiser which was successful and the 236 stumps have been replaced with steel ones. Some of the old stumps have been turned into flag holders. Great community spirit here. Her husband’s father cut timber on the Bunya Mountains.

Interesting fan set up inside. She said it works ok but there is no top vent so it just pushes the hot air around!

They are still working on stabilising the front wall as when it was a movie theatre there was a ticket box at the front and that provided some stability - might have to put it back in.

She said they had a storm this morning and there is another one building up.

Back to the camper as the thunder started rumbling.

5.30pm the dark clouds have come over, still 30 degrees.

5pm the sun is shining again as the storm rumbled off to the east. Facebook post says Dalby area coped the storm with big hail. Glad we kept driving north.

6.30pm a light shower of rain brings a nice cool breeze but it didn’t last long.

6.50pm the cicadas started but I forgot to time it for when they stopped again, about 20 minutes.

Nice and quiet now - only an occasional vehicle. A boobook owl is calling and a possum grumbles in the tree beside us.