Leaving Cape York our next destination was Boodjamulla NP (Lawn Hill). We decided to ignore Google Maps’ advice, which would have sent us a much longer way, and turn off the main road up Cape York just south of Musgrave Roadhouse to follow a road that heads south-west towards Normanton.
We weren’t expecting much to be honest, other than it being the shortest way to Lawn Hill. Everything we looked at suggested there isn’t anything along the road at all. WikiCamps only showed three campsites over about 500km, and all of the comments seemed to involve discussions about the apparently dubious legality of camping in each spot. There aren’t even any geocaches along the road!
However, the drive turned out to be wonderful. The road itself was a well graded gravel road and certainly in better condition that the Peninsula Developmental Road we had turned off, which gets a lot more traffic and is badly corrugated in spots. The drive took us through Olkola NP and then through a number of cattle stations. All the way along the birdlife was so plentiful that the kids were soon joking about the bird show being even better than the raptor demonstration at Healesville Sanctuary – and yes, we even got swooped by an eagle.
The road even treated us to what is easily our longest river crossing yet, of the Mitchell River.
There was very little traffic along the road although we did come across a Czech bloke who was cycling by himself across Australia. We filled up his water bottles for him and wished him luck. Then after a very nice sunset we set up camp beside the Gilbert River, along with a surprising number of others given the small amount of traffic we had seen on the road.
