I’ve just spent five days with photographer Michael Snedic at the O’Reillys Rainforest Retreat doing a photography workshop. Michael leads photo tours all over the world. This is the fourth time that I have participated in one of his activities and we get on very well together. I now regard him as a friend. O’Reilly’s…
By the weekend, the road to Isisford had reopened, so we decided on Saturday, to drive the 100 kms south to explore the area. The road is a one-lane bitumen road and the shoulders were still quite soft. I’m rather glad the road-trains seemed to be taking the day off on that day as we…
In my mind, I compartmentalise the ‘Australian Outback’ into different regions. For example, the Kimberley in Western Australia relates to cattle. The desert area in the Centre is all about Aboriginal culture and this area of central Queensland is all about wool. Yesterday, we drove south east to the town of Blackall and on the…
The town of Longreach is on the Tropic of Capricorn, in Outback Queensland, with a population of about 3,500 people. There are two significant museums here that we wanted to see – the Qantas Founders Museum and the Stockman’s Hall of Fame. We arrived here yesterday after a two hour flight from Melbourne to Brisbane…
Tuesday saw us taking some more activities to local sights. The south easterly wind has dropped and the weather is more settled and sunny. There are fewer clouds on the mountains. In the morning we went on a 4WD trip to Kerry’s Lookout. This gave us views across the Kerry valley with views to Beaudesert…
This morning (Monday), we had the privilege of doing a nature walk with Michael O’Reilly, one of the older members of the famous O’Reilly family. He kept us captivated for over 3 hours as he described many of the plants, insects and bird life. He also had an amazing ability to learn the names of…
We thought that the meals were one of the challenges of being here at O’Reilly’s, but today we found that it was coping with Chocolate Easter Eggs. Almost every time tbhat we turned around, we were presented with another Easter Egg. Seriously, we are learning that the staff here do an excellent job of looking…
We are enjoying our time at O’Reilly’s, however with an abundance of food, it is very easy to put on a lot of weight. Thankfully, there are enough activities throughout the day to be able to work off some calories. Yesterday (Easter Saturday) I did a 23km walk through the Lamington National Park. We started…
It’s Good Friday today and we are spending Easter at O’Reillys Rainforest Retreat in the Lamington National Park in Queensland. Current Location map We flew up to Brisbane yesterday afternoon and stayed at the Crest Hotel In Anne Street. This morning, we caught the shuttle up here from the Brisbane Transport Centre, arriving at about…
We left home on our trip to Port Macquarie yesterday among heavy rain showers. We hope these continue over the next few days to water the grasss seed that we have planted in an attempt to rejuvenate our lawn. The first stage of our trip was delayed as the railway gates at the Bell Street…