On Thursday 26^th September 2024 my wife Sigi and I, together with Mike Cahill and Brett Silvester, took off in Mike’s Cirrus MSF in company with four other aircraft for Carnarvon Gorge, the first stop on the Club’s outback flyaway.  Sam Keenan flew Piper Cherokee BHN with his daughters Georgia and Ava as passengers, Paul Sneath was accompanied by Lisa in C182 ROC and Bryan Galvin and Garry Ayre took turns at flying C172 RAQ.  Originally planning to refuel in Roma at lunchtime, the group decided at a Teams planning meeting the day before departure to depart early and fly further north via Thangool.  This route was taken to avoid a band of weather that would deliver significant rainfall to Brisbane over the following weekend.  It was a good decision as all we saw was a bit of cloud and shows what a bit of forward planning can achieve.

After refuelling at Thangool we continued to Ingelara, a cattle property near Carnarvon, that has its own airstrip.  On the way we passed over the Moura coal mine. 

At Ingelara we made sure that the cattle had cleared the runway prior to landing and parked the aircraft on the “apron” in the paddock next to the runway paddock.

I walked up towards the homestead to make a phone call to cancel my sartime via their wife (no mobile coverage out there) and saw a large python cross the track about 30 metres ahead of me. it was as long as the track was wide.

We were met by Michelle from Carnarvon Gorge Ecotours and boarded her bus for the 30 minute trip to the Carnarvon Gorge Wilderness Lodge, a glamping resort where we spent two nights.

After a bit of rain overnight, the next day dawned as a blue sky day and Michelle took us on a 16km guided walk along the gorge visiting various scenic spots.  She was a fountain of knowledge and great tour guide.

On Day 3 of the flyaway Michelle dropped us back at the airstrip after breakfast and we took off for Charleville.  First though was a small incident with MSF’s pilot door opening slightly as we lifted off.  Cool as a cucumber the captain advised he was returning to land and after a perfectly executed circuit we touched down again gently, demonstrating that an unclosed door is nothing to be concerned about. 

After ensuring the door was really closed this time we departed once again for Charleville, enjoying views of the ranges and making it there with no further incident. 

At Charleville we joined in on the ‘Wings Over Warrego’ celebrations and visited the recently completed WW2 secret base museum that tells the story of how 3500 USAF personnel were stationed in Charleville in 1943.  After checking into the Mulga Country Motor Inn we settled into the famous bar at the Corones Hotel to watch the Brisbane Lions play a really skillful game against the Sydney Swans.  We all know how that ended!

Day 4 of the outback flyaway saw us departing Charleville for Lightning Ridge heading for Hebel, a tiny settlement just north of the NSW/QLD border, where we had lunch. 

The owner of the Hebel Hotel and General Store went broke during COVID and shut it down but a local grazier bought it in 2022 and resurrected it, complete with new cabin type accommodation.  They picked us up from the well maintained airstrip that’s about one km out of ‘town’ and dropped us back again.  Very atmospheric, great service and a good selection of food.

From Hebel it was a 15 minute hop down to Lightning Ridge, home of the elusive black opal and not so elusive street art.  We were picked up by Black Opals Tours, who provided our shuttle to the Lightning Ridge Outback Resort where we were to spend two nights. 

For dinner we walked up the road to the Lightning Ridge Bowling Club, an impressively large establishment with reasonable food and wine.

On Day 5 we were taken on a tour of the Ridge by Black Opal Tours.  We visited various sites of interest around the town including a house made out of old bottles, a castle erected by an Italian immigrant nicknamed Amigo who didn’t find much opal and turned his hand to stonemasonry, a cactus garden, and an art gallery owned by John Murray, who also painted a lot of the murals around town.  We also learned about ‘ratters’, ne’er-do-wells who break in and steal opal from other people’s claims and the horrible fates that they face if they’re caught. 

After a sandwich lunch we visited the Chambers of the Black Hand opal mine, where the owner carved 900 sculptures into the sandstone walls 12 metres underground by hand, using a single butter knife.  We could then compare his artwork with a number of weird sculptures made out of scrap metal at the yet to open Puttputt place nearby. 

As the day drew to a close we relieved any muscle aches we had with a 10 minute dip in the very hot thermal baths before retiring to the pub for a drink and a decent feed.

Day 6 saw us heading for home. After a quick breakfast at the Opal Street Cafe we were dropped at the airport by the Black Opals tour bus.  With Sam Keenan leading the way we flew 40 minutes to Moree to top up with fuel.  On the way MSF overtook RAQ, ROC and BHD.  It’s really difficult to spot other aircraft, even if they’re only a couple of miles away but we managed to track them on OzRunways and AvTraffic so were able to maintain a safe distance while passing. 

Brett did an overfly of the Moree airport to check the runway for roos leaving it clear for BHD to land first.

From Moree it was 90 minutes to Redcliffe, passing over miles and miles of green pastures, a new wind farm still under construction, Texas, Warwick, Cunningham’s Gap and Amberley.  A C17 Globemaster was doing circuits at Amberley below us so, even though we were at 7000 feet, ATC guided us to the north of their airspace. 

There were great views of the city as we descended into Redcliffe.

As we put MSF awa, we removed the last vestiges of the cattle that had been roaming around the runway at Ingelara. It was the end of the outback adventure.