Charters Towers for a 50th Wedding Anniversary

Our very good friends, Jack and Mary, very kindly sent us an invitation to their 50th Wedding Anniversary.  Mary and I were really good friends when we were all living in Julia Creek.  Her youngest son and Kurt were great friends (in crime) from their days at St Josephs.  Those two were always getting into mischief and were inseparable until they parted ways for high school. Mary and I were on various school committees over the years and even though we have all moved to different areas we still manage to keep in touch.
We decided to take the camper to Charters Towers even though it would probably have been easier to  stay in park cabins but we really wanted to have a night at Innot Hot Springs before making our way to Charters Towers.  We love the hot pools - six all up, with their varying degrees of temperature.  We start at the coolest and work our way up to the hottest that we can stand. It's very invigorating and people travel many kilometres to soak up the mineral water.
We only had one night at Innot before driving south down the highway towards Charters Towers.  We stopped at Greenvale for lunch and arrived into Charters Towers mid afternoon. We were booked into the Dalrymple Caravan Park that was right beside the Golf Club where the party was to be held.  I must say that this van park was right up there with the best.  Lovely green shaded sites that were not to close to each other, perfectly clean showers and toilets, and very friendly staff to show you to your campsite.
It was like a Julia Creek reunion at the van park!  We stopped and chatted to many familiar faces but as time was marching on it was time to shower and dress for the party.
What a great night we had!  We talked, laughed and danced the night away and it was just great to catch up with so many of our friends and to hear all their news. The night passed so quickly and at midnight we were all very politely told that the party was over.....

The next morning Philip and cooked breakfast for a few of our friends.  Unfortunately we couldn't invite many as we don't have enough plates and cutlery.  More time to shoot the breeze before we sadly had to say goodbye to each other.
Once again we were on the road.  We decided to go home via Townsville and stay at Rollingstone Big 4 van park.  We have stayed here before and enjoyed it.  It is situated right on the beach, and as you have probably gathered by now, we really do enjoy the beach.  We took a long walk north along the coastline past the many beach huts, that range from humble tin sheds to whopping great mansions!  How lucky they are to live here.

Patterns left in the sand at low tide.

Some of the beach shacks.

Unfortunately our time here was short lived.  We had to high tail it home to ready ourselves for our next adventure.