A nightmare journey
The weather had got increasingly worse during our stay in Yeppoon, caused by tropical Low 29U which formed over the Coral Sea and headed to the north east coast of Queensland, and its fair to say that we were blissfully unaware of the impact 29U would have as we set off south for our long drive to Herve Bay, made even longer by our decision to stay an extra night in Yeppoon and skip Bundaberg.
It didn’t take long for us to realize that the drive was going to be very difficult with driving heavy rain descending on us shortly after leaving Yeppoon, which didn’t stop for the entire 426km journey.
Travelling along we saw flood waters by the side of the road and lots of swollen and angry looking creeks and rivers. Nikki had checked the weather on the BOM app (Bureau of Meteorology) and there were 4 warnings – a flood watch, flood warning, a severe weather warning and a marine wind warning.
Still us Brits are tough, it didn’t even cross our minds to not continue, so on we plowed (literally) swapping over driving a little over a third of the way, with Nikki taking the driving seat.
Shortly afterwards, and as we were approaching Lake Monduran our sat nav started trying to divert us, implying that the main highway, the A1, was closed. However, plenty still seemed to be coming towards us, and nothing else was pausing so on we went, with Nikki quipping, the A1 can’t be shut, and if it was, there would be a detour in place. Of course, this assumption was based on what would happen in the UK !!
Sure enough we soon hit stationary traffic, and eventually rounded the bend to find that the road was indeed flooded and ‘partially’ shut, with cars and motorhomes pulled up both sides, with one car our side with the bonnet up which clearly didn’t survive far beyond the crossing ! Lorries and some 4×4’s were continuing through, but Nikki pulled over as she wanted to ‘take a look’ first as all the way along we have seen signs ‘If it’s flooded, forget it’.
The big truck behind us had also stopped and not proceeded to cross, we think to allow the cars & trucks on the other side to have a turn, as it was single file across the flooded bridge.
The first truck and 4X4 coming towards us made it across, unfortunately the third, a blue saloon car, conked out half way through, partially blocking the road, at least for the big trucks. The guy quickly exited his car (through the door) and went to retrieve some things from the boot, presumably before they got totally submerged.
With Steve’s encouragement (go, go, go) Nikki set off across and we did make it by the skin of our teeth we think, as about half way across, just as we were squeezing past the now abandoned car, various warning lights came on. Nikki later said, that if there had not been crash barriers on both sides of the road, where the water was rushing through, she wouldn’t have even attempted it for fear of being washed away.
We think we were more or less the last 4X4 to get across, and no trucks could cross either now due to the abandoned car, we guess until someone dragged it out of the way anyway.
The road was a lot quieter after that, and as we arrived in the next town Gin Gin, we realised why, and news had obviously got through and the town was like a parking lot with lots of people pulled over to wait it out. Maybe they are still there?
As a side note, our decision to skip Bundaberg for an extra night in Yeppoon turned out to be an excellent one as they were deluged !
Hamish says ...
Our journey had pretty much exhausted us by the time we arrived late at the Oaks Hotel Hervey (pronounced Harvey) Bay. We just had time to dump our bags and eat in the hotels restaurant, The Bayswater, then head for bed.
With our full day tour to K’gari the following day, and not getting back to hotel unto 6.30pm, and no real knowledge of Hervey Bay, we again took the option of a Bayswater meal.
So, really, there is not much we can say about Hervey Bay. Our hotel seemed nice and we slept well, and Hervey Bay itself seemed to have a lot going on, but we simply didn’t experience any of it. Steve felt another couple of nights there would have been great as it felt like we only scratched the surface.
What's next
We have our final long drive in Australia as we head to Brisbane. Here we will hand the car back and spend a couple of nights before we board our next flight to New Zealand.