Word cloud

I found this cool thing that is a visual representation of the words I use on this blog. I'm a bit disappointed that 'got' is up there, it's a devil word for a newspaperman like myself. I might try to put a new word cloud, as it's known, up every now and then. I think it's really interesting!
You can do it with anything with an RSS feed by going to wordle.net.

More of Mum and Dad

I just realised that I had more photos of Mum and Dad's trip I wanted to put up!

We went for a drive to Cloncurry, which involved a great steak sandwich at one of the pubs.

One of the things that we did for some reason was go out to the airport. But it was really interesting, and we saw this old hangar. You might not be able to see the sign, but it says Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Service, also known as QANTAS.
Cloncurry was one of the original destinations serviced by Qantas, and this is one of their original hangars. I dunno why, but I found that pretty interesting.

Also, Cloncurry was the place of the very first flight of the Royal Flying Doctor Service flight. There was a base in the Curry for a long time. The first plane was chartered from Qantas, and so there's a pretty good chance it left from this hangar! Now, that's a historic hangar, as far as hangers go.

On the drive we took a lot of side trips. One of the things I found fascinating driving up here were all the ant hills. There are literally thousands of these things. I don't know what it is about certain areas, but they go nuts for it.
And I wanted to put up this photo because I think it's a good one of Mum, even if she does have her eyes closed!

Normanton and Karumba

I've just gotten back from a two-night trip to Normanton and Karumba, which are up in the Gulf of Carpentaria.

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There was a forum up there for the whole region, discussing various issues different industries are facing. That was followed by a North Queensland Local Government Association conference the next day.

I got to go because the local federal member, Bob Katter, was going up on a charter flight from Mount Isa and there was a spare seat. The plane was a Beechcraft Baron, which is a four seater plane, but I got to sit up the front next to the pilot!
We didn't get away as early as we had hoped, so most of the trip was in the dark, but I got this sunset photo as we took off from Mount Isa.
It was pretty fun sitting up the front and chatting to the pilot about all the controls. I also got to watch us coming in to land, which was very interesting!
We got a cab from the airport to our hotel, and there was a meet and greet session in the pub next door. I had to do some work, but there was also the chance to have a beer and a prawn!

I couldn't believe how many cane toads there were just hopping around...
The next day was a very early start involving a bus trip to Normanton. Most of the people at the conference were rural mayors who are graziers, and the start time was clearly set for graziers, not journalists. It was a forum about difficulties facing several industries in the north west - a great source for stories and an opportunity to get my head around some bigger issues up here.

So I wrote up a few stories and sent them off and caught the bus back to Karumba. I went for a walk down near the beach, keeping an eye out for crocs, and found out that it wasn't the sandy beach I had grown accustomed to in New South Wales. But I wanted to put my feat in the waters of the Gulf of Carpentaria.
Now, the pub we were at was called the Sunset Tavern. I've never seen the sun set over the water in Australia. It was a pretty darn good sunset, and a beer really made the moment.
The pub had great seafood - I had oysters and barramundi that night and it was divine. Just the ticket after a hard day's work. Karumba has a reasonably large fishing industry, so all the seafood was so delicious and so fresh.

This morning it was an even earlier start back to Normanton. I had taken the work laptop and Telstra internet thingy. Today, however, all of the Telstra mobile network in Queensland was down, which meant I couldn't file my stories that way. So I had to write my stuff up, put all my stories and photos on a flash drive (which I had to borrow from someone because I didn't take one - why would I? I had nifty wireless interent...) and go down to the council chambers to email it back to my editor. But it got there on time.

After that Local Government Conference wound up it was out to Normanton Airport and another flight back. I again got to sit up the front, and it was light for much of the trip, so I got to see a fair bit of the landscape.
It was a great trip, and something I'm really glad I got to do. Karumba is beautiful, and it was just great to see more of north Queensland.