Lake Maraboon

On leaving Carnarvon Gorge we decided to head north to Emerald from there back to the coast at Rockhampton. We had heard that Lake Maraboon (20 kms out of Emerald) was a nice place so we headed there. Many people (grey nomads) were there for weeks at a time, fishing for 'red claw'. They almost seemed a bit 'possessed' as they were trying to fill up there freezers/car fridges with these things!

 

A tree full of these was just next to our campsite - beautiful!





 Lake Maraboon is a man made lake, dammed by the Fairbairn Dam. There is obviously a fair bit of runoff from the surrounding ranges. Particularly, earlier this year, when Emerald was quite badly affected by the Qld floods. Evidently, 1000 houses were flooded and 95 percent of the businesses were damaged in some way! Wow! And that was only in January! To drive through, you wouldn't actually realise that this had happened.



Lake Maraboon

A giant reproduction of one of Vincent's seven
sunflower paintings.

The giant "Sunflower" painting in the centre of town obviously remained unscathed. Artist, Cameron Cross had a plan to place giant reproductions of the 7 different Vincent Van Gogh sunflower paintings, in 7 different countries. The painting in Emerald celebrates the Central Highland's reputation as a major sunflower producer. Go to  http://www.bigeasel.com/web/vangoghproject.html if you're interested in

knowing more about this project.








While nearby, we decided to try our hand at fossicking for "precious jewels"! - namely sapphires, at Rubyvale, one of the Central Qld sapphire fields. After we'd been down a working sapphire mine, and watched a 'how to' video, we thought we were set! Know worries, here comes a "huge" gem!!


The "Miner" that's been there a while!
 (A corny addition to a mine tour.)



Jed, the miner!?? But he didn't
 make us a fortune!

Well, we paid $10.00 for our bucket of 'wash' from the mine and set to work - sieving, washing, shaking, tipping, and ever so carefully fingering through tiny rocks, searching for the 'glint' of blue, pink, yellow, or green! I didn't know that sapphires came in all these colours! (actually, the gem shops here buy in their pink, orange and yellow sapphires from other places). It was actually great fun, and we all commented on how easy it might be to get "gem fever" - we'll just have a look for that one more! But...don't hold your breath... we will be back home, because we didn't find the huge one, and make our fortune. We did find a few tiny bits of sapphire tho', but none gem quality.


Rubyvale, itself, was an 'interesting' place! If you've ever been to Coober Pedy, it's a bit like that, but scrubbier. Part of the untidiness was explained when our tour guide was talking about the "Claim" regulations only allowing semipermanent dwellings on them. "Lean-to", corrugated iron, and "caravan-on-blocks" are the latest in architectural designs at Rubyvale.

No, it's not hay, it's cotton! Now I know where the ol'song about "Pick a bale o' cotton", comes from!

Our interest in agricultural pursuits was again rewarded, on the drive to Rubyvale, by seeing cotton harvest in full swing. This was our first look at cotton fields, and I even made Jon stop the ute, so I could get out and retrieve some, to look at and touch, off the side of the road. Many of the roads around Emerald are lined with little white fluffy patches, where it blows from trucks, or out of paddocks?? Amazing...it's just like cotton wool! (Derrr!)