Dickabram Bridge and the moon

 As some of you may know, my father was a civil engineer and was responsible for the maintenance of the railway track and rail bridges in the area around Maryborough which was a major train centre in Queensland for many years. He would often go on trips to inspect the lines, but he never mentioned a curious bridge that we decided to visit since we needed an outing.

It was a lovely drive south of Tiaro following back roads away from the main highway.

The Dickabram Bridge can take both rail line and road traffic. It was built in 1885-86 and is heritage listed but has been closed

There is a park (with public toilets) at the western end of the bridge. Incidentally, there is a website and app showing the location of all public toilets in Australia. Of course, in the USA you just go to the nearest McDonald's.

Looking to the east.

The Mary River. It flows into the sea just a few miles south of us.

You can see the deck of the bridge is well above the water level of the river, but the deck was submerged in 1893 and almost submerged in 1955. 

As you can see, the decking timbers are a bit rumpty. The car tires make quite a din driving over the bridge and it is anything but a smooth ride.

There has been plenty of rain so the grass is quite green.

You might be able to see a bloke sitting on the park bench. We chatted to him for a while about the bridge and the local area.

The old rails have been removed and I have not been able to discover when the last train crossed the bridge but here is a video of the penultimate train crossing the bridge.

And here is a video of a steam engine crossing the bridge in 1984.

And last, but not least, the bridge is apparently haunted by the ghost of a worker who is entombed in one of the foundations.

Our car is in the foreground. The car in the background belongs to a woman who is living in it with a bunch of dogs. The pandemic has caused a mass migration of southerners to Queensland. The cost of renting has risen dramatically so many people are doing it tough.

We drove back home over the bridge. It was a lovely trip.

A few days later, there was an eclipse of the moon just at dusk. luckily we had a wonderful view. There were a few boats out on the water getting the same view.

It's amazing what little zoom cameras can do these days.

Not by the hair of my ginny gin gin

 It's almost 15 months since we arrived in Urangan and we are still finding new things to explore. Yesterday we went to Bundaberg which is about 70 miles north and amongst other things, went to a gin factory which I had heard about.

It's called the Kalki Moon and they make gin and rum.

Fortunately, we arrived by accident about five minutes before the daily tour so we paid $10 each and were issued with a yellow safety vest. The barrels on the wall are for storing rum. Gin does not need to be aged. Their rum is being stored in used bourbon barrels from Buffalo Trace which we visited back in 2016. You can read about it in the second half of this blog.

Tasting was at the end of the tour. 

The copper still on the left is used for gin and the stainless steel still on the right is used for rum.

Solid looking seat.

At 11:00, a young girl arrived and started the tour. Above are the original stills used by the owners when they started about five years ago. They still use them occasionally.

Here is a link to their website.

The condenser for the rum still. At the lower right in the photo, you can see some sacks that contain juniper berries from Macedonia.

The gin still was in operation and the bloke on the right gave us a sniff of the product as it poured out into a fair size vat.

The guide took us into the back production area. This ginnery uses locally made molasses which is fermented in these huge containers and then subsequently distilled. One of the owners used to be a Master Distiller at the nearby huge Bundaberg Rum factory until he left to set up Kalki Moon. The guide said he left on very good terms.

The guide shows us how the labels are applied. It's a small operation and a four-person team was filling bottles in the background.

We tasted small amounts at the end of the tour but I could not tell too much other than it was all potent. It was a hot day and the liquid was at room temperature. Since we only drink gin along with tonic we bought a bottle of their $46 cheapest bottle. It's won numerous awards which you can read about here.

The rum is not ready for sale yet but I suspect it will be pretty good.

Spirits are very heavily taxed in Australia and the rate of tax rises with the alcohol level. 

We then drove down to the mouth of the Burnett River to find a place that smoked fish.

The national TV and Radio broadcaster, the ABC, often shows short videos about interesting things in rural Australia. One video was about this smokery.

It's just a bloke in a shed. He used to be a fisherman but started smoking fish a few years ago. He bought a smoking oven and modified it to do what he wanted. You might have noticed that he uses Macadamia wood for smoking. Many of the old sugar plantations have been converted to Macadamia trees since they are more profitable. Chefs around Australia reckon his produce is the best stuff in Oz.

We tasted some of it and bought a couple of packages. Some of the high-end restaurants use his produce in their dishes and it's really good. 

We will have to go here sometime. https://banksiaseafoodgrill.com.au/

Last week after the fiercest storm we have seen here so far, there was a wedding on the beach in front of our unit. That's the path where we walk down to the beach.

The guests. Water from the storm gushes out of a drain and forms a channel to the sea. It's an exciting life here.

Coolangatta Beaches

 It was a lovely Sunday morning and we decided to go for walk beside the beaches at Coolangatta.

The foreshore of Coolangatta beach.

Typical scene. Lush tropical trees with a highrise in the background.

Path to the beach.

Grreenmount surf club at the southern end of the beach.

There is a shaded path around the Greenmount Headland. Looking north at Coolangatta Beach.

Some board riders out catching waves.

I suspect somebody got married.

Probably up there on the platform.

Looking south to Greenmount Beach.

At each entrance to the beach, there is usually a shower head on a pole.

As we walked back we joined the walkers looking at the surfers. There aren't too many better ways to spend a relaxing Sunday morning.

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