Mitchell River National Park - 12, 13, 14th March 2005
We returned to Mitchell River as Michelle had said it looked quite nice from the photos she had seen from our Christmas Trip here, and it was going to be a hot weekend, so a nice cool river was the perfect place to be.
Our trip down proved eventful though when I looked in the rear mirror only a few kilometres from the campsite to discover that the bikes were missing off the back of the car! The tube holding the bike rack had snapped cleanly off. We turned around and headed back to the end of the road, but there was no site of them. I figured the next most likely place they had fallen off would have been some 50 kilometres back, so the chances of them still being there would have been very slim, so we continued down to Angusvale.
Our previous campsite was taken, and there were no river spots left at Angusvale so we headed downstream and set up camp near the river ford after discounting a few other spots. It was a lovely spot, and a good place for the kids to swim with the river quite shallow and cool as it flowed over the cobblestones.
We were relaxing around our campsite when a guy drove across the river. This was fine, but then he decided to go driving up the river. he had forgotten to lock his hubs and had become stuck. He had to jump out of the car in a metre of water and lock his hubs before he was able to drive out. of course he, and his car was soaking wet. I was surprised he didn't stuff his engine. This was our first clue of the dreadful night that awaited us.
He was joined a short time later by some of his mates, who set up camp across the river. Everything was fine till evening set in and the alcohol they must have been consuming in vast quantities took over.
They drove across the river a number of times, and as it got later they drove up and down the river banks and throughthe campground, beeping their horns and being a general nuisance to everybody.
They knocked over a few trees by the side of the track, and whilst hoonign around at the top of the hill, they must have hit a tree and damaged one of the cars. This resulted in an all out brawl back at their campsite only quieting down when one of them threatened to get his rifle out.
In the morning the 4WD club that had been camping down at Rock Creek came through and sorted them out, taking their rego plates and reporting them to the Police and Parks Vic.
As Rock Creek was now vacant, and we had no idea if could expect the same again tonight, we went without breakfast and moved our campsite. Thankfully the trouble makers moved on and we were able to enjoy the rest of our weekend.
We spotted some huge carp swimming in the river, and wee spent the rest of the hot afternoon relaxing in the water. We had a little bit of excitement after lunch when Liam came splashing towards us with a look of pure horror on his face as a snake went skimming across the water behind him!
As the afternoon passed on, we spotted some mountain goats high on the cliffs. It was amazing watching them make their way across the cliff face with absolutely no fear of heights. Makes me shudder just to think of it.
Apart from the snake we spotted yesterday, Michelle also saw a huge goanna make it's way off into the bushes, and the kids also found a baby dragon. As we were packing up, we also found a huge Huntsman Spider which we made sure didn't hitch a ride back with us.