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Small group Australian Outback tour of Queensland
Get well and truly off the beaten track on Odyssey Traveller's 15-day small group Australian outback tours of Queensland. Away from the usual tourist centres - Brisbane, the Gold Coast, the Great Barrier Reef, Cairns, Port Douglas, Mt Isa and the Daintree Rainforest - our Odyssey Travellers will discover the big skies, stunning pastoral and desert landscapes, and fascinating history of the outback communities of western Queensland with your tour guide.
Our small group tours of the Australian outback in Queensland begin in the regional centre of Dubbo , New South Wales. We chose to start in Dubbo, so that we can head north to south into Queensland and back, pausing along the way to explore and learn at each stop on day tour (s) with local guides, as we head up into North Queensland. This escorted touris suitable for the mature and senior traveler whether as a couple or solo traveler
This, like all Odyssey Traveller small group tours is limited to 15 people. As a tour company in the current environment, we are committed to small group travel that is safe for you and your fellow traveller rather than being a member of larger group tours.
Leaving Dubbo, our outback Australia tours itinerary follows the path of the iconic Cobb & Co. stagecoach, heading towards Cunnamulla via Brewarrina on the Barwon river. On the road to Brewarrina, we stop off to see one of the world's oldest surviving man-made structures: the Brewarrina Fish Traps . The Ngemba people are the custodians of the fish traps, a complex aquaculture network estimated to be over 40, 000 years old. An elaborate network of rock weirs and pools form a series of complex dry-stone walls and holding ponds, stretching for around half a kilometre along the Barwon riverbed. For the Aboriginal people of western and northern New South Wales, the fish traps and surrounds are extremely significant for their spiritual, cultural, traditional and symbolic meanings. The creation of the fish traps, and the laws governing their use, helped shape the spiritual, political, social, ceremonial and trade relationships between Aboriginal groups from across the greater landscape. Brewarrina was one of the great Aboriginal meeting places of eastern Australia .
The outback town of Bourke (though not strictly included on the tour ) has shaped the history of many of the places we will visit. Established in the mid-1950s as a developing town on the Darling River, by the 1890s Bourke became the focus of the world's wool industry. The Darling River had more than eighty boats transporting wool through the outback to ports like Adelaide . With the opening of railways in the early 20th century - which didn't have to deal with the unreliability of river flows - the end of river traffic in outback Australia was in decline.
Bourke today is a town with an outback spirit, on the edge of the wilderness, and with a great sense of Australian adventure in its historical, cultural, and geographic significance.
Cunnamulla on the Warrego River
Our outback Aussie tours continue with a day tour of the town of Cunnamulla on the Warrego River. The township of Cunnamulla was created by Cobb & Co. on September 3, 1879, when the first coach drove through from Bourke. Before Cobb & Co came to the region, the Kunja people settled in the region thanks to a reliable waterhole; and after European colonisation, the area became a place where two major stock routes joined. Today, Cunnamulla is the only surviving south-west town along the original route. The group with the tour director takes a walking tour to learn about the unique outback history and stories behind the many historical buildings including, hotels, saddlery, Tonkin House, churches and the Warrego Watchman.
Longreach
The following day we journey further into North Queensland to Longreach via Charleville, Tambo Blackhall, Emmet and Isisford. Our Queensland outback small group tour spends two nights in Longreach, the home of the Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame, which showcases the history and culture of life in outback Australia, perhaps this is the home of the Australian adventure. As well our day tour of Longreach includes the Qantas founder’s museum. Longreach was one of the founding centres for Qantas, the third oldest airline in the world (after KLM and Avianca), founded on 16 November 1920. One of the airline's original hangars remains in use at Longreach Airport and is listed on the Australian National Heritage List. The Qantas Founders Museum also includes among its displays a decommissioned Qantas Boeing 747-200 aircraft.
Winton; Dinosaurs and home of Waltzing matilda
From Longreach, the tour makes a short trip (two hours) to Winton, where we are based for two nights. Winton epitomises the spirit of Australian outback tours. We visit the North Gregory Hotel, known as the 'Queen of the Outback', which has an impressive history. The first public performance of 'Waltzing Matilda' was here on April 6, 1895 5 (the story of which is told at the Waltzin' Matilda centre, the world's only museum dedicated to a song) and in the 1920s clandestine meetings helped launch a little airline known as QANTAS... During World War II, future American president Lyndon Johnson was forced to stay here, when forced to ditch his plane. The dining room - where you can enjoy a traditional outback dinner - features original etchings by acclaimed artist Daphne Mayo. Winton is also home to the red-browed pardalote, found across Queensland and the Northern Territory, and the elusive rusty grasswren, a small, long-tailed bird with reddish-brown upper parts (related to the Kalkadoon Grasswren, found in the Mt Isa region).
Winton is also the dinosaur capital of Australia. We visit the Australian Age of Dinosaurs Museum to learn about the Cretaceous sauropods that roamed the Winton area 95 million years ago. The dinosaurs were found on the property of a man named David Elliott - amazingly, in the form of an almost complete skeleton of a Sauropod! After our visit to the Dinosaurs Museum, we learn more about dinosaurs on a day trip to Lark Quarry, one of the most fascinating tourism centres in Queensland's outback. 95 million years ago, Lark Quarry was part of a great river plain, with sandy channels, swaps and lakes brimming with freshwater mussels, lungfish and crocodiles. Rainfall was over a metre per year, so the surrounding lowland forest was lush and green.
The fossil remains at Lark Quarry tell an incredible story. On the day, our drama unfolds, herds of small, two-legged dinosaurs came to drink at the lake. There were at least one hundred fifty dinosaurs of two different kinds, carnivorous coelurosaurs about the size of chickens, and larger plant-eating ornithopods, roughly the size of an emu. The harmony was broken when a huge meat-eating theropod, smaller than a Tyrannosaurus, approached the lake. It slowed, saw the other dinosaurs gathered at water's edge, and then turned and charged. The stampeding herd of smaller dinosaurs left a chaotic mass of footprints in the mud as they ran to escape. Today, these footprints are an extraordinary record of life in the times when the land here was part of Gondwanaland, the great southern supercontinent, rather than Queensland, Australia.
Hughenden
From Winton, we continue the dinosaur trail to Hughenden, a classic Queensland outback Australia town, which owes its existence to the railway line and surrounding cattle grazing land. Its primary appeal is its position on the edge of Australia's ancient land sea, which existed between 95 and 120 million years ago, and left a rich supply of fossils in the area. The most important fossil discovery has been of a Muttaburrasaurus, today displayed prominently in the FlindersDiscovery Centre. The skeleton was the first whole fossil to be found in Australia.
The traditional owners of the land here are the Yirandali people. What is now known as Hughenden was first reached by Europeans in 1861-2 when William Landsborough and Frederick Walker arrived looking for Burke and Wills, who had disappeared in the bush the year before. The Hughenden Showgrounds are home to the historic Coolabah Tree, which is linked to two relief missions who went on search for Burke and Wills. Both expeditions blazed the tree on their way to the Flinders River, triggering the growth of settlement in the area. Hughenden is as far North as this adventure in the outbackcomes. There will be time to sit on a verandah somewhere to watch a spectacular sunset before we begin the journeysouth.
Porcupine National Park
On our second day in Hughenden the group makes a day tour to Porcupine National Park. This national park covers over 55 square kilometres of coloured sandstone desert, vine forests, and deep permanent waterholes, which contrast strikingly with the savanna plains surrounding Porcupine Creek and Porcupine Gorge or canyon. Exploring on foot, we visit the Gorge on a moderate 90-minute walk over flat terrain.
Barcaldine
Heading south from Hughenden, we spend the night in Barcaldine. The name Barcaldine originates from the Oban region in Scotland and is pronounced bar-call-din. Barcaldine is home to the Tree of Knowledge, which marks the birth of the labour movement in Australia. The tree grew outside the Railway Station for around 180 years until 2006, when sadly, it was poisoned by an unknown culprit. Today, the famous tree has been preserved and placed under an award-winning structure that gives the illusion of a canopy over the Tree. Head to the Tree at night for the best views, as the memorial is lit beautifully by special lighting.
In Barcaldine, we spend the afternoon learning about the origins of the Australian Labour Party, and view architectural curiosities, such as the masonic lodge - seemingly out of place in this small central west Queensland town.
Carnarvon National Park
Travelling back into the Australian outback, we head to Carnarvon National Park, where we spend two nights. Carnarvon Gorge is a rainforest oasis in the semi-arid heart of Central Queensland, and a major camping ground and centre of outback tourism. Towering white sandstone cliffs form a spectacular steep-sided gorge with narrow, vibrantly coloured and lush side-gorges. Boulder-strewn Carnarvon Creek winds through the gorge. The gorge is home to a range of significant plant and animal species, many of them relics of cooler, wetter times. Remnant rainforest flourishes in the sheltered side-gorges while endemic Carnarvon fan palms Livistona nitida, ancient cycads, ferns, flowering shrubs and gum trees line the main gorge. Grassy open forest grows on the cliff tops. The creeks attract a wide variety of animals, including more than 173 species of bird.
Rock art on sandstone overhangs is a fragile reminder of local Aboriginal peoples ' long and continuing connection with the ancient landscape of the gorge. Ochre stencils, rock engraving and freehand paintings make up some of the finest Aboriginal rock art imagery in Australia. We will have the opportunity with a tour guide to view and learn about these paintings at Cathedral Cave, which lies at the end of the main path through the Gorge, and is indicated by archaeological evidence to be the main campsite for indigenous people who used the Gorge.
Lightning Ridge
After this stay at Carnarvon National Park, we travel to Lightning Ridge, New South Wales for a half day tour and overnight stay. In the 1870s, black opal was discovered in the area, drawing prospectors (over 700 km by foot) from the opal town of White Cliffs near Wilcannia, hoping to make their fortune. At first, the black opals proved to be little more than curiosities to the gem buyers in Sydney, but over time their value was recognised and due to their scarcity, they are recognised as the most-valuable form of opal. Lightning Ridge remains the only town in the world to produce the elusive black opal. In town, we tour a mine, explore the opal community in the main town, and relax in the Artesian hot water spring. Lightning ridge has an Aussie outback feel when you pause to look around and take in the scenery.
Odyssey Traveller's outback adventure comes to an end with two nights in Dubbo. We spend the morning at the Dundullimal Homestead, a heritage-listed former pastoral station converted into a cultural facility and house museum. The afternoon is at your leisure before a farewell group dinner in the evening.
Articles about Australia published by Odyssey Traveller:
For all the articles Odyssey Traveller has published for mature aged and senior travellers, click through on this link.
External articles to assist you on your visit to Dubbo & Outback Queensland: