Townsville by 10

 After an excellent nights sleep , we are woken at 6:30 , but ignore it till 7am . After a leisurely breakfast we read a bit and slowly go about packing up again - we figure there is no rush , as we will be at Townsville within an hour .
 You nearly had to kick the wallabies out of the way this morning - there were 50 or 60 bouncing around the place , we could hear them chewing away at the grass when we went to bed and again in the morning .
 We hitched up and drove out , stopping to get some photo's on the way out to the highway - the first is Mt Elliot & the second is pretty obvious .

Us in front of Bowling Green Bay National Park

 As we drove onto the highway , the land flattened out and seemed to stretch a long way before the mountains shot up out of the ground again . The gum trees all look to have had there branches trimmed to a certain height . It made the fields look even bigger than they already were .

  Before much longer we were looking for a rest area to waste a bit more time , we found one , but it was on the other side of the highway , so we gave it a miss . A few minutes later and we found ourselves in road works , and a lot of them - hello we are in Townsville - at least the outer suburbs of it !! We then hurriedly tried to find our park , and realised we had gone straight past it . Going further up the road we found some side roads that we could turn around in - roundabouts are great for turning a 5th wheeler around - and doubled back to where we had to get off the highway - oops , we went past that turn before we knew it , so had to find another friendly spot to turn around in . The road to the copper smelter was good enough to turn round in , so back to the highway again , down to the makeshift roundabout , turn right off the highway , onto some new road , back onto some old road , left here , right there and we had finally found the place - Hooray !!!
 We went & checked in and talked to the managers for about half an hour - about Tasmania - not even close to Townsville - then got the rundown on where to go , what to do and how to find it - in Townsville !!!! We went & set up and had lunch before chatting to Emma for 45 mins .
 Time to start doing stuff - off we went into Townsville , Castle Hill to be precise , up to Hynes Lookout - from here you get 360 degree views of Townsville and you can see how big it is - 2nd largest city after Brisbane . You get a really good view of Magnetic Island as well - it is only 8 kms offshore .

 At the lookout , there are several tracks that take you up & down & around the top & sides of Castle Hill - there is a sign that tells you how long each track will take - we thought about half the time they had on the sign would do it easily - well it took us nearly 3 times the amount of time they allotted , as we took in the view surrounding us - and took some photos - here are a few .

Heres one for the boys still at work . Heres the pole you need to work on - the wires go down hill 200 metres to the next pole !!

 As we wandered around the hill - apparently it is only a couple of metres short of being called a mountain - the wind picked up and would have quite happily removed your hat , if you weren't watching out .  There is an old army observation post from World War 2 - they call it the pill box - the Americans used it . 

 We went down to the beach , an area they call The Strand . There is beautiful green grass , palm trees, bike tracks , playgrounds and a rockpool swimming area - It is mainly cement , and uses sea water , has a nice smooth bottom and has disabled access . It was just filling back up after some maintenance was completed . The beach beside it is patrolled and people were quite happily swimming . 

 We went for a drive down to Jupiters Casino and the wharves where you catch the ferry over to Magnetic Island , before heading back to the park . There are a lot of old heritage buildings in town as well - we will have to investigate further , probably on the bikes . Townsville is predominantly flat, so it is set up with bike tracks all over the place .
 Todays Map :- https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=z1G8gwwxwyYo.kEw6vU54iIdk&usp=sharing