We left Oasis and headed towards Hughenden to start the Dinosaur Trail. On the way we stopped at the spectacular Porcupine Gorge. It was huge and the red and orange colours of the rock were amazing.
The kids at Porcupine Gorge
I recommend anyone interested in fossils or kids to come and explore this area. The ongoing discoveries of dinosaur bones is amazing.
We bought a Dinosaur Family Pass which got us into most of the facilities.
The kids in front of a replica of a Muttaburrasaurus called 'Hughie'
Because dinosaur bones are too fragile they now don't display them standing up so anytime you see a life-size dinosaur it is probably a replica. We saw a replica inside the museum of a Muttaburrasaurus called 'Hughie' as well as the replica outside on a roundabout called, 'Mutt.' (Very original!).
The kids with 'Mutt'
We enjoyed exploring this little museum and seeing the fossilised dino bones found in the area. As with Richmond and Winton many have been found by local station owners and their families.
So far the road to Richmond from Hughenden is the worst road we have travelled on (and it is a sealed road!) It goes up and down like a roller coaster!
This whole area was once a huge inland sea so the main fossilised dinosaur bones found in and around Winton have been marine dinosaurs. The most famous one being called Kronosaurus Queenslandica. It was discovered in the 1930's by an American led team and the bones are housed in Harvard University. In more recent times they have found more bones of the Kronosuarus and a complete skeleton of a Ichthyosaur (I think!) See the picture below.
These bones were discovered by a station owner in a river bank on his property.
More Dino bones
The kids were given a booklet to complete at all the stops along the way. They had to identify loads of things along the way. I find it hard to remember all the different dinosaurs but it is very facinating.
The kids in the mouth of a Kronosaurus outside the museum at Richmond called Kronosaurus Korner. (It's a life size replica apparently!)
Thjere are many more fossilised bones of other animals in the Richmond Museum - mainly marine of course. It was amazing the number of bones that had been found and that are still being found each year. They also have a small lab there to collect, clean and restore dino bone finds.
They give you a chance to go fossicking at a couple of sites just out of town. The kids were so excited. We found a few bits and pieces. Charlotte probably had the best find - some fossilised wood. She was very excited.
After fossicking and a late lunch we hit the road again to drive to Winton. This time we took a back road (gravel) which was still better than the main road back through Hughenden. We got into Winton in the late afternoon and after a quick is it to the Visitors Centre we drove 4km out of town to the Long Waterhole. We found a lovely place to camp right beside the waterhole. It was a peaceful setting with some lovely birds around and only the occasional visit from cows! Luckily none came close to us!
We explored Winton the next morning looking at the sites of interest such as the North Gregory Hotel where the first public performance of Waltzing Matilda took place and the spot where the first meetings of the board of Qantas took place. We then enjoyed a visit to the Waltzing Matilda Centre which is a wonderful museum dedicated to the history of Winton, to the legends and facts surrounding the ballad'Waltzing Matilda,' lots of information on Banjo Patterson and Christine MacPherson who put Waltzing Matilda to music, all the different recordings of the song, bush life in general, local peoples stories, loads of old machinery & trains for the kids to climb on and explore and the Qantilda Exhibition which houses Qantas history as well as local history of people in the district. We really enjoyed it. We went back to the waterhole for a late lunch followed by a relaxing afternoon doing school work.
The next day we drove 110km south of Winton out to the Lark Quarry site. This is where a local station owner in the 1960's whilst fossicking for opal found these foot prints in the rock. He showed someone else and they thought that they should show the Queensland Museum. They confirmed that they were dinosaur footprints however nothing was done until the early 1970's when a paelentologist called Dr Wade from the Queensland Museum decided to investigate it further. By the mid 1970's she got a team together and they spend 18months painstakingly excavating the site. One man assisted her for the whole dig so she named it Lark Quarry after him for all the help he gave her. Of course many others assisted along the way. She got a grant to construct a cover to protect the footprints but this wasn't enough to protect them fully so finally in 2002 they constructed a an environmental controlled shelter to properly prove ct this amazing site.
Look closely - these large foot prints are from a carnivorous dinosaur who caused all the small dinosaurs to stampede when he came upon them at the waterhole.
Lark Quarry is the only recorded dinosaur stampede in the world! There are 3300 different tracks in the rocks. They measured them and then compared them with specimens around the world at the time (1970's) to determine how many species and what species they belonged to. They found 4 different species at the waterhole.
More footprints
We also did some exploring around the site before returning back to the relaxing waterhole. Ed and the kids collected loads of firewood and we had a nice big fire. The nights are cold +++ and we are in our thermals and tracksuits/PJ's at night as well as a beanie to keep our heads warm. The only problem is that the girls in the family have really bad beanie hair the next day!
We leave tomorrow for Longreach.
No comments:
Post a Comment