Having got everything sort of in order, we decided to go to the Darling Downs Drifters Chapter Gathering up in the hills towards Clifton. We drove the hundred odd kilometres before lunch and received a warm welcome from all the people already there. There were lots of Highway Wanderers including some we had seen for many months which was nice but we also met many people who remembered me from my last visit to their chapter in 2001 which was also nice.
We were graced with the presence of the Chairman of the Association and his wife who were on their way back to Townsville from the Tasmanian rally The chill of the evening drove us into the Motley shortly after sundown and with no TV reception we watched a Star Trek video we had pick up at a garage sale in South Australia.
We managed to surface in time for the Anzac Day celebration. I flew my Australian flag at half mast which was appreciated. We had a sit-around-and-chat day and some brave souls had a sit-around-the-camp-fire evening.
The trees and the clouds had conspired to leave my new batteries in need of some charge so, with the permission of my neighbours, I ran the generator for an hour or so while everyone was elsewhere having happy hour.
The weather had brightened a little by time I was up and about so we did some more sitting around chatting. At morning tea somebody produced a puzzle object, a railway spike turned into a whistle/bottle opener. I followed this with a selection of puzzles which kept several of the men quiet for a longish time. The ladies were doing work with material which I was told would become quilted things in due course.
Those of us still here sat around the camp fire chatting until it got dark when we retreated into the Motley for a quiet night.
We decided to stay on after everyone else had left to have a quiet day to ourselves.
The work on the new bridge had started up again after the long weekend. I spent some time watching the piling machine drilling the hole for the pile and then inserting and driving the casing into position. These piles are about 1500 mm (5 ft) in diameter and 10 m (30 ft) deep so the machine is quite big and the pile driving is quite energetic. Happily they all knocked off in mid afternoon so we had a peaceful evening.