13 February 2000
Well I was wrong. About 12:30 a.m. (local time) this morning we were woken by heavy rain. There were further heavy showers throughout the night and at one stage the rumble of far off thunder. We woke this morning to heavy overcast but there has been no further rain although the weather is still threatening storms.
Had a treat today. Went to McDonald's for breakfast. The breakfast the motel was offering was just too dear. Ridiculous, really. Afterwards went to a couple of lookouts which have views over the town. Main feature of course are the mining structures which dwarf everything and which are really the town's raison d'etre. Then went out to Lake Moondarra which is the town's main water supply and results from the damming of the Leichhardt River, which Mt. Isa is on. This is a really beautiful spot and is used as well for all forms of water sport, from water skiing to canoeing. On the way there is supposed to be a turnoff out to some aboriginal rock carvings but it is unfortunately not signposted and we couldn't find it. We 4WDrove down a couple of tracks, but they petered out in dead ends.
After lunch we (I) decided to go out to Lake Julius which is the city's backup water source. It is about 15 kms back along the road to Cloncurry then 100 kms along a rough dirt road winding back into the hills. After about 20 kms I changed our minds due to the rough condition of the road, also because nobody else seemed to be going to or coming from there, and also because if anything went wrong with the ute (not that I expected it to, its been going really well) no-one knew where we were. So we returned to the motel to potter about and relax until it was time to go to the RSL for dinner. I was talking to a chap while we were at the club and he told me his rain gauge recorded 32 mm (about one and a quarter inches) overnight - quite a bit to fall overnight, more especially since it did not rain all night and had stopped by early this morning.
Not sure about our plans for tomorrow. There are still things to see and do here, so we may stick around for another day or two. Then again, we may not.