Beautiful Betsy Crash Site

Still heading down to Bundaberg for my birthday I thought that I would stop off at another bomber crash site. I was informed that the condition of the track to the bomber site was not in very good condition, so I decided against it a few months ago.

However after talking to other people on my travels they just told me to avoid the one way track and I shouldn’t have a problem.

I thought well since I have bought a 4WD I better start using it a little for that purpose, I found a national parks map with the road to the crash site and after about 30mins playing with my GPS I managed to program the correct route into my Garmin.

In rural areas my Garmin GPS has lots of roads that don’t exist and its always trying to take me down them which is a bit of a pain, I must sit down and send in all the corrections I’m coming across on this trip.

The time on my GPS says that I still have 2hrs to the crash site which seems a little off as I’m driving along on a very good dirt road.

I have noticed since I’ve come away from the coast the landscape is so dry and brown, the animals are much skinnier and the farmers are doing it tough.

Driving along the road I pass through a few farm properties and have to drive around cattle and dodge the occasional cattle dog as they run along beside the car barking at me.

The road conditions worsen and my 2hr drive is starting to make more sense as I’m now driving around 40kph as I drive up from an elevation on 100m to almost 1000m and some areas drop down to about 20kph because of the corrugations.

It’s hard to show how steep the road is from within the car but I guess it would be almost impossible in wet weather.

I’m now driving in the national park and come across a campsite and a day use area so I stop and have some morning tea as I set off early.

Some of my rice crackers fall to the ground and suddenly there is about 8 magpies foraging for scraps.

I continue on to the crash site at a pace of around 20kph and this seams to take all day and I’m relived once I see a sign for the bomber site.

I’ve added the information boards so I don’t have to type about Betsy and the men that died in the fatal crash on 27/02/1945.

One thing that did surprise me was how far the debris was scattered throughout the bush, I was expecting to see a full plane intact like the one up the cape.

This was just bits of wings, engines, and propellers thrown across the landscape over 100m from start to finish and incredible but disturbing site.

A bit of a somber moment realising you’re standing where people lost their lives and the fear they most have gone through in the final minute of life, after surviving the war they die on a food run.

On the drive back down the mountain I stop and admire the view and watch kangaroos watching me, as I take photos in the cool mountain air at a 1000m elevation. I’m thinking how lucky I am to be driving around Australia visiting all these sites.

As I drive past the farms once again I have to slow down, the cattle dogs chase my car barking the whole way right up to the edge of their boundary fence. This must be there little bit of excitement as it seemed a friendly bark

I drive down the road and spot a street sign and it makes me think of one of my WordPress friends over seas, She will know when she reads the sign.

Sadly no water in the creek