It’s time for us to be a tourists in Longreach.

We went to the Stockman’s Hall of Fame Museum around 9am and stayed there until near 2pm. This is well worth a visit, and a full day is really needed to see it properly. Themed around the opening up of the outback Australia it pays homage to the stockmen. It really does a good job at expressing the courage and spirit of pioneering life in early outback Australia. I still don’t think we saw it all, as alterations meant the closure of one of the floors. I guess it will be ready in time for the tourist season during the middle of the year.

After doing a bit of shopping we went to the QANTAS Founders Outback Museum, as Longreach is the original home of QANTAS airways. This museum is across the road from the Stockman’s and is every bit as good. They have a full size 747 parked on the apron, which was not yet part of the displays but apparently will be. Being a QANTAS Platinum Frequent Flyer for nearly 10 years I found looking around this museum fascinating.

They have a full size model of the Avro, which was the first plane QANTAS owned, and a model of a DH61, which was one of the early planes of the 1920’s that had a passenger cabin. It even managed to include a toilet cubicle.

We had a full and very worthwhile day. Christmas saw other attractions around Longreach closed for the Chirsmas and New Year break

We spent a couple of hours in the campground swimming pool talking to some people from Victoria. It was very pleasant in the late hot afternoon and a good time of day to relax after a long day of being a tourist.