It may be called the Walkabout Creek Hotel but people are finding they can’t walk far from McKinlay’s pub at the moment.
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The tiny town, 100km south of Cloncurry is swelled to several times its normal population as the local creek rises cutting off the Landsborough Hwy north of town.
The Monday morning 5am weather update from the BoM said McKinlay was one of the places affected as the wet weather system tracked north and east today and tomorrow.
The Walkabout is serving as a defacto tourist bureau and accommodation centre and owner Debbie Wust said people were still keeping dry.
“The road will be closed for a while yet,” Ms Wust said on Monday morning with up to 20 cars and a dozen trucks all parked waiting for the road to clear.
“There’s a few people walking down to check the water. It’s busier than normal for this time of year, that’s for sure.”
The North West Star’s own Samantha Walton and her family are among many stuck at McKinlay as all roads north are blocked due to floodwaters.
“The road is not opening any time soon, the McKinlay River is over,” Ms Walton said.
Ms Walton said she, her partner Eddie, and newborn baby, were in Townsville for a few days and driving home to their property at Rosebud between Mount Isa and Cloncurry when they were forced to detour.
“We came back Saturday and only got to Julia Creek and the creeks were over between there and Curry so we stayed there the night,” she said.
“Early Sunday morning we saw the road between McKinlay and Cloncurry was still open so we said we’ll try and go around.”
They took the bitumen road from Julia Creek to Kynuna and then made it north as far was McKinlay when they were stuck again.
“The road was still open but we got about 10km out (of McKinlay) and there were some creeks over so we turned around and came back,” she said.
The couple stayed in the pub along with the other stranded travellers and truckies overnight.
“We stayed the night in the accommodation out the back (of the pub), there are so many people here camped up,” she said.
Ms Walton counted 17 light vehicles and a dozen trucks and supplied are limited in town.
“We are running out of nappies and we are not the only family with a newborn here either,” she said.
It has been an eventful few days for Ms Walton.
Last week she was at home feeding her baby during the middle of the night when she was interrupted by a 2.5m carpet python inside the house, and just metres away from where she was sitting.
Derek Barry
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
