Yeppoon/Rockhampton to the Sapphire Genfields via Blackwater and Emerald

HISTORIC & HEART-PUMPING.

Capricorn Highway / A4 Total distance 333km

This itinerary follows the Tropic of Capricorn and has a historic pioneering heart with the promise of heart-pumping excitement. Imagine learning the art of fossicking. Picking through the rocks when one catches your eye. You rub it to discover it’s a sapphire.

WHO WILL LOVE IT?

Pioneers at heart, Fossickers, Nature lovers, and Fishing addicts

Let’s start in Australia’s beef capital. Rockhampton is an easy base for short itineraries and at least a few days of exploration in this rural city itself. Check out our full description on page 12 to get started.

When you’ve had your fill, it’s time to dive into the Coal Capital of Australia, Blackwater, which is an easy 2 hour and 10-minute drive west from Rockhampton.

BLACKWATER

The Australian Coal Mining Museum is a must stop. Located inside the Blackwater International Coal Centre, the museum pays homage to the coal industry, including interactive exhibits, displays of massive equipment and a weekly coal mine tour.

Retire with a picnic to the picturesque Japanese Garden. A stunning lunch setting, it also marks a relationship between Blackwater and its Japanese sister city, Fujisawa.

Let’s swap the minute manicured details of the Japanese Garden to the sprawling raw beauty of the Blackdown Tableland National Park, a one hour drive from Blackwater.

Watch the dry plains of the surrounding area transform into the coolness of the tableland canopy and its sandstone plateaus rising high above it.

The Ghungalu People are the caretakers of this land, their ancient rock art remains throughout the national park.

Enjoy spectacular lookouts, deep gorges and swim at Rainbow Falls.

Pull your fishing lines out and head 25km north of town to Bedford Weir. Stocked with barramundi and saratoga there’ll be plenty of fight on the end of the line. But don’t forget your nets to try your hand at catching red claw crayfish, a favourite local delicacy.

EMERALD

Emerald is an easy 45 minute drive from Blackwater. It is a tranquil Central Queensland Highlands town nestled along the Nogoa River.

There’s an authentic country charm to Emerald that you can feel in every ‘G’day’ and smile as you walk down the street.

It’s alive in the ornate architecture of the beautifully-restored train station. Built in 1900, the columns and wooden lattice work of the entrance are a beautiful welcome. Still serving the Emerald community, the station is located on the main street.

The Emerald Botanic Gardens offer free entry to a tropical oasis hugging the banks of the Nogoa River. Chase butterflies through the footpaths, spot birds through the fan palms and listen to the trickle of the waterfall.

Under the spacious high ceilings and white gallery walls of the Emerald Art Gallery are more than two decades of history of bringing the arts to the Emerald community.

Changing exhibitions offer a variety of local and national artists alike. If you visit in August, you might be lucky enough to see who wins the Central Highlands Regional Council Annual Art Award.

Outside the art gallery, the world’s largest reproduction of van Gogh’s famous Sunflowers masterpiece brings a touch of splendour to Emerald’s Morton Park and pays homage to the town’s history as a significant sunflower producer.

It’s easy to be charmed by Emerald. Why not stop over and take advantage of our favourite short trips?

Top 3 Short Trips from Emerald

LAKE MARABOON 20 minute drive south west

Home to the mighty saratoga, yellowbelly, murray cod, silver perch and barramundi, Lake Maraboon is one of the reasons the Central Queensland Highlands region is famous for its fishing. Drop a line straight from your rented kayak, cool off with a swim or take in the beautiful views on a walk around the lake.

CARNARVON GORGE 2 hours and 45 minutes’ drive south

Carnarvon Gorge is part of Carnarvon National Park, one of the most visited parks in Central Queensland. The spot is full of ancient rock art, including ochre stencils, rock engravings and freehand paintings on natural sandstone overhangs. Take a dip in the Rock Pool, see how many of the park’s 170 bird species you can find or even glimpse a platypus on a morning stroll along the Nature Trail. The picnic space sits under towering eucalyptus trees and cabbage palms.

MINERVA HILLS NATIONAL PARK 1 hour drive south

This national park offers many walking trails, a huge variety of wildlife and plants, beautiful ancient rock art of the Karai people and some of nature’s finest masterpieces in the rising jagged peaks formed many years ago as a result of ancient volcanic activity.

SAPPHIRE GEMFIELDS

Just 45 minutes west from Emerald you’ll drive into more than 900 square kilometres of sapphire gemfields. First discovered in 1875, these fields are some of the largest in the world.

For more than 100 years, pioneers have travelled to the gemfields with the hope of getting lucky. Even today, the local pubs are full of stories about finding the big one.

The streets are lined with gem shops and galleries with professional gemcutters available to facet your very own find and jewellers ready to set them into a piece of jewellery that is truly unique. But first we need to find you a gem.

Harness the pioneering spirit that built the Sapphire Gemfields and dive right in! Purchase a fossicking permit from a local store or online. Hire the equipment you need and start getting your hands dirty.

If you’d prefer to learn from the professionals then join a fossicking tour and learn how to dig into the gravel, shuffle your pan in shallow waters and pick the dark glimmer of a sapphire.

Fossicking parks enable people of all ages and fitness levels to join the fun of finding a sapphire. With the digging work already done, visitors can buy a bag of wash and start searching straight away.

Try your hand at a high-tech treasure hunt on the Sapphire Gemfields geo-cache trail. Grab your GPS and a map from the Central Queensland Highlands Visitor Information Centre and discover 19 hidden gems.

When it’s time to dust off your hands, visit the pub in Rubyvale for a great meal and some of the best stories of the good old days. Did you hear the one about young ‘Smiley’ Nelson who in 1979 kicked a rock from someone’s discarded heap behind the Post Office and ended up finding the world’s biggest yellow sapphire? – all 2019 carats worth!

When night falls turn your eyes to the sky and, with the help of a powerful telescope, discover colourful clusters of stars, Saturn’s rings and Jupiter’s moons at the observatory. We promise you’ve never seen the sky look the way it does under the glimmer of the Outback starscape.

Step into another world on an underground mine tour, where the temperature sits at a cool 25 degrees Celsius. Tours take visitors through the network of tunnels, providing insight into the process of underground sapphire mining.

Sapphire Gemfields Wetlands Reserve lets you get in touch with nature as you walk through 98 hectares of pristine bushland and seasonal wetlands.