Week_1

Well we finally got away just before lunch on Friday 29th and here we are Wednesday 3rd Nov in our first caravan park stay this trip and in the famous city of Broken Hill.
Leaving Brisbane we travelled via Cunninghams Gap, Warwick and Stanthorpe making our first night stop in the historical town of Tenterfield, made famous by Peter Allen’s song Tenterfield Saddler. It cost us all of $16.00 to camp in the Tenterfield showground, use the toilet and shower and hook up to power – no complaints there and it was lovely and quiet.
As a result of the number of delays we have encountered in departing on both this and our shake down trips we had decided prior to leaving Brisbane to travel as directly as possible to Port Augusta in South Australia, then head north to get within a small plane ride of Lake Eyre with the intention of seeing this vast inland sea while it still has water in it, apparently it has only filled about 3 times in the past 100 years and there’s a good chance we may not be around for the next event. Unfortunately a schedule like this prevented us from spending time checking all the nooks and crannies in and around the many quaint and interesting towns we passed through particularly down the New England Highway and of course every where we have travelled so far because of the very wet winter and late spring, the country side is an absolute picture. We will spend a lot of time later covering these NSW areas.
Having said all that, for the need of exercise we participated in a self guided historical walk of Tenterfield before departing south. There are some wonderful old cottages and buildings in this early settled town and yes we found the Tenterfield Saddlery with all its memorabilia, but alas it is more a museum and curio shop now and not a saddlery any more however it is authentic and that beautiful smell of leather is still there. Tenterfield along the Great Dividing Range through Glenn Innes and on to Guyra the highest elevated town on the New England tableland, this odd little town is home to the one of the largest greenhouse tomato growing complexes in Australia. (not that we saw any). Another feature of Guyra is the “Mother of Ducks Lagoon”, a huge wetland lagoon that is a haven to numerous local and migratory water fowl. Our campsite for the night was a grassy roadside verge allocated by the local council for this purpose, this was a lovely quiet spot looking across the Guyra golf course to the Mother of Ducks Lagoon, this is a free spot with a clean council toilet and access to a drinking water tap where we could fill the c/van tank. Early morning (8.00am) we traipsed across cold long dewy grass to view the water fowl in this internationally famous place (just a swamp without crocs) and take photos – I think I saw a duck 100m away and through the binoculars I’m certain I could see a black swan – oh well the wind was bloody cold so perhaps even the birds had enough sense to keep their heads down.
A brief stop in Armidale to pick up some produce in the farmers market and on through Tamworth, the home of country music, travelling on the road becomes the Oxley highway another 75 kls through Gunnedah we finally pulled off into a free camp spot at Oxley Crossing, so named after the surveyor/explorer John Oxley camped in the location during his epic surveying exploits early 1800’s. Another 68 kls to Coonabarabran (it’s easier to say after a couple of red wines); we stopped at the tourist information centre and discovered an extremely interesting and well put together museum centred on an excellent palaeontology display of a Diprotodon. According to the display information this was the largest known marsupial roaming Australia a couple of million years ago and up until 20,000 years ago, this plant eating specimen standing about 2 metres high and 3 or so metres long died aprox 33,500 years ago, indications are that it was killed or injured by humans. Artist impressions of the Diprotodon have it looking something like a large wombat; this excellent specimen was excavated at Tambar Springs near Coonabarabran. Stopping for 15 minutes at the information centre proved to be worth while. Coonabarabran is another location we must revisit and spend more time at, with the Warrumbungle Range and National Park near by and Siding Spring Observatory Australia’s largest optical telescope, there are many things to see and do.
We continued west through Gilgandra and Warren punching into strong head winds, then NW onto the Mitchell Hwy for 60 odd kls to Nyngan, then once again we were heading west punching the wind on the Barrier Hwy, a total of 360 kls for the day doesn’t sound that much but towing a big van at 85 KPH, it’s a fairly long day long day, we camped at another free spot called Florida just over 60 kls east of Cobar the huge copper mine town. Florida free camp site is 100m off the highway and set up with clean enviro toilets, obviously no power or water but we are self sufficient anyway, this site covers a fair area with plenty of shrubby trees that give a bit of protection from the biting wind, there were about half a dozen other travellers camped for the night which is comforting and good for a chat.
Countryside through this region all the way to Broken hill is basically flat and desolate, when Charles Sturt encountered the area while searching for an inland sea, he described it as some of the most barren and desolate land he had ever seen (62, Explore Australia 2009). We are fortunate to be seeing it at probably its best, after a substantial wet period the countryside is green with plenty of wild flowers yellows whites and particularly the beautiful purple blue carpet of the wild flower weed, Patterson Curse.
Apart from a few distant merinos, occasional emus and plenty of feral goats were the only animals we saw. Traffic was occasional, a few cars, caravans and large trucks heading east (down wind), periodically a car or large truck would thunder past us snorting against the strong wind as we buffeted along at 85 kph burning 22 litres per 100 kls. We stopped at Cobar for a drive around look, a fill up of water and fuel $1.35 per lt. and lunch in the park. Pushing on through flat desolate country we eventually crossed the lifting bridge that spans the Darling River at Wilcannia, once an important and historical town but now dowdy and un-inviting, we were advised not to stay in or too near Wilcannia. Using our Camps 5 book and some info from a fellow traveller at the Florida camp site, we stopped at a roadside rest area called Dolo Hill aprox: 56 kls past Wilcannia, it was pretty exposed just off the highway at the top of the only hill in hundreds of kls but it didn’t feel good, the odd car and road train thundered past as though the devil himself was after them, we had a cup of tea and still no one pulled in, there was a lot of broken glass around which isn’t a good sign and I could feel Nancy’s uneasiness. Eventually a solo traveller coming from the opposite direction pulled in for a nature stop, I asked him had he noticed any vans or trucks in the next rest spot which was 14 kls further back from where he had come from and to our relief he thought there were half a dozen rigs parked there, I’ve never seen Nancy move so fast, everything was put away and secure in two minutes flat and we were off. Spring Hill Rest Area was the next stop, right to his word six or seven vans and motor homes were already there, we ended up in a nice spot shielded from the wind and slept like logs that night, funny how you really only need a couple of travellers around you to feel safe. We had covered 382 kls on that leg.
Wednesday 3rd a 121 kls and we arrived at Broken Hill Caravan Park where we intend to spend a couple of days site seeing and catching up with the washing, if Nancy doesn’t use her front loader within a week she starts to get withdrawal symptoms.
A few stats for nurds like me:
Total kls Bris – Broken Hill = 1579 kls
Longest day = 382 kls
Fuel Burn best run = 21.3 litres per 100 kls
Worst run = 24.1
Average for trip = 22.2
Cheapest fuel = 119.9 /ltr Brisbane
Dearest = 138.9 /ltr Emmadale Roadhouse – middle of no-where.
Total spend on fuel = $550.69