Nyngan to Narromine to Lithgow! - last night - coldest too! Tues 14 July 2015

Nyngan to Narromine to Lithgow – last night!

Cold morning! Lovely drive - through Trangie (huge cotton processing plant). Still lots of roadkill kangaroos. Huge areas of crops (canola yellow flowers already on to; huge canals for cotton growing; cattle & sheep) to Narromine. Cold showery & windy! Warren rang Jayco in Dubbo & booked van to have electrics fixed tomorrow morning. We decided to stay in Narromine. Caravan park out next to airport. 3 lots of us there plus 31 students (in cabins) on a UTS Science trip.

We drove out to the Wetlands on the edge of town – only saw a ‘bunch of geese’ & slid all over the place on the wet dirt track! We ‘did’ the shopping strip, great local crafts’ shop & HUGE Pharmacy cum gift cum jewellery/ everything shop!

Spent some time in Library looking up my great aunt who cooked at a station ‘out west’!!!! Found her on Carwoola Station near Bungendore in 1922!

Tues 14 July 2015
Wind dropped overnight so it didn’t feel as cold! We finished watching Homeland Series 2 after having lovely dinner (lamb chops in mint gravy & vegies) at Services Club.

We left at 8.15 & had van fixed in Dubbo – the plug to the transformer had come disconnected (no doubt things tossed about under bed on gravel road). They also ‘rescrewed’ in fridge which had come lose! Warren bought some LED lights & put them in – much brighter!!!!

Onto Wellington & Molong – love Molong (bought 5 books at Vinnies!

There was snow on the mountains around Orange & a snowman still in the park! Snow also still on some hillsides & by roadside out of Bathurst.

Lunch at Lucknow then arrived at Lithgow at 3.45 – 4 degrees! Caravan park next to railway (track up higher) & two sets of aquaducts nearby!!!!

2 degrees at 5pm

7pm - 0 degrees & windy!

Lovely spray of maroon little orchids welcomed us back after a great trip!!

Quilpie into NSW

Quilpie into NSW!  Sat – Sun 11 12 July 2015-07-12

Quilpie to Charleville was 210 kms.

Quilpie a lovely little town – great caravan park (artesian spas; glass doors between shower & change area! Meals & campfire), Also excellent Info Centre (+ museum + quilt display). The Durack’s drove cattle through the district in the early days & Amy Johnson landed here in May 1930 on her flight from England to Brisbane). Lovely library, bakery, cafes, coffee shops/galleries, 2 supermarkets – still a LITTLE town.

RC Church has a feature boulder opal rock lecturn, baptismal font & altar – beautiful!

So good to see taller green trees, GREEN grass, water in the creeks & wider sealed roads with line markings!!!!! We stopped halfway at Cooladdi (just a roadhouse now, free camping behind but offer meals) it used to be quite a railway town in its day.

At 12.30 everything except the IGA was closed in Charleville! - another nice small town. Two double storey hotels with ‘posts’ out the front. Two others (beautiful painted & maintained were the School of Arts & UCA Uniting Care & Welfare.

We had lunch in the park & were joined by 6 honking geese & flock of apostle birds!

We headed south to Wyandra where Warren was keen to stay. Lovely little village – quite a few free camped behind school or in powered sites behind Post Office. Warren had a beer & I a chocolate paddle pop (the only ice cream they had!) As it was only 2.45 we decided to go on the 97kms to Cunnamulla.

Wind had come up by time we set up. There was a campfire, singalong & sausage sizzle on to raise funds fro Royal Flying Doctor. Lots there, sitting around talking, drinking eating, singing.

A shower of rain but wind dropped – still a cold night.

So much roadkill all the way!!! – mainly kangaroos. Saw many emus, some brolgas & wild goats!

Sunday – 5 degrees in morning & warmed up to 16! 13 in Bourke.

We drove south to Bourke – stopping at Barringun – on border NSW - for morning tea. Greeted by 4 sheep & Shetland pony. Policeman there as well!

Lunch in Bourke – pies & beesting cake at café – lovely!

Less road kill! Still lots of LIVE wildlife!

On to Nyngan – cold & windy & showery! Stopped at Mulga Creek Hotel (newish brick long low building) with 5 parking meters out the front – another fund raiser for RFD!

Also stopped to take photos of disused railway station at Girilambone. Warren went over to look it over – opened the door to the station & swaggie in their ‘boiling up his spuds for tea’ He had his swag roll there. Warren doesn’t know who got the biggest fright!

Very cold & windy at Nyngan CP – snow at Orange & highways closed there.

Birdsville to Windorah to Quilpie

Birdsville

It was 186 kms from Bedourie to Birdsville – a lot more gravel road today! Stones flying everywhere & lots of ‘sliding around’ on the gravel. Again people passing really good in getting to the side of the road or off it completely.

Again lots of road kill (kangaroos) & wedge tail eagles & crows at them. Landscape changes from ‘grey lands (floodways & mudflats – ofter green patches beside the road) to red/orange with ridges of sandhills.

We stopped at the ruins of one od Sidney Kidman’s early homesteads, Carcoory. Would have been lovely stone house – flies nearly carried us away!!!!

Also stopped for a photo of the ‘boot tree’. Waddi trees grow nearer to Birdsville – thesemuli-sapling like & VERY hard wood, popular for ‘building & fencing in early days – also the termites didn’t like it!

Birdsville still very busy; very dry & dusty! Flies!!! Sign - Population 150 (+ or – 7,000) – grid of half a dozen streets. You virtually drive into the caravan park from the ‘highway’! 52 powered sites & LOTS of unpowered camping down beside the Diamantina River – lovely outlook. $40 a night for power.

We walked the streets – I bought a fly net at Frontier Services! – good museum display of it & local ‘hospital’/clinic from early days in 1930’s. The Birdsville hotel there & the same façade from 1884 with the airstrip right across the road!

We checked out The Bakery – known for curried camel pies but none left!; bought multigrain bread $6.50. The museum closed now – they are hoping ‘all the contents’ will go to the one in Longreach. Camel rides operate from outside it.

We drove to toen entrance to see the artesian bore that supplies the town – water piped out at 98 degrees centigrade, there are no iron or sulphur minerals in it so once it has cooled down in the channels (steam pouring off it!) it is pumped up to water tower!

Out to the racetrack – out of town, on other side of the river & Burke & Wills Tree (supposed to have carved initials there). People free camped everywhere beside river or just ‘in the bush’! Signs up ‘no free camping in town limits’.

We walked up to the hotel for dinner (5.30 – 6.30) but the line was out the door so we walked back & had tea at van. We walked up for outside showing of last State of Origin game (on BIG old fashioned screen). They had a big pit fire & about 80 watching it  - lots of families. We lasted till half time – we’d worn jackets & parkas but still COLD (3 degrees!) so we came back to listen to the NSW whitewash by Qld– 52 – 6!!!! in the warmth!.

Guy next to us suggested taping flattened cardboard boxes to back window against stones thrown up on gravel road. He said so many cars had arrived in Birdsville with shattered back windows. We did this as well as closing all curtains & taping door vents.  

Boulia to Bedourie

Boulia to Bedourie  - Tues 7 July 2015

COLD overnight & 5 degrees again in morning. We were away at 8.15 after our porridge! We got petrol yesterday ($159.9 lt).

We put the stableriser bars on, thinking they would help on the gravel road today. Only a few stretches of gravel (all grey rounded stones not dirt!) – quite deep groves. The bars didn’t last long & we had to stop & take them off – luckily the road surface allowed Warren to swivel them right around & able to be taken off quite easily!

We stopped at the Tropic of Capricorn marker on the ‘natural treeless plain’. I took a photo of Warren – with a little tree right behind him!

360 degrees of dry country; no cattle until close to Bedourie; no animal life except for flocks of finches & pigeons, few hawks. Trees line to creek & river beds. In a few places beside the road saw lots of (on vines) small paddy melons (like).

One of the huge stations along the way was Marion Downs. We could see a ridge (about 33m high) with picnic table, loos etc ‘off the road’. We drove up (3km) another guy come from Birdsville there. INCREDIBLE view! Cold wind blowing, had to put parkers on. A willy wagtail there! LOTS of traffic passing from Birdsville. The guy said they had had a special Anzac Day service there this year with 100 horsemen riding down the highway & up to it (wide curved road up). It was the Vaughan Johnston Memorial Lookout, he was State MP for area who pushed Govt & insisted outback needed sealed roads – we certainly appreciated him!

Overnight at Bedourie – Oasis CP – AN ENSUITE!!! $35. VERY WINDY & FLIES!!!!! After lunch we walked up town – another great Info Centre (DVD of floods when water channels fill & run to Lake Eyre. Mud Hut from 1880’s. artesian spa pool, historic hotel & shop at the Roadhouse. Petrol $1.78.9 lt)

LOTS  traffic coming up from Birdsville – lots staying here – 2 caravan parks.

 So much roadkill on the roads! Wedgetail eagles would wait until the last minute to fly off

 Boulia

 Boulia - great little town

 Brolgas

 Min Min Lights exhibition

 Burke River after 4 years of drought

 Vance Johnson lookout - rest area on top - incredible to see (300m high)  in the distance from the wide FLAT plains!

 100 million year old dinosaur bones & fossils from the inland sea

 Tropic of Capricorn marker

 Bedourie means 'place of the dust storm' depiction

Bedourie camp oven - first made there