Russ Travelling Australia

We have finally crossed the swollen Darling River on arrival at Bourke.  We are staying at Kidman’s Camp Caravan Park in North Bourke, a lovely park that completely fills up at night with tourists and empties out in the morning!  It is right on the Darling near the old bridge, built in 1883.

We did some sightseeing around Bourke and visited the old weir built in 1897, the only one of its kind built on the Darling.  We used a “Mud Map”to find the weir and spent a lot of time back-tracking and getting off private property before we found the right spot.  You can see vehicle tracks on both sides of the river that are now cut off by the high water.

We picnicked at the old wharf on the Darling in Bourke to the “tuneful” sounds of an old steam engine.  Yesterday we drove to May’s Bend, where there is a great camping spot, although you’d be looking for high ground at the moment.

On Sunday we planned to have lunch at Mt Oxley or Gundabooka National Park, but after an inch of rain overnight all dirt roads are closed, bugger!  What is worse, the roads on the east and west sides of the Darling are also closed so our planned station stays are off, because they expect the roads to be closed for a few days.  Hopefully the road to Gundabooka may be open tomorrow so we can camp there, if not, it is off to Cobar and Lake Cargelligo to see this lake that was dry on our last visit a couple of years ago.

We have enjoyed our stay in Bourke and will be back again, fancy the rain changing our plans in what is usually a dry part of Australia!

We were looking forward to our next stop very much.  Lynton, Russ’ brother, suggested we stay at his friend’s property, 37 kms East of Walgett.

Richard and Beverly Meyer run an 8000 acre station, have a B & B, and passionately run 1,500 sheep.  The property has 8 kms of Barwon River frontage, which is quite high and flowing well at the moment.  Caloola has some Warrambools running through the property, which we have discovered is different to a Billabong; not a creek; but an overflow for a rising river.  It is also not an Ana branch, but still a short alternative course for the river when the river is high.

Richard and Bev made us feel most welcome and suggested a great camping spot over looking the river.  We had our own flushing toilet and wood-fired shower, luxury!

We spent the first morning exploring their property, trying to see all the birds that would be attracted to the area with the big wet.  We had a very pleasant picnic lunch by the river.  That evening Bev and Richard hosted us to an excellent meal and a night of reminiscing and conversation.

The next day we did some more exploring and in the afternoon Richard and Bev provided a bush cuppa of billy tea before we helped them set out the alignment of a new fence.

That evening we had a late BBQ over the fire and then Bev, Richard and their friend Margo joined us for some more conversation around the fire.  We were sad to leave but we have to keep moving so we can fit in all the things we want to do before returning to home.

Tomorrow it is off to Bourke and setting up to watch the grand final replay.  After that, depending on the weather we will travel to Mt Gundaboka National Park and then down the Darling to stay on a couple of stations before heading home.  Unfortunately some rain is being predicted over the next couple of days so we will have to check in at the Police Station before we leave to make sure the roads are all open.

Travelled approximately 150kms from Tenterfield to Ashford – a few houses, service station and we camped in a paddock with power and a toilet block for 2 nights.  (very clean).  This location enabled us to visit Kwiambal National Park (for picnics and walks of course!)

First point of interest was the Macintyre Falls, where we had a wood-fired BBQ.  The falls were spectacular – never seen so much water gouging over and through the rocks, but particularly brown with all the mud and silt.

Next day drove to Lemon Tree Flat Camping area where, again a swollen Severn River had risen to cover a third of the camp ground in the last few days or so.  Usually a recommended swimming spot, but not at the moment!

We visited the limestone caves, but neither of us ventured into them.  Ten metres from them, the temperature dropped so much we needed another two layers on and we didn’t have torches.

The Macintyre and Severn Rivers run into the Barwon river, which eventually becomes the Darling.  More rain is expected so the rest of our trip is in ‘the lap of the gods’, so to speak.

Magno men were doing a little bit of absailing from the chairs, but one needed a helping hand from a couple of friends.

Arrived at 3pm after repairs at Ballina, only to find that the skylight is still leaking.  We are not returning to Ballina ever again, so a basin under the leak will have to suffice!  To say that it is wearing thin, is to say the least.

Tenterfield is a quaint little town and the surrounding National Parks are fantastic.  Thursday we picnicked and walked at Boonoo Boonoo NP (pronounced ‘bunna bunoo’, meaning ‘big rocks’.) Rained all morning, but eased enough for us to enjoy a wonderful walk to the falls.  Saw some Lady Finger orchids on the way.  We are very lucky to see this amount of water surging over the rocks and descending 210 metres into the gorge below – it was thrilling.

Yesterday, in heavy rain, we headed to Girraween National Park.  The bush here is like a landscaped garden, with huge granite boulders and rocks.   All the wildflowers put on a magnificent display.  There are 750 plant types and over 140 bird species.

We walked to Granite Arch, crossing raging creeks, on well constructed paths.  They have done a great job with well signposted walks and a large picnic area, which was surrounded by multi-trunked eucalypts and a lot of wattles (all in flower). The creek only flows on average of 2 weeks a year, so we were incredibly lucky to witness this amount of water.

Our more interesting trip is on hold, as rain has set in over the north east of NSW, apparently for a week.  We know why it is called the rainforest region.  It’s still mild, although not as warm as it was when we arrived.

Russ has erected a tarp over the washing, (he feels like he is really camping now), but with the high level of humidity, it will be a while before we are folding!

Filling in the time hasn’t been difficult.  Yesterday we had the washing and chores to do, so popped up to the pub for a delicious meal at lunchtime.  Macadamia coated Dory strips with chilli/lime aioli.

Today we headed off in the wet to picnic at Minyon Grass picnic area, planning to walk to view the Minyon Falls, but fog put a dampener on our intentions.  We still BBQ’d (chicken teriyaki skewers, with coleslaw).  The magno men were climbing the walls with impatience, waiting for the fog to lift.

Unfortunately they were disappointed and they became  more angry, because we have to return to BALLINA.  Yes, the van has been leaking from a window and the sky light, so we have to stay here until Wednesday.  Here we go again!  Adam, the Service Manager at Kimberly said as we left last time that “I’ll wait to hear from you again” and unfortunately, he was right!!!!

Soon after writing the last blog in the park, the phone rang and everything was finished on the Kimberly and an hour later, we were heading to Lismore, 35 kms (or so) from Ballina.  Only two caravan parks in this large old town and we chose the one with the least stars, but it’s on the river, it’s small and each site is surrounded by palms and large trees.  Very old toilet facilities, but each toilet is set up as a “shared ensuite” – toilet, shower and basin – and very clean.  We’ve extended our stay to four nights!

We are surrounded by many beautiful National Parks, which have been set up to protect the remnant areas of rainforest, which are World Heritage Listed.

Yesterday we went to Nightcap N.P. and BBQ’d in the magnificent Protester Falls picnic area, so named because of the actions of the Terania Native Forests Action Group, who, between 1976 and 1979, focused national attention on the extent of logging in the Nightcap area.  Nightcap N.P. was declared in 1983.

We walked 1.4kms to the falls, through forest so stunning it was hard to remember to look where you were walking.  The falls were flowing from a drop of 30m into a pristine pool, but swimming is not allowed because it is the habitat of  the endangered Fleay’s barred frogs.

Today we wanted to check out Rummery Park, where camping is allowed and a long walk can be taken to the Minyon Falls (100m drop)!, but on arrival, we were greeted by hundreds of cars and people all there to see the finish of a cycling race, so we headed to Rocky Creek Dam (within Nightcap N.P.), a water catchment area for a number of North Coast towns.

We took the Platypus Walk, across the spillway and onto a pontoon bridge over Rocky Creek, but unfortunately were not lucky enough to see any platypus.  We had very noisy people walking behind us, maybe that was the reason why?

The weather is cloudy, about 21 degrees and fairly humid.  There’s a lot more to do from here, so let’s hope those roads are drying out further inland while we are having fun!!  Not so the Magnomen, they are still sulking because they wanted to stay on the coast and do some more surfing!

Yes, Ballina again – more caravan repairs.  The water pump isn’t priming.  They worked on this last time, so let’s hope that we have more luck today.  There are fiddly little things as well, but they are happy to fix everything, so we think that we may as well get them attended to while we are here.

Wooli, as ideal it was with the setting, proved to be a bit of a nightmare.  We were extensively bitten by sandflies on the first lunchtime and there were nights when we couldn’t sleep for the itch (especially Russ, who had an allergic reaction to them).

In addition, the caravan owners had tree fellers in and felled, grubbed and mulched 10 giant eucalypts!  The noise was unbelievable for two and a half days and to add insult to injury, we were accosted by a staff member for turning on the TV in the camp kitchen!!

Our stay was saved by wonderful visits to the national park, having extended BBQ lunches.  One day, while lunching in Wooli, we saw two yellow tailed cockatoos in a banksia, munching away, oblivious to passing people or traffic.

After the week, we moved into Illaroo Sth Camping area in the NP.  Magnificent setting, overlooking the ocean.  Peace, quiet, tranquility and wood fires!  Firewood provided.

One day we took a track to Sandon River, which to say the least was interesting!  At one spot, Russ had to strip down to his undies and wade through to check to depth.  Sandon River was absolutely invaded by campers and not our cup of tea at all.  Just as well we made the trip, because we would have had the caravan on, expecting a site.

So, here we are again, sitting in a park, homeless, waiting for that all elusive phone call from Kimberley!!

We are heading inland after this, so the blog should be more interesting (although most roads are still closed due to water).  Hopefully everything will dry out over the next couple of weeks, so we can travel down the Darling.

We collected the van and everything had been fixed, hooray!  Off to Woody Head in Bunjalung National Park.  A great camping area near to Iluka, which is on the Clarence River.  We stayed there for 5 days but, unfortunately the weather was bad with either clouds or rain, so we had to move on to recharge our batteries, the caravans batteries that is!  The saucer sized huntsman on the window of the caravan on the last day had nothing to do with it!  The camping area is a wonderful grassed area with lots of trees as in the photo below; and they supply firewood and fireplaces.

We enjoyed a final evening meal on the shore of the camping area watching a wonderful sunset.

Bunjalung National Park has several picnic areas near the beach and we used these each day for lunch.  At the Shark Bay picnic area we met a new Magnoman and enjoyed the many birds that were in the trees and on our table.

Fraser Reef picnic area was another one we enjoyed and Marg spotted something in the tree above the table while we ate lunch.  See if you can spot it.

A short walk to the beach after lunch was well worth the effort.

So off to Wooli, a small village on the coast, east of Grafton.  Wooli is surrounded by Yuraygir National Park so we will spend some time exporing there again.  Our camping site is right on the banks of the Wooli Wooli river which is so clean that the oysters grown here can be sent to market straight after harvest, they don’t need purging in clean water.

We liked the place so much we have booked in for a week.  Yesterday we spent a few hours listening to the political machinations from Canberra and celebrated the result, a female PM elected in her own right, well almost anyway.  The sour lemon faces on the likes of Tony Abbot and Julie Bishop made the day that much more enjoyable.  Conservatives seem to think that they have a birthright to rule, and any other situation is an aberration at best.  However, I think Labor must use this term to improve their performance in delivering programs, and if they don’t they deserve to go.

Enough of the political stuff. Marg is fishing on the bank of the river behind our camp at the moment, after a morning of cleaning ourselves and the van.  I haven’t heard any screams of delight yet, so I presume she hasn’t been lucky yet, fishing that is!  Off to the pub tonight for dinner, it is a $10 per meal night tonight!

We are staying in a cabin at the moment, courtesy of RACV Total Care, while the van is being repaired.  RACV pay for our accommodation, if we have a breakdown with the car or van, provided the car that is covered is towing the van that has broken down.  The heating element of the hot water service had burnt out on about day 2 of the trip. No holiday is complete without a problem with the Kimberley, Russ had already replaced the 7 pin connector on the van as the brakes were not working properly. Maybe we should thank Kimberley for adding interest to out travels!

We were a little apprehensive about how we would be received at Kimberley, but they couldn’t have been more accommodating.  We had a list of 7 things to be repaired, but they have volunteered to give it a complete looking over and replace tired rubber seals, fit a new model van pressurisation system (to keep dust out), etc.

Yesterday, being without the van, we spent the day on the road, first breakfasting at Shelley Beach cafe, right on the edge of the beach, overlooking the beautiful surf beach, a pod of dolphins swam passed adding to our enjoyment.  They rode a wave for a short time and then one casually jumped out of the water off the top of the wave.

Then off to Byron Bay and Cape Byron, the most easterly point on the Australian mainland, followed by a delicious Japanese meal for lunch, back at Ballina.  Russ reckons that I have an uncanny knack of being able to find a Japanese restaurant if there is one within 50 Km!

On the way to visit Cape Byron we passed this house, a strange passion indeed, and the backyard is the same!

This has been a great stop right on the banks of the Clarence River.  You can see the river past the caravan, between the front of the van and the large tree in the photo of our camp.  The non-powered area is a spacious camping area, the nearest camp is about 50m away from us.  For the pet lovers they also allow dogs and cats.

The camp kitchen is also excellent and we have had our evening meal there each night and enjoyed conversations with lots of other campers.  We also breakfast there and just before we cracked the eggs for breakfast yesterday some young people we had met the previous night stopped us and shared their bacon and eggs – they had over-catered.  I hate to admit I had three eggs and lots of bacon, Marg stopped me having a fourth egg!

There are a couple of orchids in flower around the camp so I took some photos, of course.

Today we went on a 5+ Km walk through the Iluka World Heritage rain forest.  A cool walk on a warm day, which we enjoyed.  Lots of ferns and vines but no orchids.  There were many elk horns on the trees and some numbers of them on the ground where they had fallen, maybe because they were so big.  You can see some in the trees in the next photo.

After this we felt we had earned fish and chips from the co-op on the wharf.  Delicious fresh crumbed fish.  We also bought some local oysters (Hastings River) and will have these for tea tonight, mornay of course in case our cholesterol isn’t high enough after yesterdays breakfast.  Life’s tough but someone has to help the economy of these small towns!  Surprisingly we met some Magno Men on the way back to camp, up to their usual tricks.

Off to Ballina tomorrow to get the van fixed, then we can really start enjoying ourselves