Australia Here We Come!

Day 23

After Tenterfield, we carried through to Inverell where we had a wonderful stay. The showgrounds were fantastic at $17 per night, clean toilets, water, power and we were the only ones there!! The grounds were flat and the kids rode their bikes everywhere, even on the race track! It was a lovely green town and it wasn’t long before we got the fossicking bug. We went to one of the local free creek and enjoyed our time fossicking for quartz in the creek bed. Another couple also fossicking were soon inundated by questions from the children and in no time the children had all of their equipment to apply their newly gained information... oh dear.

We also drove back to Glen Innes for a visit, as we didn’t stop on the way through. The old buildings are gorgeous and the playground was a nice break. They also had strong ties to Scotland with a wall containing many chunks of rock from family castles in Scotland and the standing stones memorial (with Excalibur) nearby.

On another day we drove to a little town called Bingara. I’m glad we didn’t take the van as there were a lot of hills. On the way we came across a very popular free camp (caravans everywhere) on the side of a creek that looked like it had recently flooded. There was nothing to see in town, but their pies were beautiful! On the way I took a photo of this old house and then in town I took a photo of the bridge for memory’s sake and then we headed back to Inverell via a different route.

After lunch under the bridge, we headed back to Inverell via a different route and stopped in at the memorial site where the Myall Creek Massacre occurred on the 10^th June 1838.

Day 27

Once we left Inverell, we headed for Burren Junction Borebaths, but stopped off a town called Wee Waa. Here we caught up with a fellow that Andrew met in Inverell and his son played with Ethan for ages. He gave a good run down on job opportunities in the area, but we said we are not ready yet.

The photos below are of our van at the Burren Junction and of the sunset there. The bore is naturally heated and full of minerals said to be good for skin ailments. To be honest, the minerals in the borebaths might be good for you, but the baths had clearly not been maintained. Presuming they were built properly in the first place. It honestly looked like it was constructed by a couple of building students, with leftover materials, on a Sunday morning with roaring hangovers. The baths were also full of slippery algae and the smell of the area was similar to the dressing room of a football club after the game and a ½ dozen curries...not really pleasant! Free camp or not, we left the next morning.

Day 28

Feeling excited about heading to Lightning Ridge, and with the anticipation of a nice opal find, we left reasonably early in the morning. Lightning Ridge was like a large conglomeration of shanty houses. People lived there by whatever means available to them and the feeling of open desperation to make that big find was obvious. The living was hard, the environment was harsh and everything was expensive. Did have a drive around town to look at some of the ‘sights’ and the castle below is about as good as it gets, but it shook the daylights out of our car to get there (most of the roads, if you could call them that, were graded tracks). It seemed that every attraction to go to was either closed, shut down, expensive to get into and one place was open but no one would come out to take some money for us to go in! A good place to see is the local artist gallery (free entry and fantastic air-conditioning) for John Murray - also very funny!

This is the sculpture at the entrance to the town, it is very big and is a good representation of the town itself - an impressive use of spare parts.

Day 29

We gladly left Lightning Ridge the next day, with most of our vehicle intact, for a brief stopover at the Terragamine Reserve 10kms north of Dubbo. This was a nice stop by the side of a river.

Day 30

Now on to Forbes, but not without looking at the CSIRO telescope in Parkes. This place was impressive to see but there were also activities and facts to learn (I would quote some here but my enthusiasm is greater than retention). The best attraction was a couple of dishes 20 meters apart sitting in the front of the building that bounced spoken sound waves back and forth. The only drawback is you have to stand directly in front of the dish for it work most effecively (actually you didn't as standing in the middle of the dishes transmitted the wispered word clearly meters away - no secrets here...and a little disturbing).

If nothing else you can watch your loved ones talk insanely to themselves in front of an oversized saucer! Tea anyone?

Well, once in Forbes we pulled up 1 km from town on the side of the river, the only spot left and it was right on the river with a full 180 degree view!

We were here for 5 nights and loved it. It was a free camp, but the toilets were a cut lunch, water bag and a map away at the Lions Park. They opened at 6am and closing at 9pm, so outside of these times any needs that can be described with numbers had to be fulfilled in the van toilet - and emptied later by Andrew the family sanitation expert.

During our stay in Forbes we went for a drive to Condobolin and another to Ootha. Condobolin town wasn’t anything to write about – so I won’t, but we saw an old tennis court that had grown over and an interesting bridge on the way.