Nindigully to Cunnamulla

Sunday 8th September
Looks like it is going to be another great day in Goondiwindi. We got away about 9am and headed to Nindigully. We knew it was going to be quite busy as there was a camp draft on there over the weekend.
On the way we stopped to go to the loo and I got dive bombed by a magpie. This hasn't happened to me for years.
When we got to Nindigully it was packed. It is a bush pub with camping opposite along the river and a big showground beside it. Firstly there was no camp spaces left along the river, then there was red dust everywhere and huge horse floats as big as semi trailers and caravans everywhere. Then there were hundreds of horses, cowboys, cowgirls and cowkids. So we found a spot up the back and started to set up. When Ray opened the caravan door he was met by a puddle of a yellow substance. Now this was a puzzle as we had emptied the on board toilet before we left Goondiwindi. We finally worked out what it was!!! A bottle of undiluted orange cordial had split and it was this which had run down the back of the cupboard and out onto the floor. We quickly got some water, emptied everything out of 2 cupboards, washed it all and then washed the floor. What could we do as the floor dried? That's right. The pub is next door. Lets go to the pub for lunch. So that is what we did, we had lunch and a few drinks while we waited for the floor to dry.
What a great pub. The oldest licensed hotel in Queensland. It used to be a Cobb and Co stop. Lots of memorabilia around the walls and they have free showers and toilets for the campers, which is also free.

One wall of the Nindigully Pub

Quilt bought to raise money for the McGrath Foundation hanging in dining room of the pub

Wall of hats at Nindigully Pub

View from the verandah of the pub

We decided to stay one night. We wandered over to have a look at the camp drafting and talked to the cowboys camped next door who ended up coming equal second overall.

The next morning we headed to St George and stayed at the caravan park in town for 3 nights. St George is known as the "Inland Queensland Fishing Capital' and it lies on the Balonne River.

Windmill at caravan park

We  went for a drive out of town to the Kapunda Fishing Camp and got a pleasant surprise. it is a lovely bush camp on the banks of the river and we decided to go there for a couple of days after we left the town park. We also went for a drive out to Beardmore Dam which is the main water supply for St George

Beardmore Dam above the wall

Beardmore Dam below the wall

Thursday 12th September
We left St George early and were out at Kapunda by 9.30am and set up by 10am. A great spot right on the banks of the Balonne River.

Balonne River at Kapunda

Our camp at Kapunda Fishing Park

 We could get some shade and there was a slight breeze blowing across the river. Ray made a cook fire and we cooked tea in the pan on the open fire. Everything tastes so much better that way.

Ray and his cook fire

 We had a few showers that night, nothing heavy. We went back into town for a Chinese lunch and when we came back to camp we just relaxed by the river. A bit of a thunderstorm came through in the afternoon and there were a few slight showers during the night.

Pelican on the river

Sunrise over the Balonne River

Looking out on the Balonne River from the van

Saturday 14th September
We got away from Kapunda about 8am and headed to Cunnamulla. We stopped at Ballon for an ice cream and the wattle birds were going crazy in the trees beside us.

On the road there were hundreds of dead kangaroos which had been hit by vehicles. Consequently heaps of birds feeding on the road kill.
We had to slow down at one point to let a flock of emus cross the road.

Emus crossing the road

We saw herds of goats, drovers with cattle grazing in the Long Paddock and flocks of sheep.
We got to Cunnamulla about midday and selected a good spot beside a reserve with a huge sandhill in it.
Cunnamulla is very quiet. Everything shuts down at midday Saturday and doesn't open again until Monday, except the hairdressers which don't open until Tuesday. I need a haircut badly so we are staying until Tuesday. Ray offered to cut it but I don't want a haircut like his.
Sunday has been a very hot day, about 33 degrees and hardly any wind so we put the air con on in the afternoon and just read and talked.
We have an on board toilet which we use when we are free camping. When we got to Cunnamulla it needed to be emptied and there is a public dump point in town. There were some funny symbols on the signs

Winnie the pooh directing us to the Poo Pit

The Poo Pit Ha Ha

It is now Monday and it has rained on and off all night and the temperature has dropped to 20 degrees. Certainly a lot cooler and more comfortable.
We went into town to take some photos. There was a beautiful tree called a bauhinia. We seen them in St George also. Lovely scent.

Bauhinia Tree

In the 1950's and 60's Cunnamulla was booming. Young guys just out of school would be working 7 days a week, mustering chasing scrubbers and breaking in horses. At the end of a hard day they would sit around the campfire on their saddles or swags and yarn together. Around this time Stan Coster wrote a song The Cunnamulla Fella, later sung by Slim Dusty and more recently by Lee Kernaghan. As a tribute to these fellows and also to Slim Dusty the council ran a competition for people to sketch their vision of the Cunnamulla Fella. A sketch was accepted from Mike Nicholas and was sculpted by Archie St Clair and unveiled in Cunnamulla in late 2003.


The Cunnamulla Fella
"Well I'm a scrubber runner and breaker too,
I live on damper and wallaby stew,
I've got a big cattle dog with a staghounds cross,
I never saw the scrubber he couldn't toss'
Cause I'm the fella from Cunnamulla
Yes I'm the Cunnamulla Fella"
 

Next stop will be Thargomindah tomorrow, about 170km to the west.

Goondiwindi, Queensland

We left Tenterfield on Thursday and it was 2 degrees overnight. A bit of fog and a very light frost on the ground.
We arrived in Goondiwindi and it was 30 degrees, blazing sun and no wind.

We had an interesting trip. We stopped at Texas for an early lunch and had a walk down the main street. We will probably go back there in the future and stay for a few days. Lots of history and a very nice place. Real friendly locals, though no 10 gallon hats or big loud booming voices. No wait that is Texas in the US.

Wildflowers deep in the heart of Texas

Just about 20km after leaving Texas we came across a Winnebago stranded right in the middle of the road. My Good Samaritan Ray pulled over and stopped to see if he could help. Apparently the Winnie just stopped, no steering no nothing. Luckily there was quite good vision and other vehicles could see him and he had his hazards on. This problem had happened to him before and it cost $5000 to fix but apparently it is not right yet. They pulled into Texas but the mechanic there couldn't look at until the week after next so they decided to try for Goondiwindi but didn't make it. He had a little car on the back so his wife was driving that in to Goondiwindi to see if she could get a heavy tow truck to come back and get him. He said he was OK so we left him. If he had steering Ray would have come into town, unhitched us and gone back to tow him into town.

Next thing we come across a hand written sign on the road, HUMP. We were unsure if it was an instruction or a warning. About 500metres further on we realised it was a warning and we hit the hump. We were OK as we weren't travelling very fast.

Also along the side of the road, heaps of cotton which had spilled from vehicles. The birds would have no trouble up here looking for nest building material.

We arrived in Goondiwindi about 2pm and set up and relaxed in the nearest shade with a beer.

 It is very warm. Goondiwindi is built on the northern side of the Macintyre River. The Queensland/NSW border runs down the middle of the river.It is a lovely town with very wide streets and lots of trees.

The dam beside the caravan park

Sunset over the dam

Gunsynd, the Goondiwindi Grey, well known as the only horse to win at every track along the eastern seaboard was from Goondiwindi. A statue stands in the Apex park as a tribute to his amazing feats.

The tribute statue to Gunsynd

The old bridge over the Macintyre River which linked NSW and Queensland.

There is a beautiful Natural Heritage Water Park purpose built for all water sports including skiing and triathlons.

Old River Red Gum on the bank of the Natural Heritage Water Park

We met a lovely couple in the van next door John and Julie Birch and their dog Daffy. John is retired and only works part time and Julie is a nurse at Bilaluna Community in the Tanami desert. He is originally from Wyndham in WA and his mother is a full blood aboriginal and his father was a direct descendant of the Afghan traders from the Kimberley. He was an aboriginal liaison policeman in WA for 30 years and was involved in the Halls Creek riots in 1996. He has worked all over WA, the Kimberley, Kununurra, Halls Creek, Broome. They are a lovely couple and we will catch up again in Wyndham next year as he will be back there.
Then I saw another fellow in the park and I thought I recognised him so I asked him where he was from. It turned out he had worked at Boral Asphalt at Dubbo until 2 years ago when it closed. Steve Bruce was his name and he comes from Narromine and was on his way with his wife to 1770. A very small world.

The windmill in the caravan park

We are relaxing for a few days before heading out tomorrow to Nindigully to free camp along the river for a few days. If you want to know more about Nindigully, this is the link to the web site www.nindigully.com

Brunswick Heads then on to Tenterfield

Our remaining time at Brunswick Heads has been great. We had lovely weather every day. We had a couple of showers on the morning we were packing up to leave but still managed to get packed up dry.
Sue and Terry stayed until Sunday 25th August and the boys went fishing every day. They didn't do too good though but everyone else was in the same boat. There just weren't many legal size fish to be caught. They did catch another crab though even though it had thrown its nippers.

Terry and Ray fishing

Terry and Ray had crab for afternoon tea

There was a beautiful full moon on 21st August which looked great over the river

Full moon rising

Each afternoon we enjoyed afternoon refreshments sitting on the "poop deck", which is really the cement slab on top of the storm water pit

Ray, Maura, Sue and Terry

Terry, Ray, Maura and Sue on the poop deck

We enjoyed a flathead and bream lunch on the day before Sue and Terry left. It was a combination of all of the fish caught so at least we got one meal out of it.

Meagan(my niece) came down from Brisbane for lunch on the Tuesday. She brought some lovely salads and sour dough bread. Ray went and got some prawns and we had a veritable feast for lunch. Lee was there too so I got some photos of all of us together.

Maura, Ray, Lee and Meagan

Lee and Meagan

 

Visiting turtle

While she was there the turtle came for a visit so Meagan was able to get some good photos.

We have had a few great lunches out. A couple of meals at Billinudgel pub, lunch at Ocean Shores Country Club and lunch at Brunswick Hotel.

The view coming out the front door of Ocean Shores Country Club

We left Brunswick Heads for Tenterfield on Tuesday 3rd September, stopping at Drake Hotel for lunch on Lee's recommendation. Lovely meal and a great old pub with lots of historic paraphernalia on the walls from the days when Drake had a gold mine.

Arrived in Tenterfield about 2pm and it is quite a bit cooler on this side of the Great Dividing Range. It is supposed to get down to 2 degrees overnight. Thank God for the diesel heater.

Today we went for a drive up to Mount Mackenzie where you can see over the town of Tenterfield and also over the northern ranges.

Overlooking Tenterfield from Mount Mackenzie Lookout

Maura at Lookout

Ray at Lookout

 

Tenterfield is in the New England region of NSW at the intersection of the New England and Bruxner Highways. The town was gazetted in 1851 and gold was discovered nearby in Drake in 1858. The main industries are beef cattle breeding and superfine wool production.

Entertainer Peter Allen was born and raised in Tenterfield where he lived with his grandfather George Woolnough who was a saddler and owned the Tenterfield Saddlery, the subject of Allen's song "Tenterfield Saddler". Next we move on to Goondiwindi so see you next blog.

 

 

Still Enjoying Life at Brunswick Heads

Thursday 8th August
Weather is still beautiful. Lovely warm days and cooler nights. Just perfect. Not a lot going on. A big, old trawler came up the river seeking shelter in the harbour, as it as pretty wild outside. He got stuck a few times on the sandbars and had a bit of a job getting off and into the harbour. While talking to the captain later, he had some engine problems and needed to pull in to do some work. He was travelling up the coast from Ballina to Tweed Heads where he hopes to do up the trawler to live on.

Trawler stuck in the sand

Monday 12th August
Still great weather. The park was quite busy over the weekend as a lot of Brisbane people come down here for the 2 days. There was a lot of activity on the water. Paddle boarding, dragon boats, kayaks, old canoes, fishing boats, whale watching boats, swimmers, fishing people. it is just a hive of activity.
Lee came over and we went up to Billinudgel Pub and met a couple of her friends there for lunch. It is a very old pub but with great meals and it was packed. We had a great afternoon just sitting in the sun relaxing.

Two different types of watercraft

Dragonboat



Paddleboarders

Had quite a big happy hour today as Bob and Helen leave tomorrow and they had to meet Terry and Sue. Consequently jam sandwiches for tea.

 

Thursday 15th August

Weather is still fine. We saw dolphins and turtles in the river today, a sure sign of a clean river system.

 

Friday 16th August

The boys went up to check the crab pots this morning and caught a nice sized mud carb which Ray cooked and he and Terry enjoyed it as a happy hour snack.

 

 

Uncooked crab ready for the pot after it had been placed in the freezer for about an hour. This sedates it.



 

Brunswick Heads Part 1

We arrived at Brunswick Heads on Sunday and the weather has been great every day since and it is now Wednesday. Lee came to have lunch with us on Monday and Tuesday as she works around the corner on both of those days. She works at Mullumbimby on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. What does she do I hear you say? She finds jobs for the long term unemployed and as most of them don't want to work, the job is challenging to say the least. But she has been doing it nearly 10 years so she must be succeeding a little.
We got a surprise on Monday when some old friends Bob and Helen came a knockin'. We met them here at Brunswick Heads in 2010 and bumped into them again at Derby and Eighty Mile Beach in WA and now once again here. It really is a very small world. They are from Melbourne and are on their way back home after being up to Cape York.
Then yesterday I got a message on Facebook to say that our other friends Terry and Sue who we met in the Kimberley and going to drop in and spend a bit of time with us here. They are on their way home to Newcastle after having been out to Birdsville, doing the Birdsville Track and climbing the Big Red Dune. It really is great to catch up with old travelling companions again.
Ray has just gone up the river to try some fishing. He has taken the fellow from the caravan next door, who had to ask permission from his wife to see if he could go out and play for a while. Bit henpecked I think.
Anyway it is another great day, sun shining, a little breeze.
I have attached a couple of photos of a yacht being towed into the harbour. It must have run out of fuel or something and couldn't get across the bar into the river so called for a tow. There is also a photo of the Brunswick River looking upstream.
I'll probably do some more Blog next week unless something exciting happens.

This is Lee's dog Susie

Yacht being towed up the river to the harbour

Looking upstream from the caravan annex

Brunswick Heads to Camerons Corner to Home. August and September 2013

Home to Lennox Head
31st July, 1st August, 2nd August
Well we got away from home about 9.30am the second time. We had to double back as Ray had forgotten his sunglasses. It was a fairly uneventful trip. The usual traffic snarls on Pennant Hills Road, fighting the cars for a lane, cars diving in front of you because they don't want to be stuck behind a caravan. We got to our free camp at Bulahdelah to find that the flood had been through and it was very boggy. So on to Plan B. We drove on about 40km to a stop beside the highway. We didn't get much sleep though as the trucks were quite close and a bit noisy. So further north we headed and stopped at Paddy's Rest area north of Taree for lunch. We were joined by 4 very healthy free range chooks. The things we see on the road.

 We arrived at Urunga just before lunch and it was lovely. We had a site right beside the river. We went up to the local pub for tea and ate too much.

Got away about 9.30am on Friday and got to Lennox Head about 2.30pm.

 The  weather is beautiful, sun is shining, Lake Ainsworth is sparkling. Lee came and had a few drinks with us after work and then came back with her dog Suzy for breakfast this morning. It is another magnificent day. The longboard championships are on so there are a few old, grey haired surfers in the park ready for the competition. Anyway that is enough so far.More Blog when we get to Brunswick Heads.

Loxton to Renmark, then Mildura and home

This will be our last post for a while as we are heading home. It is getting a bit cool down here and we decided to get back home for Mothers Day.

We left Loxton on Thursday 3rd May and headed to Renmark. Rick and Lorraine (friends from home) were going to be there for a few days to pick up a new caravan so we ended up 2 sites down from them right on the Murray. The weather is certainly turning cooler, down to 4 degrees overnight and a cool breeze blowing during the day.

Murtho Forest lookout just out of Renmark

Ray with the Murray and setting sun behind him

 Rick and Lorraine got their lovely new van on Friday.
On Saturday 5th May, which was our 27th wedding anniversary, we were just finishing breakfast when we heard this loud music coming from the direction of the river. We went outside and this is what we saw coming down the river.

It was a fellow called Frank Turton, also known as "Chookman". He is a traditional country and western entertainer and lives at Paringa which is the next town on the river after Renmark. A young French film maker was making a film of Frank's life and they were taking the boat down to Renmark for the weekend and coming back to the caravan park on Sunday night to give a little concert. He is quite well known around the place. He used to be the entertainer at Daly Waters Pub in NT and sang with a chook sitting on his head, hence the name "Chookman".

We went down town after lunch and had a chat to him and Ray bought a couple of his CD,s.

That night Rick, Lorraine, Ray and I went out for dinner to The Renmark Club. It was very enjoyable and Rick took some lovely photos of us all.

Sunday night after tea we wandered up  through the caravan park and listened to some of Chookman's songs. His boat was lit up like a Xmas tree and he sang from a little stage on the boat.

Monday morning we bid adieu to The Baerwinkels and headed to Mildura. While there we decided to stay until today, Wednesday, and then head to Hay and then Gundagai and then home on Friday.
Hope you have enjoyed my Blogs and I will start them again when we go on our next trip sometime later in the year.
Bye for now.