NSW Country trip: 21 – 26 August

Broken Hill/Menindee/Broken Hill

Friday
Off to Menindee which is about 100km south and on the edge of Kinchega National Park with many lakes. 

We came across a few more road trains along the way. One of the reasons we installed our 2 way radio is so we can communicate with them if they need to pass us. A few photos below:

We camped at a wonderful spot on the (manmade) Copi Hollow lake. It was cold with an icy wind.  The caravan park provided us with power, hot showers with plenty of water, but there is no proper drinking water in the area, so we had to be careful. Water is gold and we had booked in for 4 nights. We had the best site, right on the lake, and a caretaker who provided us with plenty of hardwood for great fires every night.

Saturday

We did a self-guided drive around the lake system, which has been cleverly engineered to ensure enough water flows into the various lakes.  Most of the lakes are connected, and can be fed from the others via weirs and regulators (map below). 

Currently, there is no water in most of the lakes, however the ones that do have water, are amazing. We are lucky they’ve had rain, and we can enjoy their beauty.  Where the others (dry) are, is not much to see…

We ended this drive at the Maiden Hotel in Menindee fora nice publunch and warmth (there was a fireplace).

Sunday

We did a different drive and went to an old Woolshed, where we learned of the really tough shearers’ life. As if the drought and floods were not enough to cope with, these poor settlers also had to endure(RED!) dust storms – which covered the sheep, and the wool then had to be cleaned somehow.  ‘Dust flockers’  were invented to remove this red dust.

Hopefully one day we will be able to visit a working sheep station to see the modern way all this is done.

We also walked around the ruins of the Kinchega Homestead, which had been built on the side of a billabong, which was dry at the moment, but we could follow its feed (empty creek) back to the Darling River, on a lovely hike with informative signposts regarding the flora. Saw a very (around 500 year) old River Gum, with huge roots exposed above the water.

We ended up having our picnic lunch on the Darling River, which had a fair bit of water.

Monday

A beautiful day, and we did a walk as far as we could around Copi Lake. Unfortunately, the path is really only there when the water level is much lower, so we had to make our own track…. Didn’t get us too far, but we enjoyed the lovely weather. We don’t believe there are many good tracks for hiking, but if you free camp, there were some beautiful spots along Pamamaroo lake.

Tuesday

Great weather again, and time for us to move to our next destination, but back via Broken Hill again, to stick to the bitumen road. So we spent another 2 nights in Broken Hill, and Arno got another round of golf in, and Jen got to the Albert Kersten Mining and Minerals Museum and the Broken Hill Regional Art Gallery, both of which required advance booking for your timeslot. Not sure why that was, maybe it gets as busy as the Sistene Chapel in Rome.

The Palance Hotel’s front bar was open, se we went there for drinks and a bite – our last night with Geri & Michael. Think we mentioned before that this hotel is quite an icon in Broken Hill and well-known for being in the movie ‘Priscilla Queen of the desert’. You can read more about it here.

Moving on again tomorrow, straight south…..