Day 25, Thursday 21/7/2016, Gulargambone to Home

 It rained most of the night and as I couldn't sleep, I ended up reading for 4hrs. 

Our departure time was 0700hrs and we had breakfast in a cafe at Gilgandra. After looking at Siân, the lady said there is also a kid's menu available. Poor Siân, she's 18!

There was water everywhere, and meteorologists were worried the river would break its banks at Dubbo. I had quite a few snoozes during today's last leg of the trip, but I did enjoy the fantastic mountains and rocky formations around Sandy Hollow. 

We were home by 1400hrs.

Lots of unpacking, then off to Pockran's place to pick up Luna, our little 2yr old puppy.

We enjoyed an Indian takeaway dinner with them. Thanks for minding our baby!

And so that's the end of another epic journey!!

Such incredible memories to keep of time shared with family and friends!

looking forward to the next one.........

Day 24, Wednesday 20/7/2016, Darling River, North Bourke to Gulargambone

 Rain was coming in patches, so we timed it to pack up in-between. There was an amazing sunrise and some beautiful mist rising off the river.

We left a bit after 0800hrs. It will be only tar driving now. An interesting tidbit is that we drove on dirt all the way from the Stuart Highway to Bourke!

I really like Brewarrina. We stopped at our usual little 'Muddy Waters Cafe' for coffees, hot chocolate and a milkshake. The cafe has beautiful timber floors and is decorated with old museum pieces. We decided to give the fish traps a miss this year.

The army drove by and waved to us. Our car looks as if it belongs in their convoy.

I just remembered that we have nibbles and happy hour this afternoon at 1630hrs with our hosts at the farm stay. So, we had a toilet break and bought some alcohol at Walgett.

The guy in the bottlo wanted to know where the rain was. He said they'd had more than enough in the last four years. The rain hit right as we were leaving Walgett.

There must have already been plenty, as water laying everywhere along the side of the road. 

I'm so glad we changed to cabins tonight, as the camping area was like a swamp at Gulargambone. It's a cute little town on the Castlereagh River.

David and Bernadette were as lovely as Wikicamp's reviewers say. Siân spotted some wine called 'Galah Piss' that she bought for her parents.

After moving into our units, everyone piled into our unit to have lunch, before going our separate ways for showers and rest until happy hour.

There was a whole crowd already sitting around the group fire when we arrived. They were all grey nomads and for some, it was their 5th time here.

Thankfully the rain disappeared for the evening. They all knew of our booking and were waiting to see us put up our tents on the flooded grounds. Too funny! They were disappointed we had moved to the cabins. They were all in either vans or motorhomes. David says he would have let the kids set up their swags in the camp kitchen. The communal kitchen/lounge area is very cozy and homey with a lot of Australiana touches.

Jordan, Siân and I went to the paddock behind it to see the animals and we were invited in to feed and pat them. There were alpacas, goats, sheep, geese and chickens. Col and Jack weren't too interested in that.

Col and I hit it off with Alan and Anne and had a wonderful night chatting. They are from Shoal Bay. A very entertaining night and a fun party to finish off our trip. The kids didn't hold back on their celebrations either.

'Sparra' a local farmer was there with an emu egg from his property. I loved it so much that he let me keep it. 

Despite being in a bed, I barely slept. I had another nightmare that I was at work, then another one that I had just given birth and was trying to clamp the cord! Crazy stuff!

Day 23, Tuesday 19/7/2016, Darling River, North Bourke

 Happy birthday Chelsea!

It was a lovely paddle cruise on the Darling River. The staff were amazingly friendly. Siân got to drive the boat, and Jack tooted the horn.

Jordan and I were dropped back at camp after the cruise, while Col went with Jack and Siân to get new rear brake pads for the Pajero. They ended up being stuck in town for a couple of hours and went sightseeing and out to lunch. Jordan and I were pretty jealous of that. They had half the lunch food in their car, so we were left with vegemite sandwiches.

I made Jordan come for a walk with me along the river. We were hugging beautiful trees and found a lovely camping spot around the bend further north that I'll have to remember for next time.

The kids had a poker evening while Col and I read and cooked.

Heavy rain is forecast now until after we're home, with all of central NSW on river flood watch.

Sure enough, it's now raining. We seem to always have a rain cell follow us home. To match my mood. I've been having work nightmares the last couple of nights.

We decided to see if there were cabins available at Gulargambone rather than setting up in the rain. Yes! All booked. he's a lovely man. A nice way to acclimatise ourselves to the return home.

We lay in bed reading with the relaxing pitter patter of rain on our tent.

Day 22, Monday 18/7/2016, Olive Downs Camp, Cameron's Corner to Darling River, North Bourke

 We got quite hot last night. It's 10 degrees C this morning. Siân's phone got confused between SA and NSW time, so we ended up getting up at 0600hrs instead of 0630hrs.

Happy birthday Madi!

We left camp at 0745hrs NSW time, not long after sunrise, driving through the Mount Wood section of the NP as well. It is all jump-up country and gibber plains from Olive Downs to the Wanaaring-Tibooburra Rd (ie mesas and rocky plains). There are kangaroos everywhere and we saw two huge ones having a boxing match!

The scenery changes back to low pink sand dunes with yellow flowers and claypans as we head east and there are so many animals along here! Kangaroos, emus, huge cattle, galas, wedge tailed eagles, crows, sheep, goats, a huge wild boar and a feral cat.

As you come into Waanaring, the landscape is flat orange dirt with shrubs. Just like around Broken Hill. Wanaaring is a tiny town with a local park, several houses, a fire station, tiny school, general store that is also a cafe, a post office and a caravan park. They loved that we did our grocery shopping here. We had lunch, filled the water tank and the girls had a shower and washed their hair. There was a white hose attached to a tap in the park that they said we could use to fill our water. It's bore water and safe to drink. We always treat it as well. The Paroo river in Wanaaring was huge and full. 

I could barely stay awake between Wanaaring and Bourke. So exhausted! There were a few items we couldn't get at Wanaaring so I did a mini shop at Bourke as well. There was a nice grocery store just north of the town, and we also filled up with fuel. This was the first fuel up for the defender since Lyndhurst (the other end of the Strzelecki).

May's Bend on the Darling River north of town was easy to find, thanks to our GPS/hema/iPad set up. It is also sign posted and is just a couple of kilometers north of Kidman Camp. It is beautiful! A free camp right on the river which we shared with two other groups, but there was plenty of room. Thanks Wikicamps!

The weather was quite warm, and we enjoyed relaxing with a river view. I was kept busy uploading photos and videos, enjoying visits from neighboring dogs, and since we had signal, catching up with people.

Jordan did a search for Jandra times. With lots of rain forecast we opted to do the 9am trip tomorrow. 

One of the rear wheels on the Pajero is making a loud grinding sound. Col had a bit of a look but there's nothing he can do right now. The brakes seem to be the cause.

Most of us read for a bit, then had an early night.

 

Day 21, Sunday 17/7/2016, Montecollina Bore, Strzelecki Desert to Olive Downs Camp, Cameron's Corner

 It was -2 degrees C overnight but warmed up quickly to 6 degrees C this morning. 

Col saw a dingo sitting next to our cold campfire this morning when he first got up. The toilet paper was shredded, and the calico bag for the dunny was missing.

After breakfast and packing up camp, I cleaned up the dingo mess. Jack and Siân came for a walk with me to search the dingo's lair. We found plenty of dingo scat, but no bag.  We were packed up at 0745hrs but didn't leave until 0800hrs because of the fruitless bag search.

Driving north along the Strzelecki 'highway' are endless fields of yellow wildflowers. 

Then heading east towards Merty Merty corner, the creamy clay coloured sand changes firstly to pink, then orange. We were driving over small dunes on the eastern track, but with a smooth clay base. Lots of yellow flowers on every dune.

There was no yellow bus west of the corner. It's now a brand-new cattle yard with a sign saying 'no camping'.

We got to Cameron's Corner at 1100hrs. There were motorbike riders everywhere. The Pajero was topped up with fuel and we had pies, sausage rolls and coffee in the roadhouse. Jordan was hilarious at the corner marker post, running from state to state (SA, NSW, QL).

Siân opened the gate for the dingo fence, and we were in NSW corner country by 1200hrs. Third time lucky. Our two previous attempts were in 2010 and 2012, both of which were closed from flooding. Once through the fence into NSW there were about 30 emus and hundreds of kangaroos. I enjoyed the smaller track that took us into the 'coat of arms junction' otherwise known as Olive Downs. 

We went for a lovely short nature walk near our camp here and saw loads of kangaroos in the gibber hills. We've now left the sand dunes of the NW corner of NSW and have entered what is referred to 'jump up country'. Gibber plains and mesas.

Just ran out of water from our 60L tank. Lucky we have 2 more 20L containers.

Everyone seems exhausted today. We've just paid our NP self-registration fees and sat down to a nibbles plate that includes Gina's quince paste. Jack has pulled out the backgammon/chess/dominoes case but Jordan was hoping for a poker night.

After dinner and a bit of a chat, we ended up having an early night.

No fires allowed here.