TUESDAY AT LAKE HATTAH

Two blogs in one day. That's a bit much but we are very comfortably settled as the only campers in the Hattah Kulkyne National Park camp ground on the shores of Lake Hattah and we have signal so why not?

After doing the domestic chores in Mildura, we headed 50 kms down the road to here. What we now appreciate is that we should have camped on the banks of the Murray in the adjacent Murray Kulkyne National Park but the Camps Australia book was a little unclear and we ended up here.

 

 

No problem though because we spent the afternoon exploring both parks including an extensive but remote stretch of the Murray- much more interesting than the manicured part passing through suburban Mildura.

Tomorrow we head for the Pink Lakes being in the southern part of the Murray Sunset National Park. We will be crossing into South Australia on Thursday on target for Adelaide on Saturday.

 

 

 

 

MONDAY AT MUNGO

I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that there was no phone signal at Mungo National Park (160 kms north west of Balranald) so this is being published on Tuesday from Mildura on the banks of the mighty Murray. Trish is at the laundromat doing the washing and I have just filled the water tanks and emptied the waste ready for our next National Park adventure at Hattah Kulkyne National Park about 50 kms south of here.

 

 

Mungo was delightful. The van survived its 100 kms of dirt road each way quite comfortably and we camped at the very well set up National Park camp ground where the locals were very friendly.

 

 

The National Park is based on a number of former sheep stations, one of which was Mungo. The shearing shed remains as a reminder of previous activity. The name Mungo comes from Lake Mungo which is part of the World Heritage listed Willandra Lakes Region. Having said that, they are lakes in name only. It is 15,000 years since they were last filled with water.

 

 

In formation, they are very like the Menindee Lakes or Coongie Lakes but without the water.

The lake is famous for Mungo Man and Mungo Lady being aborigines reputed to have lived here 40,000 years ago whose remains were found as a result of the erosion of the lake edges.

 

 

The signature formation is known as the Walls of China (presumably a reference to the Great Wall of China). The area constituting the Walls is what originally constituted the eastern beach of Mungo Lake, known as the lunette. Because the prevailing wind is westerly, the eastern shore is a series of sandhills eventually becoming very large white sand sandhills comparable to sand blows on Fraser Island. The western shore is a typical outback dune of red sand. 

 

 

The area nearest the eastern shore of the former lake is hard sand/clay which, as it erodes, reveals aboriginal artifacts and remains as well as remains of the animals which inhabited the area between 15,000 and 50,000 years ago. 

There is a 70 km self guided drive tour which gives access to the numerous very interesting natural and man made features of the area.

SATURDAY ON THE MURRUMBIDGEE

As anticipated, we spent today in the car and are tonight camped in an idyllic spot in the Mamanga Campground in the Yanga National Park on the banks of the Murrumbidgee not far from Balranald.

What makes it particularly special is that apart from the birds and the kangaroos, we are the only ones here. It has very much an outback feel to it.

 

Tomorrow we head for Mungo National Park.

FRIDAY AT THE ZOO

Well, as you may have gathered, we were not in phone range last night so the Friday blog is being posted on Saturday.

As anticipated, we spent Friday afternoon at Dubbo Zoo reliving our youth riding bikes around the 6 kms circuit We didn't hit anything and we didn't fall off. It was delightfully quiet. The pictures tell some of the story.

 

 

We spent Friday night deep in the bush about 60 kms south of Dubbo in the Goobang National Park We didn't quite have it to ourselves. There was one other caravan there.

We were able to fill our water tanks and empty the waste tank at Coonabarabran so we can live independently of civilization for the next few days.

Tomorrow will be a driving day as we head for Balranald, the nearest town to our next interesting destination, Mungo National Park.

 

 

WALKING THE WARRUMBUNGLES

What a virtuously active day today. We did the Bread Knife track being a 12.5 km round trip. As you might expect, the track in is all uphill and, of course, the converse applies to the track out.

Needless to say, the scenery was spectacular and we virtually had the place to ourselves. We saw only one other couple.

Just before we arrived yesterday, there had been a storm which brought significant rain. We had to ford creeks to get to the camping area. Everything was therefore nice and moist today. Storms threatened again this afternoon but, apart from some drizzle, they didn't come to anything.

This is the Bread Knife formation itself. the photo doesn't really show how steep and narrow it is.

Tomorrow we are thinking we might go to the Dubbo zoo as we continue our trek south.

All van systems are working perfectly. Time to top up the water tanks tomorrow.

THE WARRUMBUNGLES

On the road today. 500 plus kms to get to the Warrumbungles west of Coonabarabran. We had a bit of excitement at lunch time in that we couldn't get any gas appliances to work. That's a major drama for National Park camping because, when we don't have power, the fridge runs on gas. We dropped into a plumber at Narrabri but, of course, everything worked perfectly for him so, we have a mystery. Hopefully it won't reoccur.

We are now comfortably settled in our campsite where we will stay for at least tomorrow night. Tomorrow will be a walking/exploring day.

THE BLOG IS BACK - CARAVAN TRIP TO ADELAIDE

 

 

 

Having collected Trish from the airport this morning after her overnight flight from Cambodia, we completed the packing up process and headed off. We are now comfortably camped at Leslie Dam near Warwick and hope to make it to the Warrumbungles tomorrow.

As you can see, we are in a large paddock which we have to ourselves and all systems seem to be working (and I have worked how to prepare this blog on my new notebook which is way more complicated than it needs to be).