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Bourke & Beyond Day 4
Oct. 3rd, 2020 04:41 pmLightning Ridge to Bourke
An overcast morning. Oh oh...
Well, we tried to find a different café for breakfast, so we could spread the love (& money) around town, but we would up at the same place as yesterday, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing - we could get a table & the soy coffee was good... we don't really ask for much more than that. Then back to the Opal Cave - the store we visited yesterday, where we were welcomed back enthusiastically, or at least our wallets were... okay mine... to pick up some earrings... okay, 2 sets of earrings. Okay & one of the purple hemp shirts on the wall... The owner - an octogenarian named Herman, took a shine to both of us, & ended up telling us his tale of woe regarding a disgruntled client of a few years back, who has been cyber-slandering both Herman & the shop, causing grief & apparently a 30kg weight loss in Herman. Having found out that Long-Suffering Partner works in IT security, he now depends on her to take down this guy’s defamatory website &, having found out I’ve been in Sales most of my life, he offered me a job to take over from him when/if he retires. Something about his manner suggested to me that he makes that offer to a lot of people who come into his Cave. I personally think he’ll probably be carried out of there in a pine box... encrusted with opals, no doubt. The amount of time we spent in there talking with this charming man, made me wonder if we’d leave the same way...
Having made our escape, we headed to the Visitors Centre, to see if there was any advice they had for getting to Bourke via Goodooga, as we didn’t want to backtrack to Walgett. They were a bit uncertain about the condition of the dirt roads & ended up calling the Visitors Centre in Brewarrina, to see if they had information on the road status &, as the news seemed to be good, we filled up with diesel & headed north, by north west
30 kilometres up the highway was the turnoff for Goodooga, a town I only know because an old friend of mine taught at the school there for a number of years. As we got closer to the town, the grey skies above began looking more like rain clouds, with a few drops falling as we took a couple of photos outside the school to send to my friend, letting her know I’d finally made it up there to visit & where the hell was she?! Where she is, is down in Ardlethan, a town on the Victorian border in the Riverina region, where she’s been for a few years now (I knew that!!). As fate would have it, we’ll probably be passing through the Riverina in about 4-5 days, so we’ll most likely catch up then
Leaving Goodooga, the first thing we discovered was that the main road from there to Brewarrina was closed for repairs. Our informant at the Visitors Centre failed to mention that! Fortunately, the alternative route was one I’d briefly seen on the map they showed us back in the Visitors Centre in Lightning Ridge & was helpfully signposted with yellow 'Detour' signs... at least it was until you got onto the road itself, which was a dirt road of dark soil instead of the red ones we’d been traipsing all over for the last couple of days around Lightning Ridge. The dark soil is softer, meaning we were sliding around a bit until we engaged Laura’s 4WD, which gave us a better ride & meant that Laura’s onboard system stopped beeping at us every time the going got a bit hairy
Then the grey sky became proper rain clouds, which stopped some more sliding, but threatened to become a mud bath instead... The dark mud clumps & sticks very quickly, so it was a relief to get off that road before we got bogged somewhere out in big sky country & onto a bitumen road where the only thing to be wary of was cattle grids every few kilometres. That's when the detour signs re-appeared, after an absence of maybe 100 kilometres or so. I had visions of us having somehow taken the wrong road, getting irretrievably bogged & having to abandon Laura out there. She wouldn't be the first, apparently...
Coming into Brewarrina, the rain began falling a lot more seriously & we began to lose most of our hard-earned dirt & mud from the last few days. Seen from the front, Laura looked pristine again. Fortunately, the rear end & back window were still evidence of miles & miles of bad road. All we know of the town was what we’d read last night. - there were aboriginal fish traps on the river. We pulled into the Visitors Centre to see what else they could tell us & met the voice on the other end of the phone call made from Lightning Ridge this morning. At least she was pleased we’d made it before the road became quicksand. Almost as pleased as we were...
The fish traps were, in fact, about 200m from the Visitors Centre itself, on the Darling River that runs through the town. Our informant told us the best viewpoint was from behind the Aboriginal Museum, where there was a path down to the river right where the traps were. As we arrived, I spotted 3 pelicans floating/swimming down the river & hastened my pace to get to the bank to photograph them before they disappeared. That’s when we both discovered the path was made from the same black soil we’d been driving on earlier & not only was it now slippery as hell, but also quickly caked itself on our shoes & then everything else stuck to that - twigs, grass, small pebbles...
The traps themselves were a revelation. They are the oldest man-made structures on earth, being at least 40,000 years old & still standing & seemed to still be working, as the pelicans & a couple of egrets looked to be making use of them for an afternoon snack of fish swimming into these old stone channels which funnel the fish out of the currents & into a dead end, where once upon a time, the local tribes would then place stones at the entry point to prevent the fish swimming out, then use nets to reap the reward. The birds, being without stones or nets, still seemed to enjoy the ancient helping hand the traps provide
I love it when a motion panning shot turns out right!!
But here came the rain again, so we headed back to Laura, did our best to clear the mud from our shoes & headed out west to Bourke. Along the road we finally saw our first wild goat herds, as well as half a dozen emus. Luckily, they were all well away from the road
We arrived in Bourke during a respite from the rain, which raised my hopes a little about our desired destination of Cameron’s Corner, but this was dashed when we arrived at the Visitors Centre to enquire about the route. All roads north west of Bourke - even the main one to Tibooburra, were well & truly closed & apparently it can cost you thousands of dollars if you decide to chance your arm on a closed road, get stuck out there & need to be dug out of the mud & towed to the nearest town. Looks like the Corner will have to wait for another time, so we went & found our accommodation for the night, which turned out to be some newly built/renovated cabins behind a pub & is quite wonderful. A firm mattress, good shower & powerful air conditioning. After a short break to freshen up & some photos of the by now impressive thunderstorm passing over the town, we headed off to a pub restaurant for what promised to be the first real country pub meal we’ve had. And it was... a decent sized steak for me, 4 lamb cutlets for L-SP & that will do nicely
While we were waiting for our food to arrive, I pointed out to L-SP the cluster of old blokes standing around at the bar, all talking while drinking. Now, this is the Outback cliché of the pub at the end of the day, but in these Plague times, you're supposed to get your drink, then find somewhere to sit down & drink it. No sooner had I mentioned that if the cops came in & saw this, there'd be trouble, two uniformed police came in, walked up to the bar, ordered take-away coffees, collected them & left... Given that New South Wales Covid19 cases are minuscule at the moment & there have never been many cases reported outside the main metropolises, I suppose somewhere pretty remote like Bourke (population - not very much) never had a lot to worry about & clearly by now, simply doesn't... Having dined & wined, we headed back to our lodgings, as the storm lit up the eastern sky on its way to drench Brewarrina & surrounding locales. I’m typing this entry on our iPad out on our verandah, as the group of drunk ladies in the pub courtyard across the carpark, yell for the karaoke machine to be fired up. I think it’s time to go inside, close the door & curtains, put a pillow over my head & prepare for tomorrow
Kilometres travelled: 310, but action packed!
An overcast morning. Oh oh...
Well, we tried to find a different café for breakfast, so we could spread the love (& money) around town, but we would up at the same place as yesterday, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing - we could get a table & the soy coffee was good... we don't really ask for much more than that. Then back to the Opal Cave - the store we visited yesterday, where we were welcomed back enthusiastically, or at least our wallets were... okay mine... to pick up some earrings... okay, 2 sets of earrings. Okay & one of the purple hemp shirts on the wall... The owner - an octogenarian named Herman, took a shine to both of us, & ended up telling us his tale of woe regarding a disgruntled client of a few years back, who has been cyber-slandering both Herman & the shop, causing grief & apparently a 30kg weight loss in Herman. Having found out that Long-Suffering Partner works in IT security, he now depends on her to take down this guy’s defamatory website &, having found out I’ve been in Sales most of my life, he offered me a job to take over from him when/if he retires. Something about his manner suggested to me that he makes that offer to a lot of people who come into his Cave. I personally think he’ll probably be carried out of there in a pine box... encrusted with opals, no doubt. The amount of time we spent in there talking with this charming man, made me wonder if we’d leave the same way...
Having made our escape, we headed to the Visitors Centre, to see if there was any advice they had for getting to Bourke via Goodooga, as we didn’t want to backtrack to Walgett. They were a bit uncertain about the condition of the dirt roads & ended up calling the Visitors Centre in Brewarrina, to see if they had information on the road status &, as the news seemed to be good, we filled up with diesel & headed north, by north west
30 kilometres up the highway was the turnoff for Goodooga, a town I only know because an old friend of mine taught at the school there for a number of years. As we got closer to the town, the grey skies above began looking more like rain clouds, with a few drops falling as we took a couple of photos outside the school to send to my friend, letting her know I’d finally made it up there to visit & where the hell was she?! Where she is, is down in Ardlethan, a town on the Victorian border in the Riverina region, where she’s been for a few years now (I knew that!!). As fate would have it, we’ll probably be passing through the Riverina in about 4-5 days, so we’ll most likely catch up then
Leaving Goodooga, the first thing we discovered was that the main road from there to Brewarrina was closed for repairs. Our informant at the Visitors Centre failed to mention that! Fortunately, the alternative route was one I’d briefly seen on the map they showed us back in the Visitors Centre in Lightning Ridge & was helpfully signposted with yellow 'Detour' signs... at least it was until you got onto the road itself, which was a dirt road of dark soil instead of the red ones we’d been traipsing all over for the last couple of days around Lightning Ridge. The dark soil is softer, meaning we were sliding around a bit until we engaged Laura’s 4WD, which gave us a better ride & meant that Laura’s onboard system stopped beeping at us every time the going got a bit hairy
Then the grey sky became proper rain clouds, which stopped some more sliding, but threatened to become a mud bath instead... The dark mud clumps & sticks very quickly, so it was a relief to get off that road before we got bogged somewhere out in big sky country & onto a bitumen road where the only thing to be wary of was cattle grids every few kilometres. That's when the detour signs re-appeared, after an absence of maybe 100 kilometres or so. I had visions of us having somehow taken the wrong road, getting irretrievably bogged & having to abandon Laura out there. She wouldn't be the first, apparently...
Coming into Brewarrina, the rain began falling a lot more seriously & we began to lose most of our hard-earned dirt & mud from the last few days. Seen from the front, Laura looked pristine again. Fortunately, the rear end & back window were still evidence of miles & miles of bad road. All we know of the town was what we’d read last night. - there were aboriginal fish traps on the river. We pulled into the Visitors Centre to see what else they could tell us & met the voice on the other end of the phone call made from Lightning Ridge this morning. At least she was pleased we’d made it before the road became quicksand. Almost as pleased as we were...
The fish traps were, in fact, about 200m from the Visitors Centre itself, on the Darling River that runs through the town. Our informant told us the best viewpoint was from behind the Aboriginal Museum, where there was a path down to the river right where the traps were. As we arrived, I spotted 3 pelicans floating/swimming down the river & hastened my pace to get to the bank to photograph them before they disappeared. That’s when we both discovered the path was made from the same black soil we’d been driving on earlier & not only was it now slippery as hell, but also quickly caked itself on our shoes & then everything else stuck to that - twigs, grass, small pebbles...
The traps themselves were a revelation. They are the oldest man-made structures on earth, being at least 40,000 years old & still standing & seemed to still be working, as the pelicans & a couple of egrets looked to be making use of them for an afternoon snack of fish swimming into these old stone channels which funnel the fish out of the currents & into a dead end, where once upon a time, the local tribes would then place stones at the entry point to prevent the fish swimming out, then use nets to reap the reward. The birds, being without stones or nets, still seemed to enjoy the ancient helping hand the traps provide
I love it when a motion panning shot turns out right!!
But here came the rain again, so we headed back to Laura, did our best to clear the mud from our shoes & headed out west to Bourke. Along the road we finally saw our first wild goat herds, as well as half a dozen emus. Luckily, they were all well away from the road
We arrived in Bourke during a respite from the rain, which raised my hopes a little about our desired destination of Cameron’s Corner, but this was dashed when we arrived at the Visitors Centre to enquire about the route. All roads north west of Bourke - even the main one to Tibooburra, were well & truly closed & apparently it can cost you thousands of dollars if you decide to chance your arm on a closed road, get stuck out there & need to be dug out of the mud & towed to the nearest town. Looks like the Corner will have to wait for another time, so we went & found our accommodation for the night, which turned out to be some newly built/renovated cabins behind a pub & is quite wonderful. A firm mattress, good shower & powerful air conditioning. After a short break to freshen up & some photos of the by now impressive thunderstorm passing over the town, we headed off to a pub restaurant for what promised to be the first real country pub meal we’ve had. And it was... a decent sized steak for me, 4 lamb cutlets for L-SP & that will do nicely
While we were waiting for our food to arrive, I pointed out to L-SP the cluster of old blokes standing around at the bar, all talking while drinking. Now, this is the Outback cliché of the pub at the end of the day, but in these Plague times, you're supposed to get your drink, then find somewhere to sit down & drink it. No sooner had I mentioned that if the cops came in & saw this, there'd be trouble, two uniformed police came in, walked up to the bar, ordered take-away coffees, collected them & left... Given that New South Wales Covid19 cases are minuscule at the moment & there have never been many cases reported outside the main metropolises, I suppose somewhere pretty remote like Bourke (population - not very much) never had a lot to worry about & clearly by now, simply doesn't... Having dined & wined, we headed back to our lodgings, as the storm lit up the eastern sky on its way to drench Brewarrina & surrounding locales. I’m typing this entry on our iPad out on our verandah, as the group of drunk ladies in the pub courtyard across the carpark, yell for the karaoke machine to be fired up. I think it’s time to go inside, close the door & curtains, put a pillow over my head & prepare for tomorrow
Kilometres travelled: 310, but action packed!
