The Waiting Man

Eden to Shellharbour

An early start, so we could be on time for our morning oyster tour on the Pambula Lake, just north of Eden. We found one of the 2 open cafés in town & picked up a light breakfast, as we knew there’d be more food during the tour - of the oyster variety!

Only a short distance north of town was the boat ramp for the lake, so we parked & waited for Captain Sponge, so his Magical Oyster Tour could begin. Yes, that’s his name - given to him by other oyster farmers on the rivers & yes, that’s what he calls his side business of taking tourists around the oyster beds & gathering spots on Pambula Lake & then down the Pambula River closer to the ocean. I still think he should call it the Magical Oystery Tour, but maybe he's more of a Stones fan...

We’d actually tried to take the Captain’s tour a couple of years ago, but the motor in his boat seized up & refused to budge us from the landing dock, so he sheepishly fed us some oysters & refunded our fees. We told him we’d come back... we just didn’t know it would be 2 years before we kept our word. Anyway, here we were & here he was, in the same boat, at just after 9am. 8 of us were on the tour, which made us relatively Covid safe, as there was enough room for us to be sufficiently distant. Julia & I held our breath as the Captain engaged the gears &... the boat moved off into the lake!!




From there, it was an informative 2 hours around the lake & river, showing us how the oysters were caught ‘wild’, then tumbled, graded & bedded & then tumbled & graded again, at various intervals over the next 2-3 years as they grew big enough to be either a snack, an entree, or a meal. We were also in Wedgetail Eagle & Sea Eagle territory, as evidenced by a few nests high up in trees along the riverbanks & by a rather large Sea Eagle flying over us at one point. There were also several ‘middens’ of oyster shells which had been gathered, opened, then left in haphazardly stacked piles by the local aboriginal people over the last 4-5 thousand years. Amazing that a shell which takes an oyster only 3 years to grow, can still be intact after thousands of years. Will anything we build today, be able to claim the same?


After a veritable feast of freshly shucked oysters, lemon & pepper, we made our way back to the landing &, of course, we headed straight to the little shop attached to the shucking sheds, where we bought another dozen to fortify us for the journey up the coast today



It had been a little cold on the lake, so Laura’s heaters were switched on for the first time this trip & probably for the first time in quite a few weeks, bringing feeling & mobility back to cold hands

Probably only 20 minutes into the trip north, we started to see evidence of the bushfires which had not only ripped through Kosciuszko National Park, but had blasted through the south-eastern coast of New South Wales all through last Summer... in fact, all through last Spring AND Summer. There were blackened red trunks & stumps not only on the sides of the road, but also up on the hills & ridges. Many have regrowth sprouting from their trunks, but there were some where that regrowth had tuned brown & the tree was dead or dying. Still others were just black, with no regrowth at all. There were road crews all along the highway, most of whom were involved in cutting down the dead trees closest to the roads, as well as running repairs to rails, signage & fencing

Well, we were on our way home. The questions now were - how far did we want to go today & did we want to take any detours into other areas between here & Sydney, to postpone our inevitable return? We have a few ideas, but regardless, expect to get back to town some time tomorrow, then claim Bella back from her lodgings on Sunday, leaving us, especially me, a few days to actually relax & enjoy a bit of rest, without recreation

From oysters & seafood, then into cheese country. We had to bypass Bega, as their cheese factory is currently closed, but Tilba & Bodalla, our preferred sources anyway, were both open & tempting to palates & wallets... & tastings. So, with the travel esky more fully loaded than when we left home, we continued north



A stop in Batemans’ Bay for a seafood snack & it was decision time. Do we stay here for the night, or go a little further north, maybe to Kiama, where we’d have the option of detouring into the southern highlands, or through the Royal National Park. We decided to book accommodation in Kiama & pressed on up the highway as the sun began to sink behind the escarpment that separates the coast & the Great Dividing Range. It tuned out that our Motel is in Shellharbour, not Kiama, but it was only about 20 minutes further, so still no problem for any detours tomorrow. We'd never been to Shellharbour before - it looked to be one of the more developing south coast towns, given its proximity to Sydney, I'm sure a lot of people are heading down this way to escape everything from the Plague, to the outrageous real estate prices. Our Motel room was in another place attached to a pub, but basically comfortable enough for us

Kilometres travelled: 394

Euston to Ardlethan

A small, simple breakfast at the same little take-way shop up the road from our Motel, then a false start, due to Google mapping us to the nearest petrol station, which was on the wrong side of the border. We could have got petrol there, but would have had to wait 2 weeks before we could go anywhere with it. So, having found the 2nd nearest one, on the right side of the checkpoints, away we went, following the Murray River eastward, then as it dropped away south, the landscape became flatter & we were in big sky country again

And there’s not really much more to say about the drive to Ardlethan than that - it was a fairly uneventful day on the road, with no real photo opportunities, apart from one I only really saw as I was driving past it, but didn’t stop, or turn ‘round for... then spent the next 30 kilometres wishing I had

Being in big sky country meant we could see the rain clouds approaching from maybe about 100 kilometres away & thought initially that they’d slide past us on the right... & the initial rain bursts did just that, but the sky gradually turned greyer, then darker & then we were in the thick of it for about 5 minutes, then it would stop for 5, rain for 5, stop again... all rather frustrating really. Especially when we stopped in the town of Narrandera for a break & some pastries from the bakery & found that the rain had once again, washed off all the mud & dust we’d spent the last 2 days getting re-applied on the way down from Broken Hill. Our friend in Ardlethan will never believe where we’ve been, because all the evidence is gone...

The only stop we could have, maybe should have made, was to Altina Wildlife Park, which we saw a sign for about 200m before its gates, so we braked hard & turned left to go into the car park. What we could see from there was a lot of concrete walls & mesh fencing, which was a little too ‘Tiger King’ in appearance for us, so we elected to not go in, because if it was anything like Joe Exotic’s place, it was only going to make us angry & that’s not what this holiday is for. That’s what work is for...

We arrived in Ardlethan just after the school’s finishing time, so messaged our friend to let her know we were in town, then took a little drive round to see it. And a little drive is all that was needed, for a town of only 375 people. Shortly after that, we turned up at our friend’s doorstep, for an afternoon/evening of catching up, a great country pub meal (in the town's only pub) & playing with her dog. She informed us that the Altina Wildlife Park is apparently quite a good & reputable one, so we shouldn't have judged quite so quickly & it’s earmarked for a future trip down this way... She also had a lot of background information about the towns of Brewarrina, Bourke, Ardlethan & Wilcannia regarding the tensions with the aboriginal communities there & the occasionally violent & always racist treatment meted out to them by the white settlers, then the police & courts, not to mention government policies over the last 175 years or so. It's going to take a lot of communication, understanding, reconciliation, apology, one hell of an attitude shift &, unfortunately, probably a couple of generations before the wounds are healed

Kilometres travelled:404 - we ticked over 3,000 kilometres today

Broken Hill, Silverton, Mundi Mundi

One thing you need to know about Broken Hill on a Monday... it’s like Bourke on a Sunday - everything seems to be closed, so the few places that are open for breakfast, are in high demand. So, no breakfast for us at the Silly Goat café, but a quite acceptable substitute 50m down the road at the next one

Some sight-seeing today, not something I’ve ever done in Broken Hill, but L-SP has, so she had a list of places worth seeing, starting with the Line of Lode Miners Memorial at the top of the broken hill itself. This was under construction last time we were here, so a first for both of us to start the day with. It’s a memorial to 817 miners who have died in the mines since they started in the late 1880s. The structure itself is in the shape of the mineral lode under the hill & lists the names of the miners, as well as how they died - everything from asphyxiation, falling down shafts, explosions, run over by machinery... & one poor guy who fell off his bike. It’s telling that as the 20th century ticked over, the numbers decrease year by year, especially as the miner’s union movement won more & more concessions on working conditions & safety regulations, to the point where the last recorded fatality was in 2008 & there was only one that year, compared to dozens in the mines early years







Speaking of those early years, our next stop was White’s Mineral Art Gallery & Mining Museum, on the western outskirts of town. This is run by an elderly couple who have collected a huge array of mining equipment from the last hundred years or so & have arranged it in a gallery that they’ve designed to look like a mine shaft. Any spare space on the walls is filled by mineral sand paintings done by one of the owner’s older brothers - now deceased (which is not that surprising, as the owner himself must be in his mid 80s at least). The paintings are done by taking a photograph & then grinding various minerals to a fine sand, or powder in various colours, then it’s kind of like painting by numbers. Lots of works depicting the mines & miners of course, but a surprising selection of other topics - including various biblical scenes. Not sure where he got the photos of those from...

Next, to the Flying Doctors base out at the airport on the other side of town. Begun by a Methodist missionary after the First World War, they fly doctors & nurses throughout regional Australia, dealing with everything from births, accidents, cancer & dentistry, landing on everything from bush airstrips, to a flat enough paddock. So not only do you need to be across multiple medical disciplines, you also need balls of steel... & that goes for the women too



Back to town for a quick late-lunch break & to discover that the bookshop we wanted to visit was, of course, closed on Mondays. So, next was a trip out to Silverton, about 20kms north west of town &, as the name suggests, an old silver mining town founded about 5 years after Broken Hill. It’s also famous for having been the central location for the Mad Max movies. A few artists have moved out to the area as well, obviously finding the hustle of Broken Hill too much for them. Last time we were here, it was an overcast day, which today certainly wasn’t, so the light was pretty harsh, but certainly a nicer day to be wandering ‘round the town. There's a Mad Max 'museum' in the town, which we didn't visit last time we were here & didn't this time either. We did wander through one of the places styling itself as a museum, which was interesting from an artistic point of view - as there were a lot of paintings by Howard Steer, a Broken Hill painter whose work is highly stylised & the kind of thing you either like, or don't.... The Gallery owner wasn't very chatty, but his dog was friendly



The landscape of the town is littered with old mining houses & some 'half-houses' - which was a house you could build half of & live in while you tried to make enough money to build the other half. Some never did & these days, there's about half of the half-house still standing...


One from 2014, when we were last here... a better photo than I managed this time!



From Silverton, it’s a short drive out to the Mundi Mundi Plains - a vast open space that extends out to the South Australian border & the desert beyond it. The place is so vast, wide & flat, it’s been said you can see the curvature of the earth. Perhaps this is the reason the lookout location was chosen today by an aspiring young rock star to shoot video footage for his new single. He & his team arrived at the lookout about 2 minutes after we did & set themselves up with lights, cameras, a drone & a boom box which belted out the song about half a dozen times... something about how his girl has left him because she’s not ready for love. Dressed in black & striking anthemic poses against the flat, but stunning landscape - U2’s photos & videos in the Joshua Tree desert back in the 1980s have a lot to answer for

The sunset was cloudless & given the absence of any landscape features, it was a tricky one. Only when the sun was touching the horizon & its light had dialled waaay down, could we get shots that featured the landscape as well as the sky


Back to Broken Hill & we decided, after having driven past the place about 4 times over the last 2 days, to go into the Musicians Club. It turned out to be less of a haven for players of instruments & more of a lesser RSL, or sports club. But the bistro menu had enough appeal & the drinks were cheaper than the other places we’d been, so dinner it was

Afterwards we took a drive back up to the Miners Memorial, to see if it was lit up at night. It wasn’t... well, not until Laura’s high beam headlights hit it, but that wasn’t good enough for a night shot of the place, so back here to the Motel, as we have another long day in the saddle tomorrow. As we arrived, guess whose car was in the Motel carpark? Definitely time to go then...

Lightning 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!

Narrabri to Lightning Ridge

A lesser travelled day, overall, but it certainly felt like more than just 340 kms

Breakfast at the 2nd local cafe we found, then to a pharmacy for essentials & a lottery agency for some wishful thinking, before heading back out to the Australia Telescope Compact Array about 15 kms out of town. We’ve been there before, but being mild science nerds, it’s always worth the trip. With the sun on the ‘right’ side of the dishes in the morning, it was easier to get shots of the 5 close dishes all together (the 6th is fixed at a point some 5 kms away from the others). A little science reading in the Visitors Centre, then testing out the in-line acoustic dishes, which are set about 50m apart & if you face the dish & speak, the person at the other one can hear you clearly. Be careful what you call your partner - they can hear you!!



And so, on to Lightning Ridge, via whatever we find along the way. We decided to try out Laura’s on-board mapping system again & she directed us down a red dirt road for a few kilometres, before getting her wires crossed & sending us in a couple of circles around a rail siding, before we figured out the way to Walgett ourselves. We got a little ambitious & added in the town of Come By Chance, simply because who can resist a name like that. After a bit (okay, quite a bit) of prevarication on Laura’s part, we found the right way there, thanks, in no small part, to the little town of Burren Junction. Now, I'd never heard of the place, but once upon a time it seems to have been the Grand Central station of Australian travel & freight, if the sign outside town is to be believed... You can get anywhere from there



Funny that Come By Chance isn't mentioned on there, but it certainly helped our bearings. For all its past glory as a transport hub, it's pretty isolated out there & the landscape is an Australian cliché... you know the one



We soon left the black top behind, for some narrow dirt roads & only had one unscheduled stop due to an oncoming road train, who was about the width of the entire road... The driver seemed quite pleased we hadn’t panicked at his approach & had calmly got off the road while he was still about half a kilometre away. We got a wave as he thundered past at some impressive rate of knots, anyway... I'm still not sure how he'd got through the narrow gate we passed a few hundred metres down the road... it still looked intact

Not long after that, we disturbed some small birds by the roadside & unfortunately one of them will never be disturbed again - our windscreen was the shock of his life. L-SP was pretty shocked too - it hit on her side & she had visions of broken glass & a dead bird in her lap. Fortunately, Laura is made of tougher stuff. Well... not so fortunate for the bird, but...

After these encounters, we finally made it to what Laura called ‘Come By Chance Park’ which was a few hundred metres down another dirt road & was indistinguishable from the surrounding scrub & red dirt we’d been driving past for some time. Certainly didn’t look like anyone had been playing football or cricket there for a while... or ever. Either the park didn’t exist, or Laura had no idea where we were. I could see what looked like a small town a few hundred metres away, so abandoning Laura’s navigational conniptions, we found the right road &...




... really needn’t have bothered. The ‘town’ such as it was, was a few old & older buildings in various states of collapse & all seemed to be closed to visitors, whether they’d come by chance, or by dogged determination like we had. Oh well, at least we’d got some dirt on the tyres... windows, interior... & got a whole lot more when some white Toyota thing decided that 85kmh on a dirt road wasn’t fast enough for him & overtook us, leaving us literally in his dust, which totally obscured my view of the road, the side of the road... hell, even the sky!! Everything went white for about 20 seconds & I hit the brakes as we both coughed & swore at the rapidly dwindling shape of the arsehole as he disappeared in the fore-distance

Not long after that, L-SP got her wish of seeing a real Goanna, as it raced across the road in front of us, being chased by an angry magpie. Everybody is scared of Australian snakes, spiders & lizards, but don’t mess with our birds either... especially in nesting season!!

Walgett, when the dust had cleared & we could see the road, seemed a nice little town. Certainly the lady in the Visitors Centre was very helpful & happy, especially when warning us there was rain forecast for the north-western corner of New South Wales, which may put our planned route to Cameron’s Corner in jeopardy. We decided to press on regardless & adapt as we go, hoping we don’t have to. Cameron's Corner is where New South Wales meets both the Queensland & South Australia borders & we just wanted to be able to put a foot into both of those States, so we could say we've been interstate at a time when all the Covid19 restrictions mean that actual interstate travel is, if not actually banned, extremely problematic, as it involves a 2 week quarantine stay in a hotel, at your own expense, before you're allowed to go anywhere

The Corner is not really a major thoroughfare for interstate travel, as the dirt roads preclude most traffic &, if the expected rain hits, the roads will doubtless be closed. It can be an expensive exercise getting bogged out there - especially when the road's officially closed. You are charged $1000 per wheel that needs to be dug out, you pay for any damage you've done to the road & then there's the cost of getting the tow team out to you & the fee for dragging your recalcitrant arse back to the nearest town, which is Tibooburra - about 200 kilometres away. Not something we've budgeted for...

From Walgett, it's only a short trip down the highway to Lightning Ridge - the Opal Capital of Australia & boy, do they like to let you know!! From the moment you hit the 5 kilometre mark outside town, there’s nothing but roadside signs for opal mines, traders & tours. We found the Visitors Centre on the way into town &, again, the staff were friendly & helpful, recommending drive-yourself tours & various places. Given we’re here for 2 nights, it’s a good bet we’ll get to most of them. The drive-yourself tours are named after various coloured car doors. There’s a blue one, a yellow one, a red one... & the green one is the best to do at sunset, so, given it was about 4pm, we thought we’d start there. I’d noticed a sign for a green car door tour on the way into town & wondered what the hell that meant... now I know. It means about 20 minutes on a red dirt road full of ruts & potholes past & through small opal mine ‘claims’ which make the landscape look like a rabbit warren gone into overdrive, or a bit like the eastern end of the South Dakota Badlands, where the prairie dogs have holes everywhere... if the prairie dogs were the size of a young bison



This was our first real encounter with the Red Centre of Australia in quite a few years & it felt good to know we were really out there & a long way from home. It’s a wonderfully liberating feeling

One that is apparently shared by a significant amount of Grey Nomad tourists, who seemed to converge on the end point of the trail, where the sunset view is written to be the best in town. We went from being pretty much alone, to waving away SUVs like the persistent flies all around. Fortunately, the view over the plains & the historic mine sites were quite interesting, even if the more recent addition of a ‘labyrinth’ made of small rocks arranged in concentric circles was not - though it certainly caught the attention of the increasing throng. Sunset, when it arrived, was nice, but not amazing... & certainly not improved by the soundtrack provided by one of the nearby SUVs pumping out an 80s power ballad, nor by the drone launched by another couple, which flew into my shots a couple of times. If there had been a suitable sized rock near to hand...


Back into town & more trouble with Laura’s navigation system. All we wanted was directions to a suitable restaurant. After a few U-turns & confusion, we headed for the town’s Bowling Club. It is something of an Australian country town tradition that, if there is a Bowling Club, it will have a Chinese restaurant in it - even if there's another Chinese restaurant elsewhere in the town. Lightning Ridge's club advertised ‘Lucky’s Brasserie’ which surely couldn’t be the local Chinese joint with a name like that, could it?

Yes. Yes it could... so far, so traditional. But it also did ‘Western Meals’ which were everything from steaks, fish & chips & a mixed grill of sirloin, chicken , bacon & egg, with chips & gravy, which my stomach cried out to

We plan to do the other coloured car door tours tomorrow & may, or may not, wind up down at least 1 opal mine. Who knows??

Kilometres travelled: 340 - though it felt like more...