Glen Innes Trip Day 3

A nice leisurely start to the day with breakfast by the campfire while Peter played Good Samaritan and delivered a walk-in camper with a hurt leg to a previous camp back up the road where her support crew were camped. 

Before packing up the van, we wandered down to Boundary Falls picnic area, meeting a large fat black snake along the way. Thankfully he decided to slither in to the undergrowth as we approached. In the picnic area we successfully found an old cache and then descended the many stairs to the base of the falls. It was worth the effort. Crystal clear water, sheer rock cliff faces, several varieties of moss and lichen and general loveliness. 

A bit of a scramble around and a rock hop across to explore the other side of the creek before we heaved our way back up the stairs to the top. 

A quick pack up on our return to camp and we were Glen Innes bound. Arriving just after 11am we managed to check in early, giving us plenty of time to set up the van, do a supply run, get some laundry done, visit the visitor information centre and take a drive around town to familiarize ourselves with it again. 

Sarah soon befriended the kids from two sites down and disappeared until dinner time. Funnily enough they live only a suburb away from Sarah's school. 

The weather has been beautiful during the days so far while we keep reading of storm warnings at home. We sure picked a good time to leave. 

Glen Innes Trip Day 2

We enjoyed breakfast out in the gorgeous sunshine before packing up the van for the day's journey. 

Our first stop was at the big prawn because the kids hadn't come to see it last time we were in the area for a caching trip.

 Obligatory photos taken we continued on towards Grafton. The sugar mills were operating along the way but no aromas of molasses were scented as we passed. 

A bit of excitement occurred as we were forced to stop for the raising of the bridge across the Clarence to allow two yachts through. 

At Grafton we pulled in to the visitor information centre as we had decided to buy an annual National Parks pass. They redirected us to the NSW parks office in town where we had very friendly helpful service. 

A trip to the supermarket for supplies, a quick stop for lunch in one of the many parks, and we were once again on our way. 

Up and over the Gibraltar Range towards Glen Innes with beautiful scenery and diverse biomes as we crossed. 

Our camp for the night is Boundary Falls with fire pits and wood provided. The area was a sawmill in years passed and some traces of equipment and foundations are still present. We used the plate at the firepit to cook our dinner and spent the night outside stargazing and fire gazing.

 Would have been nice to stay here a little longer. 

Tomorrow we will walk to the falls before we leave. 

Glen Innes trip day 1 28/12/15

Headed south from the Gold Coast after picking up Emily from the marina. Arrived after an hours drive at the small town of Billinudgel, where we set up camp behind the pub.  

After the caravan was sorted we went for an exploratory walk of the township. We found an awesome wood place called Billinudgel Woodworks. The owner played a number of handmade guitars as we wandered around the shop. Sarah was very interested in the instruments that he was playing. Stan invited us into his work area which he calls his playground. First of all he showed us how amazing nature can be, by showing us a walking stick which he had found in the bush and some dented wood that he turned into spoons.

 Dad was very interested in what Stan had made around the shop so we stayed at the shop for an hour. Mum finally got tired and said that we should start heading back to the caravan where we got rugged up ready to go up to the pub for dinner. 

Perth 12 January 2015

A return to our youth as we flew across the country in the early hours of the day, minus the kids, with our backpacks, headed for Perth. The Perth YHA was our destination today. Situated right next to the main Perth railway station, walking distance to all the CBD has to offer and serviced by the airport shuttle. What more could you ask? Ok, so thicker walls and double glazing wouldn't go astray but hey, location, location , location. 

 

We left our bags and headed off to explore on foot. The number of old buildings in the city took us by surprise and made for an interesting city scape. The amount of public art was also something we hadn't expected. 

During our wanderings we discovered a free bus and jumped on board to see more of the city. We did a complete circuit, seeing the bell tower, the interestingly designed TAFE building and the aptly named Horseshoe Bridge before hopping off at the museum/library/art gallery precinct and wandering through there, eventually making our way back to our accommodation around 4pm (6pm Brisbane time). 

Our early start was catching up to us so we chilled in our room for a couple of hours until Perth dinner time. The trains below our window timed their horn blasts perfectly with Peter's drifts into sleep causing him to jump awake (and me to almost die laughing after the third time). I may not be laughing later tonight!

Dinner was at a Japanese shop a block away from the YHA, in celebration of the kids imminent departure to the land of the rising sun. It was still light at 7 when we were finished and we decided we hadn't quite walked far enough today so made our way down to the river via a cache. 

When we reached the river the sun had almost finished setting and the view was lovely. 

After what felt like 20km of walking and being on the go for just under 20 hours straight, we fell into bed at 9.45 (11.45)pm. I suspect a sleep in may be happening tomorrow. 

Sydney Trip Day 13

Wollomombi to Ebor

A very short day traveling today so we were in no hurry to leave. We eventually emerged from the van at 8.30 to enjoy pancakes, bacon and eggs cooked over the fire. After breakfast I followed the track leading in to the bush behind our campsite which ends at a lookout over the gorge. Way below was the nearly waterless Chandler River.  The gorge here looks quite different to the section further along where the Wollomombi and Chandler Falls usually flow. A lot less sharp and rugged and a lot more treed.

We still hadn't started moving by 9.30 as we were enjoying sitting around the campfire, listening to all the bird calls and soaking up the sun. The next campsite eventually called to us and we hit the road again around 10.30. We only drove half an hour as we wanted to spend these couple of days re-energising after the madness that was Sydney. We set up camp at Native Dog Creek campground in  Cathedral Rock National Park. The campgrounds in this area have been excellent. This one has a fireplace with BBQ plate and hooks for a billy as well as a picnic table at each site. After we had staked our claim, we drove in to the tiny town of Ebor to find some lunch (and a cache). The cafe was the only shop in town and doubled as the post office and the local meeting hall. There were small wooden boxes, tea cosies, second hand books, marmalades, knitted teddies and miscellaneous other granny craft things for sale as well. As we waited for lunch to be made, I snuck outside to find the cache. I was unsuccessful even though I apparently looked right at it as Emily found it later exactly where I had checked.

After lunch, Ebor Falls was our destination. We were not holding out much hope as the other two falls yesterday had been dry, so we were very excited to see a lovely cascade of water pouring over the rock from the lookout.

There are two lookouts at Ebor Falls. One to view both the lower and upper tier of the falls, and one at the upper tier. The lower tier was by far the more spectacular of the two so we were surprised to see the majority of people were at the upper tier.  The volcanic nature of the area was very clear at the face of the falls where the rock was the classic organ pipe formation.

After returning to the campground, Peter and I went for a walk along a 1.3km circuit through the sclerophyll forest that starts at one end of the camping area and ends just near our site. The variety of low ground cover type bushes was surprising and we found a number of orchids along the way. A number of balancing boulders and large swathes of moss covered granite call this area home. The wattle was just coming out in bloom and there were little wild flowers here and there if you looked closely. 

Back at camp we started a fire with the tiny number of off cuts we had managed to scavenge from the empty firewood pit provided by the ranger. We're not sure why this one was empty when the one last night had plenty. The fire lasted long enough to sit by as dinner was simmering away on the stove but not quite long enough to eat dinner in front of. Besides, the temperature had dropped and we retreated to the relative warmth of the van to eat.

Earlier in the day, on our way to Ebor Falls, we had driven past the Ebor cemetery and I had mentioned that there was a night cache there. Everyone had expressed a desire to go and find it after dinner and that's what we did. With jackets on ( the car thermometer told us it 9 degrees outside) and torches in hand we arrived at the cemetery to find a car parked there already and a man wandering about with a torch! We couldn't imagine what else he could have been doing there apart from caching so decided to begin our adventure. We walked across to the starting coordinates but couldn't see any fire tacks reflecting back so started to walk further in to the cemetery. The man with the torch came towards us and asked if we were looking for a geocache. He had been there for twenty minutes and had only found a small number of reflectors and was stuck. While Tim and I had a chat with him, the others headed across to the back fence where they thought they had seen something. It turns out they had, and the chase was on. From the right angle, a whole line of tacks showed up and we had the cache in hand less than a minute later. I didn't know whether to feel happy or sad for the guy. Apparently, it was his 960th find. We parted ways - we went back to try to find the start of the trail and he returned to his car. With the trail found, we also headed off, but pulled in to a rest stop a few kilometres up the road to find the only other cache in the area. We waited in the car as the man from the cemetery hunted here also and we felt we should give him a chance to find the cache. After about five minutes he had not found it so we decided to join him. We started at a large tree, which was the most likely spot, not even looking at the GPS. Emily bent down to use her torch in a hole and Sarah, who was with her, calls out, there it is! The poor guy. They'd been out of the car all of ten seconds. Emily offered for him to sign the log first, which he did, and then he made a very quick exit. I definitely felt sorry for him this time. 

With the kids still excited on our return to camp, Peter took each of them for a walk along the circuit. Hopefully, they'll sleep long and well after that. Tomorrow we go to Glen Innes.

Sydney Trip Day 11

Bretti to Armidale

Realising last night that we didn't have enough milk for breakfast, we decided to leave early and have breakfast on the road. The big kids are becoming more and more involved in setup and pack up of the van on this trip so it took about an hour from waking up to leaving as we stood back and let them attempt the whole process. More steep climbs and descents as we made our way towards Walcha. In one section they were doing guardrail work so we were stopped by a traffic controller on the uphill. Had we been in the old car, I wonder if we would have been able to start again!  So glad we bought this car.

After descending from the mountains we passed beautifully green undulating farmlands with new lambs and calves sprinkling the flocks and herds all the way to Walcha where we stopped for a bite to eat. The mountainous passage through from Bretti had taken longer than originally anticipated so our breakfast had turned into brunch. We had originally stopped at a park right in town but it had no BBQs (or cache) so I suggested we move to another park a little further along and cook some snags (but didn't mention the new park did have a cache). At the new park, everyone decided just to have sandwiches anyway so we could have stayed at the original park (but I'm glad we didn't). After eating, playing and caching we jumped back in the car for the last leg through to Armidale.

Our arrival in the early afternoon into Armidale allowed us to set up the van, let the girls have a dip in the pool and then head off to explore the town.  I decided the best way to explore was to find a couple of caches. One took us to St Peter's Cathedral

and by default, the even more stunning catholic cathedral further along the block.

The other took us to one of the many large parks in Armidale and a historic wool wagon. We had booked to go on the Armidale Heritage Tour the next morning so just finished with a general drive through the town and back to the caravan park. 

The kids went to explore the park and discovered a number of recreational activities were available. Emily wanted to have a go at mini golf so she and Tim went off with their hired equipment for a game. Tim returned to the van after a while to offer his club and ball to me. Apparently he had had enough of chasing his ball in the bushes! I had a lovely game with Emily. There was much hilarity as we attempted again and again to persuade the ball to go through the small tunnels. Another swim followed mini golf before we called it a day for dinner and bed. 

Sydney Trip Day 9

Blue Mountains

Today was our final day in Sydney so we decided to do something a little different and head up to the Blue Mountains for the day. We left nice and early and had an uneventful trip along the motorways out of Sydney arriving in the Blue Mountains an hour later. I hadn't recalled from previous visits there just how far the area stretches. Katoomba was still half an hour away as we passed through all the small towns along the way. We drove through the town centre of Katoomba and out to Echo Point where we found plenty of parking as it was still early in the day. However, breakfast was calling so we continued on to find a sunny park to enjoy our meal. The park we found had a small stream and seemed to be the top of a waterfall. We discovered later that it was the top of Katoomba Falls. 

As we ate, we discussed our options for the day and the kids were all keen to go on the scenic railway nearly straight down the cliff face! I was outnumbered so, after finishing breakfast, we drove straight to Scenic World. Even though it was only 9.30am there was quite a queue for tickets but once we were in, and decided to take the skyway first, we managed to not have to wait. 

On the skyway we chose to stand on the glass bottomed section (yes, even me!) and, although I was apprehensive, the journey over was calm and steady and I was quite happy to do it again. The view of the Katoomba Falls from the skyway was excellent but unfortunately, they had very little water coming over them. I imagine they would be spectacular in the wet.

After exiting the skyway, we chose to walk around to Echo Point Lookout to see the Three Sisters. We had two options. A 20 minutes walk via the road or a 30 minute walk via the cliff track. We chose the shorter walk but half way there found a series of steps down to join the clif walk and took them instead. Very glad we were going down the steps and not up them. 

The scenery here is, again, a vista I could never tire of. Sheer cliffs of grey, orange and yellow. Rugged rock formations. Valleys filled with tree ferns, coachwood, acacia. Just stunning.

We were met by the tourist hordes as we reached the main lookout and squeezed in to take the obligatory Three Sister photos and then joined the throngs walking down to the first sister. 

The kids were keen to take the Giant Stairway but, at 900 steps, they couldn't convince me it was a good idea so we returned via the cliff walk to the skyway station where I scored a cache with Emily's help. The next request was for the scenic railway but the queue was exceedingly long. For some reason the cableway queue was tiny so guess what we did? Cableway all the way down to the valley below. Again, I was surprisingly calm, considering my dislike of chairlifts. This one is glass enclosed and doesn't rock so I guess that makes the difference. At the base, there are a number of walks through the valley. We chose the one that goes to the old Katoomba Coal Mine, for which the original incline railway was built. There is boardwalk and interpretive signage all the way along the ten minute walk. 

The trip back up to the top of the cliff was via said railway. Once again, we got lucky with a tiny queue and got straight on the first train. This was the least enjoyable for me and was not dissimilar to a slow roller coaster but it just went up and up and up. I can't imagine what going down would be like. Ugh.

At the top, the kids wanted to go again. We had time and our passes were for unlimited rides so we checked the queue lengths and went once more down into the valley on the cableway. This time, there were a number of tour groups. They were very good at pushing in and at taking up the whole pathway once down here so we were very glad we had had a great experience the first time. One last ride back up on the incline railway (the steepest in the world!) and we called it a day.

On our return to the caravan park, Sarah again requested a swim, despite the temperature in the teens. She had a ball playing with two other crazy boys who were there too then headed for a nice hot shower. We put one last wash on before we sadly leave tomorrow. We've had a fantastic time here.