A wander around Northern NSW - April 2019

Having a couple of weeks available to us we decided to do a bit of a loop around some of the northern part of NSW.

The plan was to head down the coast to call into a couple of beachside camps that held fond memories for us, and to do this before the Easter school holidays, and to then escape the crowds by heading inland and looping back towards the north and home in time for Easter.

The weather did not look promising, but we thought we'd take a look anyway. After all, how often are those weather forecasters 100% right?

Well they were this time. We arrived at a riverside camp at Coraki (between Casino and Woodburn) and set up before heading off for a walk and then back to the van for a coffee.

It started raining then and it never stopped for the two days and nights we were there.

It's a good job that the pub, only about 30 metres from where we were camped, was a friendly place with some great food and great prices. Seriously, this pub is highly recommended.

So, we decided to head west and get across the Great Dividing Range to some drier country and aimed the bonnet towards the Kwiambal National Park.

Getting in there was easy enough, although the 20km of dirt road was nastily corrugated in many spots, and the camping area we chose was almost deserted, giving us a choice of lots of spots on the Severn River's banks.

We chose one reasonably close to the spotlessly clean dunny and set up for the next four nights.

There was a fire ban in force so we had no camp fire, but that was no real hardship as the weather was warm and dry.

So what did we do there? Walk is the answer, following tracks around to some lookouts and enjoying the tranquility.

The walks were all reasonably well marked out and lead through a treed landscape that was just beautiful.

We walked to some lookouts that gave us views over different parts of the river. The one above shows a narrow gorge through which the river must boil when it is in flood.

All we saw were pools of water with only a trickle of flow.

Here's Karen looking healthy and gorgeous :) 

And me, looking lopsided - I must find somewhere level to stand next time! 

All the photos above show how rugged is the country through which this river runs. It must be a great sight when in flood.

One of the regular sights in any granite country in Australia are the balancing rocks. The weather erodes any boulder into a ball shape and  leaves it sitting on a narrowing plinth, just balancing and looking like you'd be able to roll it down the hill with a push.

You can't of course, but it looks that way.

This was is about 6 metres high.

Walking back we left the high ridges with their views, but dusty tracks, and walked back along the river bank where it was accessible.

It's a beautiful place here. So peaceful with only the birds for company or the occasional fish rising. 

Karen found herself a comfy rock to sit on and cooled her feet in the water. 

Wildlife - there was a lot of wildlife in this Park with birds, grey kangaroos, wallaroos and goannas around all the time.

We were visited by two goannas (that we saw) no doubt scrounging for food, but each of them scooted up a tree if one of us stood up.

Can you see the one starting to climb the tree above?

Well, you couldn't miss this picture of him. He was about 1.3 metres long so he still has a lot of growing to do. 

 Another day we went for a walk to the MacIntyre River and found that is a similar state to the Severn, pretty dry with just pools of water and lots of boulders that show the power of the river when it is in flood.  

Lots more balancing roacks, but as there have not been eroded over time, just created by the flooding river, they are not as rounded.

One of the marked walks takes you to "The Rockpool" which is an impressive size for a hole carved into the rock, but it seemed to be filled with highly silted water - not going to bother swimming there! 

We moved on from Kwiambal with some great memories of a cracking Park, but also with a number of sand fly bites that were to irritate us for days and weeks afterwards.

We headed south, calling into Inverell for supplies, to a free camp at a spot called the Bundarra Lions Park.

This is a spot on the Gwydir River that is just a couple of klms from the town of Bundarra (with a great pub) and with a set of decent flushing toilets and water. 

We picked a spot on the bank of the river close to an old friend of ours (we met her here a few years ago) and relaxed into life in the slow lane. 

The sunset sky was spectacular.

This was our setup.

A closer look and from this pic you can see the river a couple of metres below us. 

We stayed there just three nights as, apart from walking the couple of klms into the town to visit the pub (great food and very friendly) there isn't much to do beyond relaxing and reading a book. 

So we packed up and headed off through Armidale to the Wollomombi  National Park where we set up and then checked out the walks.

The pictures that follow show some of the walks and the views, but they can't capture the sheer beauty of the place. 

From here we headed off to Nymboida where we camped next to a creek and then to Brooms Head where we found a spot in a beachside van park (with only intermittent rain) so we stayed and enjoyed a more traditional beach mini-break.

The pictures tell the story of the place and the walks we took.

Yeah - it's a beautiful place and (considering it was Easter) not too overcrowded.

A Weekend at Waterfall Creek Reserve

For the past year or so my university commitments have kept us close to home as I simply can't find the time to go away.

So we have tried to make a long weekend available to us maybe once every month or two and we'll head out on a Thursday afternoon (after my morning lecture) and expect to come home on Sunday afternoon. Three nights away is not a lot, but it is surprising just how much fun it can be.

So a couple of weeks ago we picked out a destination that we hadn't visited before in a place where we expected to find peace, quiet and beauty as well as somewhere we could go for walks in the bush and exercise the mad pooch.

The destination was the Waterfall Creek Reserve in the Scenic Rim - less than two hours caravan tow away from home.  For anyone wanting to follow in our footsteps (and I would recommend it) you drive from the Gold Coast through Canungra, then Beaudesert and on to Rathdowney. Just a couple of hundred metres south of Rathdowney you'll see the Boonah Road and you drive down that for maybe 25 klms until you reach the township of Maroon. Turn left down Newman's Road (you're on dirt by now) until you reach Waterfall Creek Road and head down there. At the end of the road is the reserve.

We arrived at about 2pm and took a look around. The place seemed deserted so we picked a spot that had us nicely sheltered, but on reasonably flat ground and unhitched. We soon had the chairs out and a glass of wine and beer in hand. Even the dog seemed happy as he first investigated everything and then settled in next to us. 

The pic below is our camp.

After spending the afternoon exploring around the camp area we found the creek line and followed it up to the waterfall. It must be beautiful when there is water falling over it, but we are in the middle of a dry spell and the creek was just a series of pools and there was nothing flowing. Still, it was good exercise and Bruce the Dog thoroughly enjoyed piddling on everything in sight. 

Back at camp we lit a fire for warmth and cooked a steak (to eat with fresh salad) on the van's roll out BBQ.

The next day we walked Bruce the Dog around and breakfasted before jumping in the car and heading up the track that leads you half way up Mt Barney.  The track is steep and rocky so it was a slow drive and the rocky nature of the place started giving Karen real concerns that we might end up ripping the sidewalls out of our new tyres.

So we ended up heading back down and exploring the area generally.

There is a whole heap of beautiful countryside out here generally with none more beautiful than Maroon Dam. Pics below will give you the idea of how pretty it is. Nice and quiet too as we were the only people there for most of the hour or two we spent walking around and watching Bruce indulge his passion for swimming. 

We ended up travelling through Rathdowney so we called into the pub there for a beer and a relax. This used to be one of our "nice to visit" pubs, but things have changed, presumably because of the population pressures as the Gold Coast and Brisbane are expanding and all those new people are driving around and they end up spoiling things just by being there.

The Rathy pub is just one example - dogs are no longer permitted even in the beer garden (which is newly refurbished) so Bruce the Dog had to stay with the car. The pub itself seems less friendly than before and the prices are waaaaay up now.

Sad really. 

So, we ended up heading back to camp to find that some other people had turned up. Nice to have some company.

Dinner was a leg of lamb roasted in the camp oven along with a selection of vegetables. Beauty! 

Saturday was pretty much a repeat of Friday although a little more targeted as we headed up into the high points of the Scenic Rim. We couldn't believe how damned cold it was up there, but it is a spectacular place to visit as the pics below show.

This is one of Karen with Bruce as we were half way up the caldera rim (the Scenic Rim is actually an ancient volcano) 

Travelling down the other side we turned off the main road and headed down the Condamine River Road. The pic below shows the road heading into the gorge where we enjoyed the change in scenery and vegetation caused by the fact we were then in a sheltered gorge. There are fourteen river crossings to negotiate, but none of them are difficult. 

There are no pictures as it was difficult to stop anywhere due to the volume of traffic - every 4WD club in the area and lots of solo travellers had decided to visit the gorge that day and there were queues to cross the river at each crossing and people zipping back and forth.

Too many damned people. A gorgeous place though - if you visit then do so mid week. 

The road pops you out at Killarney (there must have been a lot of Irish settlers around this area) and we rejoined the main road heading back to Rathdowney.

Along the way we came across a few waterfalls and at each point where we were allowed to stop (some were in National Parks and Bruce was not welcome) we parked up and went for a walk. 

The first stop was at Brown's Falls.

As you can see from the sign, it is only a 600 metre walk each way, but they do say it is only for able bodied people.

What they don't say is that the walk is actually up the creek bed so you have to hop and climb from rock to rock to work your way up there. Bruce just loved it (yes, he went swimming again) but my knees didn't appreciate it so much. 

This pic shows the first little waterfall along the way and Karen working her way up one side of it. Bruce is already up an on the opposite side.

Eventually you reach the falls themselves which are high and beautiful. Once again, the lack of water made them less spectacular, but they are still worth seeing. The best view I could get was through a hole in the tree canopy.

By the time we got back we were both stuffed, but happy to have done it.

The next falls were Daggs Falls which brought to mind Brad Pitt's character in the movie "Snatch" where he asks "D'you like daggs?".

Well Bruce liked it anyway! 

These falls are also high and beautiful -From above they are spectacular with the two step fall that is not visible from below. 

We headed back to the van for dinner and to slump into a well deserved sleep.

Home the next day!