NSW Dismissed

Well, we left Canberra with some unexpected regret. It has been a great town to visit and we have both learned and enjoyed a lot.

We headed on up the Hume Highway to visit some friends of ours in Camden (Hiya Tracey & Colin) - people we met in Darwin and people that we have always liked. Camden is a much more rural place than I expected and the town itself is nice and friendly sized.

They have recently moved to the town from Darwin so our dinner out at the Camden Valley Inn was a voyage of discovery for all of us.

A good meal and great company - thanks guys!

Leaving Camden we decided to skip Sydney completely. We have lived there and we don't like it that much. Too much the big city for these country cousins. However, the road system has improved since we were there though with the M7/M2 providing an easy way to drive around the city. For what its worth, this leg of the trip gave us the best fuel consumption we have seen - we used 14.3 litres every 100klms and we were towing the HTC for 99.9% of the drive. That compares to mid 15s most of the time.

Anyway, having skipped Sydney we decided to head up to Crowdy Bay and camp out at Diamond Head. 

Of course when we got there, with it still being NSW school holidays, we found the place wall to wall tents and screaming kids so we wandered off to the next place along the Bay - Indian Head where we found a deserted campsite and we set up there for a few nights.

Nice place as you can see:

Lots of wild life wandering around including the biggest kookaburras we have ever seen. Cheeky too!

The walk along the clifftops from headland to headland was pretty spectacular too and this pic of the "Natural Arch" shows just one great spot.

As we approached the beach at Diamond Head we saw vehicles on the beach (eat your hearts out Victorians) and we wandered around checking out the headland itself and the "Split Rock". Lovely stuff, but it did start to look cloudy.

Cloudy - hmm. In fact, the weather turned really wet and foul and we decided to get out of there before the roads closed or we washed away. The coast was just sodden so we decided to head inland to drive the Waterfall Way from Urunga to Bellingen to Dorrigo to Ebor and on to Armidale and hope that the weather would improve with the storms staying coastal.

No such luck. After seeing a couple of waterfalls from the comfort of the Troll (and watching waterfalls cascading off our roof rack) we chose to head off to the Cathedral Rock Nat Park and camp out there and see if the next day was any better.

Well, the next day was indeed better, at least in the morning, and we got to walk out to the Ebor Falls on the Guy Fawkes River. Pretty sectacular after the rain as I am sure you will agree.

I wonder who threw the bike in there though? Anyone spot it?

Walking as little further on we came to a second viewing platform where we could see both the upper and lower falls, but by this time it was raining again and we headed back to the Troll,

Before we left I took this pic of the hills cloaked in mist and rain - looks pretty, but it is damp and horrible really.

With soggy feet we headed north again, hoping to escape the downpours and by the time we reached Brooms Head the sun was shining and the day looked lovely.

We spent the afternoon drying out the soggy stuff and then we walked the kilometre to the Bowls Club for tea. Tea was good (they have a Chinese restaurant there) but by the time we wanted to head back the rain was with us again. The club loaned us a couple of umbrellas (thanks guys) but as even the road was under 2 inches of water we got soggy feet again.

The storms lasted all night and the next morning so we thought "Stuff NSW, we're off to QLD" and we headed north to the Gold Coast where it is dry and warm and lovely.

At least for now.