We left lightning ridge and passed over the QLD border at Hebel where we looked at the old pub with John Murray drawings on it.
The loos were Man goes And No man goes which was a new variation to describe loos ,I hadn’t seen before and I was amused!!
The history of the town was on display in the towns park and heritage circle .
There has been famous poets and runners from this area and it was also thought to have had the Kelly brothers pass through here after they were thought dead, a bit far fetched !!
We drove through to St George but couldn’t get a van site for the night and all the free camps were closed, apparently there is a big dirt car bash on the weekend. So we had a quick look around the river and town and stopped by the Barwon river for lunch, looked at the bridge and weir which had just opened the flood gates to let water through and took a picture of the big cod. We will have to return another time to this town.
So we drove onto the Nindigully pub which offers a free camp by the river. We caught two blue claw yabbies much bigger than the ones in Cobar, went for a walk near the river and had dinner at the pub. The pub is said to be the oldest pub still trading in QLD built in 1864.
The next day we moved south towards the NSW border to Mungindi for a swim in the hot artesian bath and then a cool off in the pool. Mungindi is half in NSW and half in QLD. Other than the swim we didnt feel inspired to stay here.
On the way we stopped briefly for a photo of the silo art and wombat in Thallon
Then after lunch on to Goondiwindi for two nights
On the way John found a bare paddock and trialled his drone, happy with its performance and picture quality.
The drive along this bumpy hwy showed lots of cotton farms and sorghum and where there wasn’t farms the bush was inundated in prickly pear which continued all the way towards Stanthorpe. We were surprised that it was not being poisoned or controlled in some way, being the pest it was in years gone by.
While in Goondiwindi we did a tour of the cotton farms which in good years is grown extensively here with Sorghum often grown as well in years when they cant get there full water allocation for the cotton crops. This water comes from the whole Murray-darling basin an extensive river system that includes many rivers including the McIntyre here at Goondiwinni. In all the MacIntyre-Barwon-Darling -Murry river system is 3370 kms in length, making it the longest river system in Australia.
This was followed by a look at the custom house museum, a walk along the McIntyre River to the bridge, the tree of knowledge and the statue of Gunsynd, the famous race horse which came from this area in the early 1970’s.
Then after lunch at the historic Victoria hotel it was shopping for me and van cleaning while John played with the new drone.
Next we headed to Stranthrope via Lake Coolamunda where we had hope to stay but are moving onwards to Brisbane for a car service before the car reaches 100,00kms.
It was a lovely stop for morning tea and John took the drone for its first official fly over, see attached.
Stranthorpe
A pretty town with a lovely Central Park and creek behind the info centre. Stanthorpe is in the middle of the granite belt so lots of boulders everywhere. There are plenty of shops and some lovely old buildings plus a huge thermometer next to the info centre and the lookout overlooks the town and out to the mountains.
The next day we had planned to have a day trip to Giraween National Parks and do some walks but it was raining and rained for days afterwards.
So we took ourselves to lunch at the Granite belt brewery after some shopping and took a drive out around the townships of Amiens and Thulimbah.
Stopping at the Stanthorpe cheese and purchasing some cheese and later taking a pic of the big Apple near the fruit orchards and Suttons cider and juice finished the day off nicely, pleased to go back to the van and be out of the rain.
The next day we headed off to Brisbane via Warwick where we stopped to print out the papers on the sale of Anja, now signed and emailed back. The sale of Anja and our dream of living on a barge in France every year, destroyed by Covid.
