Adventures with Tug’n Joey

Wednesday We started our day with a peaceful hour cruising the Darling on board the PV Jandra. The original Jandra was a paddle steamer built in 1894 which was used to transport provisions, materials, mail, wool etc, up and down the Darling. The current vessel was built in 2000 for tourism. Apparently last years season was non-existent due to a lack of water in the river. The  cruise took us under the North Bourke Bridge which was opened in May 1883 and is Australia’s oldest movable span bridge. All the parts were built overseas and transported by paddlesteamer. Understandably, seeing the timbers from below, it is no longer in use. After stocking our little esky and collecting the key from the tourist office we dro ve out the Louth road to the Fort Bourke Stockade  The Fort Bourke Stockade is a re-creation of the stockade built by Major Thomas Mitchell as a depot and point of defence. It was the first and only fort erected by explorers in Australia. From here the first Europea...

On a day when we were supposed to be flying to Western Australia we found ourselves still in Lightning Ridge. We had finally been notified on Saturday that the flight was cancelled and Virgin are offering credits which can be used up to June 2023. Welcome news as I thought we had said goodbye to that money. We began our day with a visit the the Chambers of the Black Hand. After masking up we made our way down in to the mine via the stairs...which also turned out to be the way out! The Mine is a labyrinth of tunnels full of carvings. Twenty odd years ago a miner, Ron Canlin, realised he wasn’t going to make his fortune finding opals and began to carve Australian animals in the soft sandstone walls. Over the years his skills and repertoire have expanded greatly and now the carvings cover many religions and other themes. From here it was a short drive to Lunatic Hill Open Cut which came about after it became so full of tunnels that it was felt to be safer to mine this way. Australian auth...

Sunday I had been advised that the birds out here stayed in bed until around 9...but I think they must have set their alarm clocks early. We visited the Parrot Ponds, which were sadly lacking in parrots although I did get a good view of a flock of Cockatiels and a pair of Diamond Doves. Today we decided to complete the Orange Car Door Circuit. This took us in to the Grawin area about 50kms from Lightning Ridge. The first stop was at the Club in the Scrub, a registered sports club, which has been built by locals over the years.  Being Sunday they were gearing up for their raffles, weekly members draw and an afternoon of live music. After a cool beverage, and not tempted by a round of golf we moved on. Our next stop was the Glengarry Hilton...time for another drink, this time with lunch. I think it didn’t matter if you ordered spring roll, chiko roll or any other roll they were all the same! An interesting fact we picked up here was that the miners can’t live underground here, as the...

It was a relief to to have this trips departure, free of issues! In fact on the eve of our departure we received the pottery we created at the Pilliga Pottery on our previous trip in June. It is obvious mine have a ‘rustic’ feel to them while Michael’s may have the makings of a post-retirement hobby. After a comfortable night in the now completed Lismore Lodgings we were away from Lismore with no problems. A fairly ordinary day retracing our steps to Inverell. When the radio reception ran out we filled the time with a Conversation with Richard Fidler and Stan Grant. What an amazing achievement for a young man who had everything against him really. A short stop for lunch at Deepwater at Michaels favourite bakery before continuing on to Inverell. The recent rain has made an incredible difference to the landscape with some vibrant colours. After settling in to the campground it was time to stretch the legs around Lake Inverell. The lake has twice as much water as in January and the area i...