White Cliffs Outback NSW to Charleville Outback QLD

Monday 5^th May 2014 to Wednesday 25^th May 2014

When we left Menindee, we wanted to travel the Darling River Route to White Cliffs but the road was too bad, so we had to go back into Broken Hill. That gave us an opportunity to do some food shopping in preparation for the next part of the journey. We were looking forward to this because we are now on the way to visit places we’ve never been to. After completing the shopping and refuelling we headed out on the Barrier Highway towards Wilcannia. We stopped overnight at Spring Hill roadside stop, before continuing on to White Cliffs.

White Cliffs has the distinction of being Australia’s first commercial opal field. Opals were found in this region as early as 1884 but not a great deal of interest was shown in this gem until around 1889. By 1990 White Cliffs opal was available in the Britain, USA and Europe Markets.  This unique area is famous for the White Cliiffs PINEAPPLES, an Ikaite crystal cluster which has opalised, and is only found at White Cliffs.

We stayed at the Pioneer Tourist Park, which is a small but clean and friendly site, where we could enjoy a fire at night. From here we could fossick in Potch Gully for opal. Some of us found bits that look pretty but of course with no real value. The fun is in the trying and putting a bit in a little test tube to show off what was found is satisfying. We did the Red Earth Mine Opal mine tour where we ventured underground and saw the old timers diggings and a modern day working opal mine. It was very interesting. We went to the underground Hotel/Motel and had a brew in the underground bar and fossicked around in some of the Opal Shops. We had beautiful warm and sunny daytime temperatures and warm fires each night.

After White Cliffs, Lynette and Peter left us to head home. It was great spending a few weeks with them and we were sorry to them go. We headed to Wilcannia to fuel up for the trip to Cobar. While we were there we had a walk around the town. It is a very sad looking town with most old buildings boarded up and only a few heritage buildings intact.  Wilcannia is not known as a tourist attraction but only a stop for fuel as most people wouldn’t want to stay there. We then moved on to Cobar where we stayed for three nights, and had a sight see around town.

Pineapple cluster at White Cliffs

Around the campfire at White Cliffs

Stunning sunset at White Cliffs

Stunning dusk at White Cliffs

A bit of fossicking at Fossickers Den Opal Shop

The cruiser in the opal fields

Around White Cliffs

A line of opal in the mine

Greg attempting to find his fortune in the mine

This is Anybody's loo.

A small open cut mine at White Cliffs

Hello White Cliffs

A room in the underground Motel

Having a brew in the underground bar with Pete and Lynette

The sign says it all

Fossicking in Potch Gully

Wilcannia heritage

Wilcannia heritage of another kind

Wilcannia again

 

 

Cobar is the copper capital of NSW, it has a rich history of copper mining, but gold, silver and lead have also been extensively mined here. We visited the heritage centre to get some information on what to see and drove around and took some nice photos of Cobar features. We saw the big beer can, the big Cobar mural at the entrance of town. The statue of a miner and old mining equipment in the Mining Heritage Park, the pub with the long veranda and the Fort Bourke Lookout with a view of the open cut gold mine. It was a nice place to visit and I would recommend a stop over here.

Around Cobar

Around Cobar

Open cut gold mine at Cobar

Heritage building at Cobar

The big beer can Cobar

The pub with the long veranda Cobar

Next destination is Bourke, one which has been highly anticipated for a while. One reason is that you haven’t really seen Australia until you’ve been Back O’ Bourke and the other reason is we were meeting up with some old friends here. Ian and Cheryl Blair and John Blair from Melbourne, met us in Bourke and we spent a couple of days with them and enjoyed every moment. We stayed out at Kidmans Camp about ten kilometres from town. It is a really lovely camp on green, grassy sites with excellent facilities. There was plenty to see and do in Bourke and we had a lot of fun discovering it all.

We booked the Premium Package which gave us access to The Back O‘ Bourke Exhibition Centre, The Outback Show, the PV Jandra and the Mateship Tour. Firstly we did the Outback Show which is a one man show. Luke Thomas gave an excellent show with his Working Bullocks, Clydesdale Horses, Talking Camels, Performing Trick Horses and his Sheep Dogs. He worked very hard to provide over an hour of entertainment in true outback style. It was very entertaining. That afternoon we took a ride on the replica paddle vessel the PV Jandra. It is a locally built vessel and we enjoyed a one hour cruise on the Darling River.

That night Kidmans Camp hosted Poetry on a Plate. Andrew Hull is a local lad who recites contemporary poetry with a good mixture of humour, wit and tragedy. He had us laughing and crying with his recitals. It was a great night around the campfire with a camp oven dinner and dessert as well. The next day after we sadly said goodbye to the Blairs, we went to have a look at the Exhibition Centre, which is a magnificent history of Bourke. They have done a wonderful job of presenting an interesting insight into the history of the area and its people.

In the afternoon we had a two hour tour with Mateship Tours of a lime farm, an orange farm, a cotton farm and a cotton gin, as well as a tour around the general vicinity of Bourke. We were able to pick oranges from an orange grove which is sadly closing down due to drought conditions and poor return.  The very interesting commentary was provided by the bus driver Stuart who has a long history in Bourke which was evident by his knowledgeable stories of real events and history.

Greg and I drove out to the cemetery to see where Fred Hollows was buried. Fred, a native New Zealander and inspirational eye surgeon, did a lot of work in the Outback for many communities and wanted to be buried in the area. The locals have commemorated him by building a wonderful gravestone. We drove around town and took in some of the historic buildings, the old Crossley Engine and the old Wharf. Bourke is an extremely interesting town and one I would very highly recommend a visit to.

The outback Show

The outback Show

Pelicans on the Darling

A flotilla of Pelicans on the Darling

The Darling River reflections from the PV Jandra

Enjoying Poetry on a Plate

The old Bourke Courthouse

The old Bourke Post Office

The park at the Wharf

Underneath the Wharf

Beautiful heritage house Bourke

Cotton farm

Welcome to Bourke

Picking oranges at Bourke

At the Cotton Gin

Part of the Outback Show

The Outback Show

Bullocks at the Outback Show

The PV Jandra

Enjoying the PV Jandra

The old Bourke bridge

Time to leave Bourke and head into outback Queensland, but not before getting new tyres on the van and having the Cruiser tyres rotated. We received excellent service from Crossroads Tyre Service who managed to do this within an hour on the morning we left Bourke.
 

Hello Queensland. Not long into our journey we crossed the border into Queensland on our way to Cunnamulla. Cunnamulla is on the banks of the Warrego River and we travelled just four kilometres out of town to set up camp for the night at Alan Tannock Weir on the Warrego. It was a lovely spot for a free camp, right on the water and we had a roaring fire that night as we watched the full moon rising.

Welcome to our sunny weather

 

Full moon at Cunnamulla

 

The Cunnamulla Fella

 

Around Cunnamulla

 

Around Cunnamulla

The next day we drove back into to Cunnamulla to see the sights they had to offer and do a bit of shopping. We took photos of the Cunnamulla Fella which sits on a pedestal to welcome visitors to the town. It was created to honour characters that have passed through, set up camp, worked and wandered this country. Slim Dusty and Stan Coster wrote the song ‘Cunnamulla Fella’. We had a wander through town, spent some money and then had lunch in the pub before heading off to our next stop Eulo.

Eulo is a small community on the banks of the Paroo River. We camped on the banks of the river only one kilometre out of town and again it was a perfect night with a fire overlooking the river. The next day on our way to Yowah we had a walk through town, visited an Art and Opal shop and a craft shop, had look at the old Air Raid Shelter and took some nice photos of the town.

Eulo Art Shop

The lizard racing track Eulo

The air raid shelter Eulo

 

Next stop for a couple of nights was the Yowah Opal fields. We stayed at the Artesian Waters Caravan Park, which is the only one in this very small town. They do have free camping close by, but we had heard the managers of the park are doing such a great job that it is worthwhile to stay there. We were not disappointed. Colin and Georgina who run the park were affected by the fires at Marysville in 2009 and then travelled up to Yowah to take over the park. They have hot artesian bore baths on the property, which are said to be like a multi vitamin for the skin. This couple have made a huge difference to this little town and offer a free tour of the town which takes you up to the Bluff for magnificent views of the surrounding country, through the town, around all the mine sites and a personal tour of Colin’s own mine. They made us fish and chips for lunch for an extremely reasonable price and showed us an array of the beautiful opals they have found and made into jewellery. Georgina gave us all a different postcard of the area and a small test tube each of colourful little opals as we were leaving. This couple are very hardworking, very generous and do a lot for the community. You must stay here if you are ever up this way.

The toilet block at the Caravan Park Yowah

The Artesian bath cubicles Yowah

The baths

The Caravan Park entry

Sunset at the Bluff

Sunset at the Bluff

 

View from the Bluff

 

Our next destination was Quilpie to do the much anticipated Outback Mail Run.  On the way there we stopped at Toompine, which is a delightful pub with a lot of history. Toompine is about 80 kilometres south of Quilpie.  It is known not as the pub with no beer but as the pub with no town. It used to be an opal mining town but after the miners abandoned their prospects, the town all but closed down. Now there is only three residents: the Pub owner, a backpacker and the pub manager. They get a lot of tourists call in, as we did to enjoy a brew and some great photo opportunities.

Toompine Pub

Toompine War Memorial

Me at the Toompine Pub

Back to Quilpie; it was an early 6:45am start to our mail run day, which is the earliest we have been up to go anywhere for a long time. The sun hadn’t yet risen, but we were looking forward to the day. This journey on a 12 seater 4WD bus took us on 400km trip that was very interesting and eye opening. We delivered mail to 10 stations, had smoko and a tour of one of them and a lovely lunch at another. Along the way we saw lots of wildlife, this is the real outback people and it didn’t disappoint. Alaric Station is now a retreat for Vietnam veterans and is set up really well for that purpose. This is an outback experience that, along with the flies, would be very relaxing. We had smoko here and were able to wander through the homestead at our leisure. For lunch we called in at Trinidad Station, to enjoy the hospitality of Margaret Peglar and have a look around her property which she has been on since 1958. Her garden has been featured on a Garden Tour show and although at 80 years old, she can’t maintain it as well as she used to, it is still very pretty. There is a plane wreck on her property from a crash back in 1984. Margaret witnessed the crash through her kitchen window and sent her sons to investigate. Surprisingly, especially after you see the wreck; the pilot died but three passengers survived. We also saw some stations that have now closed down or have been abandoned and it is quite sad to see these old places in derelict condition. It was a very long day, but a journey that taught us quite a bit about the outback and the people of the area. The last stop at Thylungra station to have a look at the old shearing sheds was run by the very famous Durack family who drove their cattle all the way up to Kununurra in WA. They were pioneers of the district and their history is amazing.

The caravan park we stayed in at Quilpie has three artesian spa baths and we made the most of this relaxing activity after our big day out. Quilpie itself is a nice little town, with a few points of interest, including St Finbarr’s Church which has a magnificent opal altar, lectern and font. The war memorial is in a nice little park and has a mural depicting World War II activities.

The Outback mail run

The outback mail run

The loo at Alaric

The garden at Alaric

Alaric homestead

Homestead looking at the campfire area

Old shearing shed at Alaric

The Dingo fence along the outback mail run route

Trinidad station

The plane wreck at Trinidad

Derelict windmill and tank along the way

Derelict house on an old station

Welcome to Thylungra

On the way in to Thylungra

In the shearing shed at Thylungra

Shearers messages on a wall in the shearing shed

Greg and I in the shearing shed

Greg and I on the bus

Quilpie main street

Mural in Quilpie

Old water tank at Quilpie

The old hotel at Quilpie

Butterfly at Quilpie

Opal Lectern at St Finbarrs

At the Caravan Park



Spa baths at the Caravan Park

 

Charleville is our next destination with the Cosmos Centre being on top of the list to see.

First we had a look around town; we had a look at the Graham Andrews Park, where there is a pretty little lake and the famous Vortex Rainmaking Guns. These were built when Queensland was in the grip of a terrible drought in 1902 with the belief the explosion could change the atmospheric pressure and produce rain. Not surprisingly it didn’t work but it makes a great outback story. We visited the Historic House Museum, which used to be a bank and is one of only a few Queenslanders left in Charleville that wasn’t affected by flood of burnt down by fire. There have some great displays here with some quirky items and a wonderful history of the town. This rates as one of best museums we have been to.

 The Cosmos Centre, which offers four different experiences, has the mantra ‘Be Amazed” and we certainly were.  We chose the observatory session to see the outback night sky in all its glory. We had huge Mead telescopes for viewing and learnt a lot about the stars including being able to see the shapes between the stars. Those black bits of space offer some amazing shapes and now we can recognise them. The highlight though, was seeing the Saturn and the rings of Saturn through the telescope, it was simple amazing.

Windmill in the park at Charleville

The lake in the park Charleville

Rainmaking Vortex Guns

Pub at Charleville

Historical house museum Charleville

Part of the display at the museum

 

Unfortunately we weren't allowed cameras at the Cosmos Centre, so I am unable to supply you with any photos of that amazing experience. But I  hope you have enjoyed the rest of it.  

After leaving Charleville, we had one overnight stop on the Barcoo River and we stopped at some gorgeous towns on the way to Longreach where we are at the moment. We will be leaving Longreach tomorrow to head for Winton, Cloncurry, Gregory Downs, Lawn Hill, Normanton and then Karumba. We will be in Karumba from 12^th June for about five days, so I will post my next blog after that part of the journey.

Cheers til next time.